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Vol. 3, no. 1/2011 STYLES OF COMMUNICATION
5
Insights into the Politico-Administrative Dimension
of Interwar Romania.
A Perspective of the Gustian Monographic Sociology
1
Bogdan Bucur, PhD Student
University of Bucharest, Romania
bogdan_asg@yahoo.com
Abstract: In this study, we intend to present, using a socio-historical approach, the political and
administrative aspects of the interwar Romanian society and state, as it has been investigated, from the
perspective of monographic methodology, by the Sociological School of Bucharest, headed by Professor
Dimitrie Gusti. The article aims at highlighting the existing legislative conflict between the traditional local
government organization in the the modern
administrative codes, adopted after 1864, by the
highlight the negative perception of the population in the Romanian villages of Bessarabia and Transylvania
(who lived under the tsarist and Austro-Hungarian rule until World War I) on the deficient administrative
functioning of the interwar Romanian state. Although various projects of administrative reform attempted to
correct these shortcomings, within the interwar period studied, excessive bureaucratization of the state and
poor salaries of the public servants remained constant elements of the Romanian administrative political life.
Keywords: Sociological School of Bucharest, monographic methodology, bureaucratization, administrative
reform, state centralization, local and central government.
1. Introduction
The social politico-administrative embedding has always played a significant role since
the ruling styles and the
social structure of the respective community. This article will focus on a synthetic
analysis of the social politico-administrative reality specific to the interwar Romanian
society and state as it was studied through a monographic methodology, within the span
1
An extended form of the article was presented at the first International Conference of the
Remaking the Social. New Risks and Solidarities
organized by the Faculty -Bolyai-
Napoca, December 2-4, 2010.
Vol. 3, no. 1/2011 STYLES OF COMMUNICATION
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of 23 years (1925-1948), by the Sociological School of Bucharest
2
. From the very
beginning, it should be highlighted the fact that such a retrospective and sector-based
approach on the impact of the politico-administrative regulations, practices and
manifestations (as they were perceived, studied, measured, observed, or analyzed, at that
time, by the Sociological School of Bucharest) upon the interwar Romanian society,
even under this synthetic form, represents a novelty within the Romanian sociological
research, which has been claiming itself since the Gusti School, more than 60 years
since the banning of sociology by the communist authorities of the Popular Republic of
Romania.
Two reasons can be mentioned for such a novelty within the Romanian sociological
research.
-12; Larionescu 2007: 121) of four
aspects (cosmological, biological, historical and psychical) and of four manifestations
(economic, spiritual, moral and judicial, politico-administrative). Except for Henri H.
Nerej, un village d'une region archaïque, three volumes,
published in 1939), this scientific wish has never been achieved. On the other hand,
according to Paul H. Stahl (2002: 7-8), the study of the Romanian interwar political-
which seemed to foreshadow the legendary aura of the rural areas and settlements which
had been provided with monographic studies. This is the reason for which, for example,
such a significant chapter for the Gustian methodology belonging to the sociological
research is not included in the monograph of the village of Nerej (published in 1939, as
the opening speech of the International Sociological Congress which should have been
be accepted by those
Stahl 2002: 8, our transl.),
under the political conditions of that époque marked by the royal patronage exercised
upon the Prince Carol Royal Cultural Foundation (which used to finance most of the
2
The Sociological School of Bucharest (1919-1948), also known as the Gusti School, named
after its founder, was the first and the only Romanian school of sociology. It was founded,
after the World War I, by Professor Dimitrie Gusti and his collaborators: Henri H. Stahl,
Within the intellectual interwar
scene, the Gusti School proposes the concept of a modern sociological seminar or the
revolutionary idea, at that time, of the sociological monographs. These monographs started in
1925 and involved the direct investigation of the Romanian villages. After December, 30,
1947, when the totalitarian communist regime sets in Romania, sociology was considered a
The total
exclusion of sociology from the curricula of high-school and high education represented the
end of the Gusti School.
Vol. 3, no. 1/2011 STYLES OF COMMUNICATION
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monographic campaigns conducted
th
century).
In order to highlight the way in which the Sociological School of Bucharest studied the
politico-administrative problems through its monographic campaigns during the
interwar period, it is necessary to provide a brief insight into the concepts of the Gustian
theoretical and methodological framework.
