The 5th World Festival of Youth and Students (WFYS) was held from 31 July to 15 August 1955 in Warsaw, capital city of the then Polish People's Republic.

[1] The World Federation of Democratic Youth organized this festival during the rise of the peaceful coexistence concept introduced by Nikita Khrushchev among the socialist bloc.

[3] Designed to be a vast propaganda exercise, a meeting place for Eastern European communists and their comrades from Western Europe, Asia, Africa, and South America.

This event brought hundred of thousands of Polish spectators to Warsaw for the five days, watching dancing, theater and other attractions.

However, the real attractions for the Polish people were the foreigners, of whom many were from Western Europe and contrasted starkly with local Poles because they shared similar culture but were much richer and more open.