Romania/ 1. Historical perspective: cultural policies and instruments  

From 1945 until 1989 and with a few short periods of relapse (1965-1971), Romania was the theatre for one of the most refined and detailed totalitarian experiments in Eastern Europe. Naturally, culture was one of the most affected fields, as the state grip on individual private lives and collective mentalities alike was totalitarian.

In 1948, a new regime was installed, the People's Republic, which was progressively placed under the single rule of the Romanian Communist Party. During the years 1948-1949, all the other traditional political parties were brutally disbanded and most of their leaders imprisoned. As a member of Kominform*, COMECON and the Warsaw Pact in the economic and military / strategic fields, Romania started to implement the socialist Zhdanov (cultural) Doctrine at the domestic level. This Doctrine prescribed a blind obedience of all the actors in cultural life towards the new regime, correlated with state control of the whole "cultural chain", from budgetary resources and printing facilities, for example, to the very content of cultural products that had to be adapted and aligned to the new, Soviet directed standards**.

All media, including television, was placed under close censorship, both through the presence of political propaganda by specialised departments and through the close monitoring of the content of all forms of media.

This firm grasp on cultural and creative life was accompanied by the progressive multiplication of various administrative entities and structures such as the Propaganda Secretariat of the Communist Party Central Committee and the National Council of Socialist Education and Culture (NCSEC). The public authority pyramid system was reinforced by the political hierarchy, in close communication and often using the same human and management resources. Therefore, repression of any attempt at underground culture or challenges had increasingly been effective and immediate.

There was a short détente, mainly highlighted by propaganda coups (for example related to the visit of some foreign leaders to Romania, such as Charles de Gaulle in 1968 and Richard Nixon in 1969). However, in 1971, a new national cultural programme was introduced, known as "the July Platform", which was clearly inspired by the Maoist "Cultural Revolution". Thus, a new wave of repression began with culture. Brutally and implacably, Romania entered its "cultural dark ages"; a result of Nicolae Ceausescu's extreme personality. There was an almost complete lack of communication and circulation of cultural goods and values to, and from, the Western World and renewed repression towards artists.

Romania's progress cannot be fully understood and evaluated without taking into account the mutation process in the field of collective mentalities in general, namely of culture and cultural policies in particular. In contrast to the dereliction and negative control of the whole system and political behaviour before 1989, the 1990s presented a frantic and sometimes incoherent succession of trends.

No less than seven different Ministers of Culture took office between 1990 and 1996, in an attempt to steer the course of reforms in the field adequately and coherently. However, contradictory inspirations, resistance of old structures and habits and sometimes a lack of initiative and political backup, coupled with a progressive devaluation of culture's rank in the national budgetary system, reduced the steady pace of change. 1996 marked the arrival to governmental affairs of the Romanian Democratic Convention, a coalition of liberals, social-democrats and Christian-democrats. Significant steps towards pragmatism were made in the cultural field.

The problems related to the cultural structures, and patterns of public policies, are mainly the confusion between the welfare mission of the state and the modern meaning of its role. Therefore, under the impetus of the Council of Europe, a first evaluation review was organised in 1998 to draft clear instruments and criteria for public cultural policies, adapted to the local context, yet coherent with current European standards.

The second, this time domestic, pressure factor was civil society. More specialised structures (e.g. Ecumest) started to appear in a domestic scene which had been dominated for a long time by generalist NGO "holdings", such as the Soros Open Society Network. Their public impact is far more pragmatic and specifically targeted to the real needs of cultural life. Thus, NGOs started to provide an articulated framework for grants, in order to develop local pilot projects of public interest, public awareness and transparency.

Under these symmetrical pressures, the structures of the Ministry of Culture and Religious Affairs (MoCRA) had to evolve, in terms of increased transparency and cooperation, as well as meeting the needs of the stakeholders in the domains of policy and decision- making.

Until 1997, the drafting of public cultural policies was exclusively realised on a closed circuit basis, which included MoCRA's civil servants and those responsible to the Ministry. In 1997, a Consultative Council of the Ministry was set up, with the regular participation of representatives of relevant stakeholders.

In 2001, several Regional Cultural Forums were organised, which analysts considered to be similar to the negative NCSEC precedent. The whole debate was largely characterised by civil society as classic post-electoral "lip-service".

In the autumn of 2005, the new popular liberal coalition, The Justice and Truth Alliance, brought a new, increasingly transparent vision of public cultural policies. MoCRA has ceased to be a mere cultural operator, administering and distributing public funds and organizing events. It aims to complete the transfer of its competencies related to the financing of cultural programmes and events to arm's length bodies, such as the recently reorganised National Cultural Fund.

* The international structure of Communist parties for media and culture

** The Zhdanov Doctrine is also known as "socialist realism".