2. The Gustian sociological system – a theoretical framework of the politico-
administrative manifestations
From the very beginning, there should be emphasized the fact that the political action is
based on the sociological knowledge within the monographic sociological system
developed by Prof. Dimitrie Gusti. The theoretical system established by the
Sociological School of Bucharest involves an interdependence between relation and
correlation, a harmonious collaboration between the scientific research versus the
versus
Thus, politics can no longer be conceived apart from a thorough sociological foundation.
Being embedded
monographic sociology, was placed, from the very beginning, by the founder of the
School of Bucharest, within the public service of the Romanian village. Firstly, as
or the field sociological survey, mainly run in the rural areas of the Great Romania.
sis of the
sufficient reasoning acquired through early scientific knowledge, the political action of
social change that c
activity, under the reign of Carol II (Gusti 1934: III, VI-VIII & 12).
In the volume Îndrumări pentru monografiile sociologice/ Guidelines for Sociological
Monographs
3
-367) develops the problematic of the
political and administrative sociology, following the line highlighted by the founder of
the School of Buch
3
Institute of Social Sciences).
Vol. 3, no. 1/2011 STYLES OF COMMUNICATION
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studies is to document the political decisions that are to be taken by the persons who
perform state functions. Thus, the effort to know and to scientifically study the social
reality should be carried out within the context of the act of running a nation.
The sociological monographs which study the demographic, economic, social, cultural,
or politico-
contribution of social
Golopen , our transl.). Dimitrie Gusti (1934: 19)
emphasizes the necessity of such an institutional effort to organize the sociological
with few exceptions, is mostly led by routine, lacking ideas and information , in some
best cases, by a sort of sentimental utopism, namely by ideas lent through a feeling of
As for the politico-administrative mission of the monographic sociology, the founder of
the Romanian School of Sociology is of the opinion that the scientific study of villages
should provide to the local and central public administration the documentation and
information materials on: at the very
the lack of a technical organization of the rural
a proper care-
diseases with all their well-
public administration, the monographic research constitutes a valuable scientific help,
become productive or creative, namely it cannot accomplish its
household, when one does not know what and for whom (s)he manages his/ her
(our transl.), Professor Gusti considers that the sociological monograph
places politics, whose main task is to achieve the social ideal, within the context of the
concrete reality, through a deep awareness of the real social evolution tendencies (Gusti
1934: 85-86).
But the sociological monograph also has its own politics, since the social man of
science, through his/ her personal contact with the rural social life, arrives to discover
and understand the evolution tendencies and the social ideal towards which the society is
heading. Then he may work on the adequate means, from a political point of view, to
Vol. 3, no. 1/2011 STYLES OF COMMUNICATION
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provide the social achievements and changes. Thus the man of social science,
suppress
beyond the interwar Romanian political and social reality. As the man of science
becomes a political man, the monographic sociology, which is always based on an
objective study of some concrete social reality, gets at the ethical and politico-
administrative achievement of the social ideal, having as final outcome the
accomplishments of some social reforms through political means. Within the Gustian
system, sociology (the scientific research) is interwoven with ethics (the defining of the
social ideal) and with politics (the achievement of the social ideal).
3. The politico-administrative manifestations – the monograph methodology
Within the monographic and sociological activities conducted by the Sociological
School of Bucharest, between 1925-1948, the politico-administrative manifestations
were not generally given a great attention and were not widely spread (compared to
other manifestations and frameworks). Nevertheless they used to stir some scientific
interest. Taking into account this situation, Dimitrie Gusti (1946: 164-165) considers
that the sociological monograph studies the rural administration (village halls, public
the Romanian administrative, executive, and legislative authorities (at the central and
perceptions especially on the way in which
politics works and the party system functions at the local level. A special attention
should be provided to the administrative habits or customs, de facto applied at the local
level since ancient times. These should be related to the administrative laws, regulations
and codes, de jure applied at the national level. Regarding the manner in which the Gusti
School understood how to achieve this monographic study of villages, there should be
highlighted the fact that in a work whose foreword is written by Dimitrie Gusti, Henri H.
