Communism, between condemnation and nostalgia

The government and the Institute for the Investigation of the Crimes of Communism and the Memory of the Romanian Exile are preparing a plan to raise people's awareness of the crimes of communism in Romania.

Roxana Vasile, 24.12.2025, 14:00

For Romanians contemporary with the anti-communist Revolution of 1989, December is not only the month of the Winter Holidays, but also the month in which they remember the historical events they experienced firsthand.
After more than 40 years of communist rule, between December 16 and 25, 1989, Romania became the last country in the totalitarian East European bloc, in which the regime ruled with an iron fist by Nicolae and Elena Ceaușescu collapsed in the sound of bullets and the smell of gunpowder. Romanians said “no” to dictatorship, agricultural collectivization, severe austerity, shortages, the cult of personality or the omnipresent control of the political police of the time. It was to be the bloodiest anti-communist revolution in Eastern Europe – over a thousand dead and more than 4 thousand injured. It culminated with the escape of the dictatorial couple, their capture, conviction and execution by shooting on Christmas Day.

36 years later, a survey conducted by INSCOP Research in partnership with the Institute for the Investigation of the Crimes of Communism and the Memory of Romanian Exile (IICCMER) indicates a huge gap between the historical reality of the communist regime and current public perception. More precisely, a large part of Romanians today idealize that period, despite the historical facts. Almost 50% of the survey participants believe that life was better in Romania before 1989. 66% of Romanians believe that Nicolae Ceaușescu was a good leader, although the regime committed serious acts and generated major social problems. The phenomenon is particularly pronounced among vulnerable groups, economically and socially dissatisfied, in the context of the lack of effective public policies and an educational vacuum regarding history, the study shows.

However, in order to reconnect society to the memory of recent history and to the fundamental values of freedom and democracy, the memory of the anti-communist Revolution of 1989 must, first of all, be defended. Forgetting what happened then would mean a moral crime, said the former president of Romania between 1996 and 2000, Emil Constantinescu, at the symposium “The Fall of the Berlin Wall, Echoes and Influences in Eastern Europe”, recently held in the martyr city of Timișoara. Emil Constantinescu: ʺWe, who are perhaps the last survivors, are called to answer a fundamental question: how was it possible that the universal ideals of truth and justice, the foundation for which huge crowds fought at the cost of their lives, were replaced by the current society, which can be defined as a society of lies and interests? The answer can only be found by reconsidering the recent history of Europe born at a moment of rupture in world history, in 1989-1990. I firmly state that denying, falsifying, diminishing and, ultimately, forgetting the historical importance of the December 1989 Revolution is a huge moral crime.ʺ

The former head of state emphasised the vulnerabilities of current democracy that fuel nostalgia for the totalitarian era: ʺAfter integration into the European Union, there were also several unexpected and unpleasant involutions that distorted the freedom won in December – the emergence of a trend towards authoritarian or populist political regimes, the replacement of the real economy with the speculative one, the worsening of manipulation through mass media and social networks, the establishment of a society of lies… After 36 years since the fall of the Berlin Wall, a symbol of the division between East and West, we are forced to note that democracy is fragile and vulnerable in the face of Russian aggression in Ukraine, which establishes the use of the right of force against the force of law, which is the guarantee of freedom.ʺ

The current president of the country, Nicușor Dan, believes that ʺthe main reason why more and more Romanians idealize communism is the deep disappointment with the political class over the past three decades. Corruption, lack of transparency, broken promises and a sense of injustice have weakened people’s trust in the present and the future,” he says. The false image of the communist period is also maintained by disinformation campaigns, which try to undermine democratic values and offer a beautifully packaged past, while hiding the truth about repression, fear, hunger and lack of freedom. Therefore, in the vision of President Nicușor Dan, “in order to keep democracy alive and relevant, we must firmly combat disinformation, restore people’s trust through correct public policies and build a society in which justice, equity and real development are felt by all citizens.”

In a very concrete way, British professor Dennis Deletant, a specialist in Romanian history, claims that, in order for today’s young people, who did not experience the horrors of communism firsthand, to know the past as it really was, there is a need, among other things, for a museum of communism: “There must be a museum, because a lot of people know, especially those of my generation, what communism meant for Romania and how it continues to influence the mentality of many people. I often go to villages in Romania and talk to people who have their own grievances, especially pensioners, and it strikes me that they only know scraps of the history of communism. They are certainly thinking about the food situation and how difficult it was before from this point of view. But they like the fact that it was a certainty – even if the situation was bad, the future was assured and many people, I noticed, talking to them, are bothered by this uncertainty of the future.ʺ

Since education is, therefore, paramount, a national plan for raising awareness of the crimes of communism in Romania will be implemented next year. The document, currently being worked on at the level of the Prime Minister’s Chancellery, also aims at the appropriate training of history teachers to correctly convey information related to the period preceding the December 1989 Revolution.