Land Reform in Romania – A Never-Ending Story
Land Reform in Romania – A Never-Ending Story

Summary/Abstract: In the past ten years, history has demonstrated its power in the question of peasants and the agrarian problem during the post-communist transformation process. History has seemed to repeat itself in more than one way: rather than learning from (negative) past experiences in solving the social and economic dilemmas of rural modernisation, political leaders have tended to repeat past mistakes, partly because they were under the same structural pressures as had existed after the First World War and after the communist takeover. The auithor provides a historical overview of land-ownership in Romania, describes regional differences in feudal agricultural relations, the 1907 peasant revolt and the 1920 land reforms and finally the collectivisation of agriculture after WW II and Ceauşescu’s systematisation of agriculture in the 1970ies and 80ies. « In sum, a preference for strict state control over agricultural production and rural property rights seems to be a shared characteristic of different Romanian regimes throughout the entire twentieth century. The same applies to the pressures of political support and legitimacy which make political leaders opt for short-term solutions to the social questions surrounding peasants, while neglecting the parallel issue of the economic and technical issue of the modernisation of agricultural production.»

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