Stahl (1937: II & 194-196) largely deals with the political and administrative life
problems of the Romanian village, referring both to the aspect of the written
administrative law (the way in which the administrative legislation of the Romanian
modern state is applied at the local level) and that of the oral administrative law (which
produces judicial consequences in the name of the land tradition, without being
ers of the village hall
well-
Vol. 3, no. 1/2011 STYLES OF COMMUNICATION
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monographic he village since
(Stahl 1937: 194-195). The study of the political life of the village involves, on the one
hand, the study of the local election phenomenon, as the political parties are the
organizations which maintain the link between the local and the national political life,
even in villages, between different race, confession or economic categories, each of
them wishing to have a decisive word in what the administrative problems are
ic research, H.H.
Stahl (1937: 196-197) writes some guidelines formed of two questionnaires:
1. The questionnaire for the study of politico-administrative life focuses on the history,
domestic administration, location description, former activity presentation, present
functioning of the village hall, the rural goods and properties administration, the
relations between the village hall and other public authorities or state organs, the
pinpointing of the tasks customarily or habitually assumed by the village hall and
which are not stipulated in the modern administrative legislation, the village annual
budget construction and implementation.
2. The questionnaire for the study of political life focuses on the political psychological
elements regarding the persons involved in the village politics, on the knowledge of
the political club members, on the k
on
the presentation of the party organizations which have local branches, on the
observation of the way in which the election and political confrontations take place
in villages, on the analysis of the county and village election results.
In the volume Îndrumări pentru monografiile sociologice/ Guidelines for Sociological
Monographs (see footnote 3), Traian Herseni and Gheorghe Lupchian (1940: 368-374)
the household
concerned, involves three major layers of scientific interest for the sociological
investigation:
- the technical-judicial perspective: the legal administration or the administrative law
focuses on the study of laws, administrative regulations or other legislative acts;
- the sociological perspective: the real administration implies the study of the local
administrative life as it really takes place in the village, beyond the legal stipulations.
- the political perspective: the (local) political action focuses on the measure plan,
scientifically drawn and studied on the basis of the data of the social reality, provided to
Vol. 3, no. 1/2011 STYLES OF COMMUNICATION
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the state by the field sociology. This plan embeds the ways in which some concrete
improvements to the administrative functioning can be brought about, thus having
immediate positive consequences for the state domestic activity.
Once these main elements of the methodological and theoretical framework belonging
to the Sociological School of Bucharest have been established, we will provide a
synthetic analysis of the main approaches that the Gusti School had on the
manifestations and genesis of the politico-administrative activities. A special emphasis
will be laid on the negative social consequences of the politico-administrative issues
under study.
4. The dissolution process of the local traditional administrative and
organizational structures
The analysis will focus on the dissolution process that took place in two Romanian
regions: (1) the County of Vrancea which was organized on three layers
of local authority: the layer of the village, the layer of the valley (embedding more
neighboring villages along the same valley) and the layer of the region (formed of more
valleys); (2) the County which used to have the lad group
neighborhood as administrative structures.
According to Henri H. Stahl (1929: 576-578), the main reason which led to the
disaggregation, administratively speaking, of the former Moldavian-Wallachian
community life and to the internal dissolution of group under the form of a
the centralization process, following the French model. Starting with the Phanariot 18
th
century and having as main reference points, the adoption of the Organic Regulations
(1831/ 1832), of the administrative reforms initiated by Alexandru Ioan Cuza (1864
the Rural Law, the Law for the County Hall Settlement) and the 1866 Constitution as a
climax point, there had been taking place a rapid process of replacing the traditional
systems of free village collective administration with the official system of state
administration.
Traditionally, the free yeomen villages (a yeoman was called an in Wallachia,
) used to organize, run and administrate by themselves through
their own administrative organs, elected from among the rural community, according to
equal rights, all the adult villagers under a form of deliberative and decisional
Vol. 3, no. 1/2011 STYLES OF COMMUNICATION
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association which used to be specific to a primitive democracy. This assembly had the
role of delegating the elected executive public authorities (the village seneschal, prince,
judge, mayor) and those mandated (having no time limit, but always under the
possibility of being revoked). Their role was to put into practice the decisions taken by
--63).
In the 19
th
century, the two laws regarding the complete reorganization of the Romanian
local public administration (the Rural Law and the Law for the County Hall Settlement,
promulgated by Al. I. Cuza on the 1
st
and 2
nd
of April 1864) had a twofold effect:
- on the one hand, they caused a break from the Romanian institutional tradition
because of the import of politico-administrative organizations and institutions,
following the French and Belgian model.
