The 2024 Romanian Elections: A political earthquake and its aftershocks?

By Dr Daniel Brett, Lecturer in Social and Political Science, UCL SSEES

The first round of the Romanian elections has produced something of a surprising result. The victory by the little known, party-less extreme far right candidate Calin Georgescu has caused a great deal of shock among some Romanians and commentators. However, the result is less surprising than we might think given Romanian politics over the last five years. That the election was won by a member of the far right is unsurprising, that it was Georgescu rather than the more well known AUR (Alliance for the Union of Romanians) leader George Simion is surprising.

Who is Calin Georgescu?

Despite his positioning as an outsider and his lack of a party, he is the ultimate ‘system guy’ having been educated at elite schools in Communist Romania, setting him up well in the early years after Communism for his subsequent career. He is an ultra-nationalist, a conspiracy theorist, his policies are incoherent and bizarre but he is also someone who is very keen to emphasize his own expertise with his frequent mentions of his working at the UN. In a country where parties dominate state and society, his lack of a party is unusual, while much has been made of the role of TikTok in promoting his candidacy, anecdotal evidence from supporters suggests that they became aware of him via traditional media including hearing him on the radio.

A political earthquake and its aftershocks?

Perhaps equally shocking is the failure of the PSD (Social Democratic Party) to reach the second round of the Presidential elections. Their candidate Marcel Ciolacu trailed Elena Lasconi the candidate of USR (Save Romania Union) by a mere 2740 votes out of 9 million votes cast. The PSD and its precursors have contested the second round in every presidential election since the fall of Communism. Likewise the Nicolae Cuică of incumbent President Klaus Iohannis’ PNL (National Liberal Party) trailed in fifth place. The result confounded the polling which, while showing a rise in support for Georgescu, it did not point to his victory.

The reverberations are already being felt with the resignation of PSD leader Marcel Ciolacu on Monday as the results came in. In response to the result, judges at the Constitutional Court (most of whom were appointed by the PSD) have called for a recount which could potentially lead to the results being altered or annulled to get Ciolacu into the second round. This is the second contentious intervention by the Constitutional Court in the election having previously banned Diana Șoșoacă, another far right candidate and leader of the SOS Romania Party. On both occasions the legal rationale for the decisions appears to be weak to say the least.

If the results stand after the recount, Lasconi will challenge Georgescu. USR is a relatively new party, although their candidate came third in the 2019 Presidential elections. It is a party which has sought to position itself as different to the parties that have dominated Romanian politics since 1989.

Thus, the expected run off between Ciolacu and either Simion or Cuica has been overturned and what had been seen as a relatively low stakes presidential election has become an existential one given Georgescu’s attitude towards Romanian democracy and politics and society within the wider region, as well as the behaviour of the Constitutional Court and the PSD. So the question becomes one of how did this come about and what might happen in the second round elections.

How did we end up here? A negligent, complacent and self serving centre

Romanian politics has, since 1989, been marked by an elite that have been more interested in power games and scrabbling for office and the material rewards that it brings to their holders, than in governing the country for its citizens. This has particularly been the case in the last five years, with Klaus Iohannis reaching his term limit, politics has often been nothing more than a series of electoral games as members of the elite try to position themselves to succeed him.

There have been two consequences of this – one political, the other social which has in turn had political repercussions. The vanity and ego of the Romanian political elite has meant that there was an exceptionally crowded field with 14 candidates standing – including the current and two former Prime Ministers (Ciolacu, Cuică and Orban), three former Deputy Prime Ministers (Kelemen, Birchall and Predoiu) and two former foreign ministers (Geoană, Diaconescu). And yet despite this there is relatively little ideological or programmatic difference between the candidates in terms of economic policy or indeed social values. All offering broadly the same mix of social conservativism, nationalism, platitudes about the EU and NATO, and neoliberal economics with lip service to social justice, with the main area of differentiation being the level of social conservatism. This is nicely illustrated by one version of the political compass:

The consequences of choice without choice

The upshot of the culture of political games has been the erosion of support for both the PSD and their main rivals the PNL. The two parties have dominated Romanian politics since 2000, however, it is clear that they have been in gradual decline for some time, this especially true of the PSD that until 2014 was able to poll around 4 million votes consistently in the opening round of the Presidential election.

The lack of ideological variation, and the absence of a left alternative (although REPER are standing in the parliamentary elections) has opened up a window of opportunity for the far right which has been able to position itself as the only alternative. The far right has always been present in Romanian elections, although the current result is a stronger showing than even the 2000 elections when Vadim Tudor made it into the second round where he lost to the PSD’s Ion Iliescu.

