Authors

Discussion

Despite myths that economic migration has a positive “modernizing” effect on countries of origin (Schiller and Faist 2011), not only materially but also culturally and politically (Levitt 1998), newer studies have shown that transnational work is linked to a form of exploitation and domination of peripheral countries by developed states (Ness 2023). This geopolitical power imbalance contributes to the consolidation of the dependence of countries affected by the post-communist transition on foreign capital (Ban 2014). Recently, the Romanian diaspora has become increasingly disillusioned with both European measures to manage migration and the political situation in their homeland. The diaspora's disenchantment has not resulted in a critique of the neoliberal policies which created this socio-political predicament, but towards nationalism or even a backlash against “coerced cosmopolitanism”. A clear expression of this nationalist drive is captured in the 2024 European Parliament election results from diaspora: almost 30% of votes were won by far-right parties A.U.R. and S.O.S., which exceeded the number of votes for other political formations (Romanian Central Electoral Bureau 2024). I believe that this illiberal tendency of the transnational working class is reflected in the migration literature of post-communist Romania. Moreover, such an analysis of migration literature showcases a disciplinary gap—a lack of theoretical tools to explain the complex interaction between ideological narratology (Dwivedi et al. 2019, Rogozanu 2024), class consciousness (Baghiu and Olaru 2024), and the metahistorical aspects of these writers’ work. Focusing on less recognized figures in the local literary scene—Liliana Nechita, Ingrid Beatrice Coman-Prodan, Lilia Bicec-Zanardelli, and Valeria Mocănașu—this presentation argues that, while often dismissed as structurally simplistic, their works address critical, urgent issues. These authors’ primary narratives center on labor migration to Italy, particularly their firsthand encounters with the transnational care industry, while a secondary corpus reflects on a nostalgic ‘prosthetic memory’ (Landsberg 2004) of Romania’s communist or pre-communist eras, from Ceaușescu’s late socialism to early Soviet deportations and the interwar ‘golden age’ of Romanian capitalism. By examining how these narratives blend life writing with historical reflection and memory with ‘postmemory’ (Hirsch 2012), this presentation explores two facets of contemporary migration literature: (1) these authors’ difficulty in recognizing their labor roles within a transnational class system due to a Cold War narrative framing that leans on anticommunist and developmentalist perspectives; and (2) the populist frameworks they use to interpret the historical and geopolitical forces behind the post-communist transition, often leading them to nostalgic, nationalist conclusions.