- on the other hand, they determined a complete and immediate change of the
Romanian institutional environment by the abandoning of the ruling role that the
traditional administrative organ, under the form of a group, used to play at the local
level.
Following the French model, there were legislated the institution of the prefect and of
the mayor (having executive tasks) and the county and commune council (having
deliberative tasks). The two executive functions at the county and commune level
acquired a double quality: a) organs of decentralized public administration, and b)
governmental representatives at the local and county level. The interweaving of these
roles had a twofold consequence: the politization (loading with tasks imposed by the
central executive authorities from Bucharest) and the rigorous governmental control
upon the mayor and the prefect positions. This is the reason why in Romania, the local
autonomy and the administrative decentralization principles formally stipulated in the
1866 Constitution
4
actually implied a moderate centralization, having as consequence
the extreme instability of the position of a prefect. The reasons for this incertitude lie on
the frequent changes of the Government and the
official duty, that of being a promoter of his village interests, to a role of a mere executor
-204).
Whereas in Nerej (the County of Vrancea), the traditional organizations of the local
4
According to the 106 and 107 articles in the 1866 Constitution, the commune and the
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public administration (village, valley and yard group) had rapidly dissolved once they
in the County , the lad group and the neighborhood used to experience an
alteration of the former norms which were the basis of the ancient traditional
organization, especially the ancient election mechanism of the neighborhood fathers and
the group leader (Herseni 1936; Stahl 1929; Idem 1936).
5. The local public administration (in Bessarabia and in Transylvania)
We will present the way in which the administration in the two territories evolved under
the Tzarist and the Austro-Hungarian ruling (until the First World War) and the
Romanian ruling (after 1918).
A significant population sample which might appreciate and knowingly evaluate the
Romanian local public administration organization and functioning mechanisms during
the interwar period is formed of those Romanians who, until 1918, lived under the
Russian ruling in Bessarabia and under the Habsburgic ruling in Transylvania and who
Austro-Hungarian imperial system. The most sensitive problem, after the Great Union,
the
regime
was of Hungarian origin in Transylvania, of Austrian origin in Bukovina and of Russian
a commune, towns used to benefit from an administrative autonomy, all the organs of
these administrative units being elected. These organs might self-organize and run
themselves following their own by-laws, the head of the decentralized county public
administration was not a representative of the center, the control being more relaxed and
(-254, our transl.).
communes were artificial creations, arbitrarily delimited by the legislator, the towns had
an administrative autonomy only if the center accepted such a thing, only some of the
decentralized administrative organs were elected. Generally the county and commune
regulations were to be approved by the tutelary organs, the position of the county public
administration head coincided with the government representative at the county level,
the administrative control was excessively overwhelming, especially for the rural
Vol. 3, no. 1/2011 STYLES OF COMMUNICATION
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communes, and the financial resources were most of the times fictitious, thus not being
able to finance the local public services. Above all, the local collectivities were often
, our
transl.).
Actually the liberal law which was meant to achieve, in 1925, the unification and
extension of the administration regime of the Old Kingdom, towards all the recently
joined Romanian provinces, was deeply centralized and neglected the great local
autonomy which Transylvannia, Bukovina and Bessarabia, within the Habsburgic and
the Russian empires, benefited from (
This is the reason why the monographic research teams that studied two rural
period, were surprised to notice, on the one hand, the generalized hostile state of the
organizations and, on the other hand, the explicit regret for
politico-administrative life (free of anarchy, violence and Romanian electoral
demagogy).
5.1. The Russian administration versus the Romanian administration (Năpădeni,
in Bessarabia)
-
state administration. Although in this Bessarabian
Dumitru Dogaru (1937: 288-291 and 296-297) was surprised to find out that not an
inhabitant knew anything about the Romani
gaining these
inhabitants through its huge dimensions, its uniform glamour and brightness, and the
had still been holding the portrait of the Russian tzars in every single house, in 1934.
This loyal feeling towards the Russian state was based on the lack of Russian constraint
upon the villagers, who seemed to feel freer under the
taxes were paid through share tribute, the education and military services the latter
introduced relatively late, towards the end of the 19
th
century were not compulsory and
the own product commerce was tax free.
