Mark Percival
"The only solution, another revolution," was a favourite slogan in the early 1990s among civic activists bitterly disappointed that Romania's post Ceausescu leadership of former communists were making a mockery of the ideals of those who died for freedom in December 1989. The flourishing of corruption in the last sixteen years, under a political and economic elite with strong roots in Romania's communist past has only served to prove correct the sentiments of those who believed that fundamental change to the power structure had yet to take place. Immediately after December 1989, the communist era hierarchy essentially consolidated its power, quickly eliminating those arguing for real democratic change, by marginalising genuine dissidents in the National Salvation Front as early as January 1990, and then through the brutal suppression of the University Square demonstrations in June of the same year.
Mechanisms of control became far more subtle. Romania's new leadership recognised that it was counter productive to prevent citizens from leaving the country, and thereby incurring international criticism. It was far better from their point of view to let people go, especially since a high proportion of those who left were well educated people who could cause trouble for the regime by staying. A large wave of emigration by intellectuals took place in the aftermath of the suppression of the University Square protests. The media was no longer controlled directly through censorship, but by financial pressure through the granting or withholding of government advertising, as well as numerous other mechanisms.
At the same time, media ownership was dominated by Romania's new economic elite, which had made its wealth through connections with the hierarchy of the former regime, and who had little interest in promoting freedom of the press, but rather in using the media as a tool to promote their business interests. Individual journalists were controlled by financial pressures or incentives, which reward the less scrupulous and severely discriminate against those with real ethics. In recent years, the control exerted by Romania's post-communist economic elite and their networks of patronage in which mediocrities are placed in positions of authority due the compromises they make has if anything appeared to have been strengthened. The wealthy have in many cases multiplied their fortunes, while the rising cost of living has placed increased pressure on many decent citizens who refuse to engage in corrupt practices.
Yet at the same time, and in spite of a general context dominated by the banal, Romania has seen the emergence of a strong new intellectual elite, increasingly in contact with the outside world, fluent in foreign languages and with high standards of professionalism and dedication. Inevitably this new elite expects authority to be based on merit and reacts strongly against mediocrity. This elite can be found in multinational companies, but also increasingly in the media, NGOs and in the arts, where Romania excels internationally in spite of corruption in state funding, which has discriminated against new talent. At present, the economic power of Romania's new intellectual elite compared to the old guard is weak, but over time this will change, particularly as more foreign investment focused on long term development enters the country. Romania's new intellectual elite is increasingly tired of corrupt politicians, of a judiciary which serves interest groups rather than the principle of equality before the law, of a dysfunctional health system, of Kafkaesque public administration, of media outlets which represent interest groups, and of poor and costly services even in the private sector. This new elite will press for change, taking up the call for "a new revolution" which this time will be not be fought by street protests, but by other means such as through NGOs or the formation of new, genuinely representative trade unions. Faced with well organized groups of citizens demanding a society based on the rule of law, ethical standards in public and private life, and a hierarchy based on merit rather than mediocrity, the old structures will inevitably start to crumble, and justice will take its course.
Copyright © 2004-2006 Bucharest Daily News
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