Barcikowski served as head of government negotiations with striking workers in Szczecin in 1980 and was one of four deputy chairmen of the Polish Council of State from 1985 to 1989.

He completed doctoral studies at the Higher School of Social Sciences at the Central Committee of the Polish United Workers' Party.

In the years 1965-1968 deputy head of the Organizational Department of the Central Committee, at the same time editor-in-chief of the magazine "Życie Parti".

In 1980 he became the representative of Poland in the Executive Committee of the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance, in the same year he also became co-chairman of the Joint Commission of the Government and the Episcopate.

He signed the agreement between the government and the Inter-Enterprise Strike Committee, whose chairman in Szczecin was Marian Jurczyk.

In the years 1981-1983 he was a member of the Commission of the Central Committee of the Polish United Workers' Party, established to explain the causes and course of social conflicts in the history of the People's Republic of Poland[3].