Vol. 3, no. 1/2011 STYLES OF COMMUNICATION
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Once Bessarabia joined Romania in 1918, the first impact with the new Romanian state
N
explained why the new Romanian state compared to the
coercive because it involved scholarly compulsory presence, a different form of taxation,
different supervisors, the financial guard, soldiers, too many official papers for the most
old,
considers that if you want to transport a small wine barrel from one place to another, you
are caught and they confiscate all your fortune. This did not happen under the Russians.
Now you even pay the vineyard and if God helps and the wine is made, you even pay
the beverage tax. It was better before. I just used to load my wine barrel and I could just
cross the N
of tact, the clumsiness, the inability and the evil will of the Romanian official
family, even if this should have been freely distributed. Asked by the team students
where she had the royal family portrait from, a woman gave the following answer:
-298, our transl.).
5.2. The Austrian-Hungarian administration versus the Romanian administration
(Șanț, Năsăud County, Transylvannia)
A relatively similar situation could be met in another region monographically studied by
the Sociological School of Bucharest, namely the village
before the war, under the Austrian-
, after
in Bucharest (Micu 1937: 460).
time for different political forms to be
shortcomings (caused by the growing number of inhabitants and the plotting of the
-
created political entities might launch, support and legislate
Vol. 3, no. 1/2011 STYLES OF COMMUNICATION
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, insufficiently informed, the illusion of an
agitation of the village coul
the
county which
formerly used to be the workplace of border guards.
ement of
ed in winning and completely
al
problems, which the village experienced for two years, the climax point happening in
revolutionary
separation , achieved by the inhabitants
themselves through violent means (Micu 1937: 460, 463).
of
, stirred by the politiciaa desperation impulse. On
July, 23, 1933, they organized a great protest meeting which, although forbidden in the
last minute by the government, gathered 5,000 persons , from all
the 44 communes o, the former workplace of border guards. The
protesters threatened to devastate the County Hall and the County Forest Division.
in the village of -horn could be heard and all the men, the whole
consequence, there w
at -464). During the
of the villages , the former workplace of border guards, Constantin V. Micu
(1937: 463- ,
against the so-
political , had been competing in
Vol. 3, no. 1/2011 STYLES OF COMMUNICATION
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6. The former traditional local autonomy versus the new modern
administrative centralism
Unlike the villages under the domination of boyars, monasteries or rulers, where the
villages in Wallachia and in Moldavia usually preserved their former administration,
always consulting the council of the elders (or that of the village groups). In time,
pt
influencing the village administration and justice more a
the persons sent from the centre and authorized to rule and to exercise administrative and
judicial attributions at the local level. During this period, the local public authorities
were to be appointed, even in the free villages in Wallachia and in Moldavia,
directly or indirectly
5
by the ruling centre (Cernea, : 187- 2006:
109-113). The Organic Regulations somehow corrected this deficiency and set, from the
were established
( 1927: 29-30).
This historical process, started in the 18
th
Phanariot century and accomplished under
which completely changed the pre-modern
Romanian local public administration (traditionally, having a relative autonomy from
the central authority), had a twofold outcome:
- on the one hand, the adoption of an administrative centralism, thus following the
French model, which was acknowledged in the 1864 administrative ruling systems;
- on the other hand, the excessive growth of the public officer system, with all its well-
known deficiencies concerning the poor salaries, the attribution overlap, the poor
professional training, the poor public services for the population and the lack of control.
such an unprecedented centralism in the both
since the Phanariot rulings, determined the shaping of a state administrative system
by far
5
The indirect appointment was made by the county prefect
position is the equivalent of the County Prefect of the modern Romanian state. This county
governor was appointed and revoked by the powerful rulers.
Vol. 3, no. 1/2011 STYLES OF COMMUNICATION
18
functioning p oitation of the country
-96). The direct consequence of the enactment and
18
th
and 19
th
centuries, implied the dissolution of the traditional autonomous legal forms
of administrative organization at the local level (in the County of Vrancea the village
group, the valley group and the yard group and in the County the
neighborhood and the lad group). These were replaced with public organizations,
completely centre-free, and having a double task: a) deliberative tasks (commune and
county councils whose decisions became executory only after they were approved by the
tutelary administrative organs) and b) executive tasks (the state tutelary organs the
prefect, the minister of domestic affairs, the voivode, having the right to suspend and
revoke the commune mayor or to dissolve the local and county council)
203-204).
