Authors

Victor Rizescu¹;  ¹ University of Bucharest, Romania

Discussion

The paper approaches the problem of the connections between the pressures of delayed development and the drive to authoritarianism in Romania, over the decades predating the installation of communism, with references to both the more distant and the more recent periods in the history of the country. The authoritarian temptation is studied not only along the layer of politics, but also as an integral part of the overall social dynamic, present as such within various interdependent segments of it and being promoted by social actors of different categories. The central thread of the research stretches, nevertheless, along the layer of the connection between ideological patterns and public policies, being sustained by the effort of dissociating between strong and the mild versions of the authoritarian solutions emerged as part of the process of modernisation.