This article summarizes author's experience during anthropological fieldwork among the Polish established community in London in the years 2002-2004. Using conceptual framework set up by Robin Cohen, the author tries to answer why Polish Diaspora in UK failed to capitalize on the 'diasporisation' processes that according to Cohen are strongly intertwined with globalisation. Power relations within the community, old émigrés identity characteristics and social construction of a meaningful boundary that separates them from the 'other' in the form of newly arrived post-1989 migrants are put as a most possible answer. The example of the Polish community in UK is a proof that civic and political participation of ethnic minorities cannot be discussed without careful studying the internal history of migration waves and power relations within the community.