7. The politico-administrative origins of “the social evil” in interwar
Romania
There were various and numerous deficiencies of the Romanian politic system which
finally led, in 1938, to the collapse of the Romanian parliamentary and democratic
political regime. Ten years later, after the Russian military intervention, the troublesome
modernization process of Romania, following the Western model, was to be stopped for
more than 40 years.
Without providing a complete analysis of the elements which constituted the major
disfunctions of the interwar politico-administrative system, totally inefficient and which
caused significant inequalities, we will only mention those elements which were
considered important by the main social actors studied by the Gusti School. Among
these irregularities, there could be mentioned the administrative and political
arbitrariness, the agrarian reform failure, the corruption and the public authority system
inefficiency, the legislative and administrative instability, the public administration
inefficiency, the administrative system overload, and .
7.1. The administrative and political arbitrariness
ative ruling, the modern reorganization of the
Romanian local public administration had been involving some malfunctions, among
6
(1927: pp. 36-37) mentions the fact that during the process of
6
is the former President of the High Court of Cassation and Justice, the
Vol. 3, no. 1/2011 STYLES OF COMMUNICATION
19
happened that one village might be joined to a commune which was too far away or that
a mountain, a large forest or some water which often used to prevent a proper
communication might separate the village from the respective commune
Although, according to the law, the commune administration and ruling belonged to the
commune council, which was directly elected by the villagers, it sometimes happened
that
man who was involved in the central political life, he was the one who decided how the
Actually, this situation, which obviously violated the legal
previsions in force, seemed not to disturb the Romanian peasant too much because
rs used to judge and
hey were
During the 6
th
monographic campaign of the Sociological School of Bucharest, which
took place in July 1930, in Runcu (Gorj County), -171)
talked with the peasant Grigorie Loghie. He highlighted some elements of peasant-like
mentality: a disappointment in the concept of (secular or clerical) local public authority,
the village hall and the church being considered the very souls of swindling in the rural
environment. According to this mentality, the origin of the social evil has a political
other to cast themselves down from the high positions of power and make this country
The peasant, Grigorie Loghie, labelled the politicians and
the interwar political party representatives
ot their
ruling positions and had of
counter-
a conclusion, the peasant, Grigorie Loghie, was skeptical about the
democratic altern
the country budget and the inhabitants with the payment of their excesses. He even
former president of the Romanian Academy.
Vol. 3, no. 1/2011 STYLES OF COMMUNICATION
20
provided an ironic
7.2. The legislative instability
As during the Old Kingdom (1866-ome with
on its own citizens. To mention only two examples: a) the law for the county council
settlement (promulgated by Alexandru Ioan Cuza, on April, 2, 1864) was changed, until
the First World War, at least eight times (in 1872, 1883, 1886, 1894, 1903, 1905, 1912,
and 1913); b) the Rural Law (promulgated on April, 1, 1864) six times (in 1874, 1882,
1887, 1904, 1908, 2006: 228).
7.3. The public administration inefficiency
-72), initially
published on March, 7, 1938, in Revista Ofensiva Română (The Romanian Offensive
Journal), there were published, for the first time, the conclusions of a report, edited at
the request of the Presidency of the Council of Ministers, on the 125-
through the tangled Romanian interwar central and local public administration that a
petition of a state factory should go through in order to be solved. Unfortunately, this
phenomenon turned into a social practice: at village halls, not a public officer could be
found during the program hours; at schools, children played on the porch because the
teacher was late again; at hospitals, the sanitary agent was out of town; at church, the
priest could not be found; at police stations, the soldiers wrote letters. The consequences
of this state of social inaction were visible: the population was very unsatisfied, the roads
were broken, the bridges were damaged, the schools were filthy. Even in the forest
villages, where there was enough wood, the firewood for the public institutions was
scarce. In the rural areas, the epidemics and the filthiness were a constant characteristic
1927: 39-40).
7.4. The state administrative system overload and the public officers’ low salaries
constituted the main cause of the
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appointment of the central public authority representatives in communes implied the
annihilation of the local autonomy principle
8
. Under these conditions of such an extreme
legislative instability, the number of public officers was constantly increased without
any objective reason and without them being professionally prepared. Being the
down on his servants, namely the peasants, and who gives orders and asks for things to
be done and who receives whatever and whenever he wishes and satisfies whomever
and
Romanian population could not satisfy anybody (: 38-39).