 

Just as the centre ground is crowded, the far right in contemporary Romania is also politically crowded with Georgescu, Simion and the AUR and Diana Șoșoacă’s SOS Romania Party. While both Simion and Șoșoacă have endorsed Georgescu for the second round, there is little love lost between the three or their supporters.

Who voted for Georgescu and why?

Revenge of the countryside?

Voting returns and anecdotal evidence suggests that Georgescu made strong gains in rural areas. This has long been the heartland of PSD support. It has relied on its inherited political organisation’s ability to distribute material resources (such as free flour or clocks) to mobilise voters. However, the PSD has lost approximately 2 million votes in the last 10 years reflecting a longer term decline of the party. Victor Ponta in 2014 attempted to shore up this by embracing ever more socially conservative positions as well as ethno-religious nationalism. The extreme right has simply built on this and taken it further. The PSD’s traditional approach of gifts and nationalism no longer works. Moreover, Georgescu has done something which is rare in modern politics and started to speak about the socio-economic concerns of rural voters. Despite his appeals to his own authority, his ideas about the countryside are incoherent and no more plausible than the Iron Guard’s ‘One man, one hectare’ slogan during the interwar period. While mainstream politicians are happy to cosplay at being peasants, dressing up in traditional dress to show their ‘Romanian-ness’  during elections, however, rural poverty, issues with infrastructure and the vacant state are not topics that the Romanian elite ever talk about. Thus Georgescu has leapt into a political vacuum of the Romanian elites’ creation and filled it.

Humiliation

A second theme that has come up in evidence from supporters of the far right, is humiliation. Stealing the rhetoric that the EU was no longer going to push Romania around that Ponta and Crin Antonescu used in 2011-12 against the EU during their attempt to impeach Băsescu. While it also echoes the rhetoric of Orban and other populists within the region, the Romanian far right has been able to exploit the sense that many Romanians have of being peripheral and being second class citizens at home and abroad. While the Old Towns in Bucharest, Cluj and Sibiu, glisten with bars and banks, and EU funded renovations, this is a world away from the working class districts of those cities, the provincial towns and the countryside where the economic benefits seem scant, other than that other people have got rich. While increasing pluralism in Romanian society is seen as a threat for which the EU is responsible. Thus rhetoric that emphasizes that Romanian workers and peasants have borne all the costs and gained nothing from EU membership.

Diaspora swings to the far right?

While Romanians at home are sceptical of the benefits of EU membership, the theme of humiliation is relevant and resonates among the diaspora. One of the shocks has been the widespread support throughout much of Western Europe among the diaspora for AUR. Diaspora voters had between 2004 and 2019 consistently supported candidates who were perceived as being more liberal thus the support for the extremist AUR seems puzzling. While the diaspora is not monolithic, AUR has consciously and methodically targeted Romanian voters abroad. The theme of humiliation resonates given the way in which Romanians are treated in the West European states in which they live and the political rhetoric that surrounds them. Secondly, the Romanian elite in Romania has either viewed the diaspora as ‘traitors’ for leaving the country, the PSD in particular blamed the diaspora for its election defeats in 2004, 2009 and 2014. In the case of the PNL, it has taken the support of the diaspora for granted and done nothing to support them or to protect them when they have suffered such as during covid or in the face of anti-Romanian politics. It is little wonder that unwelcome in the PSD and taken for granted in the PNL, that many voters in the diaspora have moved to the one party that talks to and about their concerns.

And what next?

Much depends on the outcome of the recount. If the results are changed then there are likely to be protests. If the results remain unchanged and Lasconi faces off against Georgescu then much will depend on where the supporters of the other 12 candidates goes, and given the low turnout in the first round as to whether there is a substantial mobilisation in the second round and in which direction this will go.

Additionally, the parliamentary elections taking place this Sunday will shape the second round of the presidential election. Paradoxically, although much attention focusses on the presidential election (including this blog) because Romania is a semi-presidential system, the president is largely ceremonial and has relatively few powers. The power over policy rests with the Prime Minister and they responsible to parliament not to the president. Current polling puts AUR in the lead with the PSD closely in second place, with USR in third. It is entirely conceivable that the extreme right AUR could be the largest party in parliament. It is also conceivable that given the authoritarian tendencies within the PSD, as well as the breaking of the firewall against working with the far right in Western Europe, so that the PSD might be willing to form a coalition with AUR and SOS Romania (currently polling around 5%). Thus irrespective of whether Lasconi were to win the Presidential election, the government and cabinet will almost certainly come from the PSD and/or AUR, which is as potentially troubling for Romanian politics and society, as a Georgescu presidency.