Abstract
Reviewed by: Călin Morar-Vulcu, Institute of Oral History, Babeș-Bolyai University Cluj-Napoca, Romania
This book attempts to offer a history of post-war Romania dealing not only with the communist period, which has been relatively well covered in recent English language scholarship, but also with the last two and a half decades of post-communism. The book’s author, Florin Abraham – senior researcher at the National Institute for the Study of Totalitarianism in Bucharest and author of several books on totalitarianism, the politics of post-communist Romania and Romanian foreign policy – is well-positioned for such a task.
The part of the book devoted to the communist regime is informative and well structured, if succinct (it makes up one third of the total book). Attention is paid to the political architecture of the regime and to its repressive side, but also to its strategies of economic and social transformation and to their impact upon the life of the population. Abraham provides a complex and nuanced account of how this regime evolved from being a Soviet instrument in the late 1940s and 1950s to its ‘indigenization’ in the 1960s, before ending as universally loathed in 1989. Abraham contends that, in economic terms, although Romania (which was aptly called a ‘dictatorial welfare state’ (76)) achieved important and quick progress, this was unexceptional in the context of the Soviet bloc and development gaps were not closed but grew ever wider towards the 1980s.
Post-communism is the central nucleus of this book. The fall of communism prompted the rebirth of a tumultuous and conflictual political life, which is examined in detail. Abraham devotes particular attention to the political system, describing its structure and evolution, and also to the main political orientations and debates around such topics as institutional reforms, economic strategies or attitudes towards the recent past. The international context is important in the author’s analysis: foreign policy gets ample space and Romanian internal politics is examined in close connection with the external factors influencing and shaping it (shifting geopolitical situation, economic globalization or EU accession). The process of transition is expertly analysed, starting with the immensely controversial process of privatization, dismantling of the welfare state, de-industrialization and ending with the widening social gaps and the dramatic changes in the social fabric. It goes without saying that the emerging picture of post-communism is not one of a linear and optimistically-pursued path towards democracy and prosperity, as had been hoped at the end of the communist regime. The complicated social aspects of this transition are supplemented with a very useful part on demography, delineating the main trends of the last decades, from the pro-natalist policies of Ceaușescu to today’s worrying demographic decline.
The book draws on a rich and diverse bibliography and has a well thought through structure. Contemporary events are always put into historical perspective, thus making it easier to discern continuity and change. Some chapters are chronological, while others are thematic, which allows the author to easily and frequently switch his focus from a bird’s eye perspective to in-depth discussions that straddle disciplinary boundaries and borrow analytic perspectives from political science, economics, law or international relations. This makes the book more than a good introduction to recent Romanian history, and also means that it remains accessible to the non-specialized reader. It is also worth noting the presence of topics not usually tackled in similar works (culture and arts and sport), as well as an appendix containing short biographies of historical personalities.
There are several debatable aspects, too. At times, particularly in the part dealing with post-communist Romanian politics, less-relevant details about events or persons are provided, which are out of place in the broader context of the book. To his credit, the author does not shy away from making judgements based on ethical or legal standards, but he does it slightly inconsistently, treating some problematic events as instances of a ‘normal mechanics of power’ which goes unexamined. For example, while glossing over the constitutional grounds invoked for dismissing President Băsescu in 2007, Abraham explains that his dismissal by the Parliament was a method of ‘consolidating the political position of Mircea Geoană’, the then PSD president (154), which is self-evident, but lacks an interpretive depth. Issue can also be taken with Abraham’s treatment of ethnicity, nationalism and Romania’s policy towards minorities. Nationalism and ethnocentrism tend to be seen as a feature of minority groups only, while the nation – which seems to be understood mainly as an ethnically-defined, organic and even biologically homogeneous entity (301) – is a given constant against which the nationalism of others manifests itself. The failure of some policies towards minorities tends to be imputed exclusively to the minorities themselves (particularly in the case of Roma (286, 294)).
These remarks notwithstanding, this is an informative, well-written and accessible book, which will be of use for a wide range of readers, from scholars and students to the general public.