In a study published in Sociologie Românească (Romanian Sociology), Ion I.
Teodorescu (1938: 568) reiterated
conclusions, and he noticed that if there was some characteristic feature for the interwar
Romania, from an administrative perspective, this was
since their activities and performances of the public services were
For example, in 1928, in Romania, there were 345,066 state public officers in the central
public administration and more than 100,000 county and commune public officers in the
local public administration. This means more than 455,000 employers in the state
administrative system at all levels whereas in Romania, according to the 1930 census,
there were 14 million inhabitants. Comparing the interwar Romanian percentage of 34
public officers to one inhabitant (which means a 3.4% of Romanian population
embedded into the state administrative system) with the percentages of public officers of
other European countries, there could
258-
Compared to the whole state budget of
Romania (approximately 38 billion lei for the year 1928), these expenses for the
employers in the state system meant nearly 20 billion lei, which was more than 50% of
the total budget expenses. Paradoxically, was
8
C. Enescu (1937: 513) provides a good description of the Romanian centralized
administrative regime, where all the decisions were taken in the capital. The main cause of
this phenomenon lay on the small numbers of those who were really interested in politics,
or better said, of those who could
when between the ruling class of the powerful, the rich, of those who could influence
politics (let us say, the rulers), on the one hand, and of the others, of the ruled, on the other
handthere was built With no direct contact with
ling class and with no qualified personnel, the ruling class, small in numbers, had its
headquarters in the capital where they fought against each other, in order to have the order
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22
assigned from the state budget for the payment of public officers, their salaries were
As for the monthly salary of the Romanian public officers, Ioan Measnicov (1938: 25-
26) highlighted that 72% of the public officers received less than 4,000 lei monthly
during the 1934/ 1935 budget year whereas the life costs for that year included the
higher monthly expenses. For example, for a 5-member family (2 grown-ups and 3
children) whose head was an average public officer, the expenses were the following:
10,596 lei, for Bucharest; 7,500-9,000 lei, for big towns, and 5,500-6,000 lei for towns
with cheaper life-styles. In Bucharest, the rent for a modest two-room flat was 3,000 lei.
Thus it is obvious that these low salaries triggered a low or better said, miserable life
standard for the majority of public officers. This social situation forced the Romanian
based on illegal services.
8. Conclusion
The objective of this article was to provide a first attempt of systematizing the main
directions of monographic investigation that the Gusti School carried out in order to
study the Romanian interwar politico-administrative phenomena. Firstly, our concern
was to highlight the evolution of the historic dissolution process of the local
administration and organization traditional structures in the County of Vrancea (
Vrancei . The outcome of our analysis
was to identify the politico-administrative origin of the
experienced by the Romanian population during the interwar period. Secondly, we
mentioned the improper manner in which the local public administration used to
function in Bessarabia and Transylvania, under the Romanian ruling (after 1918). Last
but not least
organization in order to observe the disastrous consequences of the state modernization
process, following the French centralist model. This permanently centralized cultural
and political vision upon the state life organization in the modern Romania (although the
principles of local autonomy and decentralization or administrative regionalization never
stopped to be acclaimed by the legislator) is best underlined by the founder of the
Sociological School of Bucharest It is not «the man who is
the measure of all things», but «the country which is the measure of all things»
1937: 4). This syntagm should be embedded within the spirit of that period, marked by
the apparent failure of the democratic regimes and of the economic market systems in
onsolidation of
Vol. 3, no. 1/2011 STYLES OF COMMUNICATION
23
the extreme right movements. As, in that period, at the cultural level, it was not the
individuality or personality that mattered for the officials from Bucharest, but the
happened at the politico-
administrative level: it was not the local or regional specificity which mattered, but the
centralism (a reality which, judicially speaking, was acknowledged in all the Romanian
administrative codes). Finally, all the major dysfunctions of the politico-administrative
system generated, during the interwar period, a failure of the political modernity and of
the democratic regime in Romania.
Acknowledgments
This work was supported by the European Social Fund in Romania, under the
responsibility of the Managing Authority for the Sectoral Operational Programme
for Human Resources Development 2007-2013. The title of the project [code:
POSDRU/88/1.5/S/58711
Support in Sociology, Education Sciences, Psychology, and Communication
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