Romania’s elections - a cheat sheet

A few (editorialised) notes on Romania's recent elections stunner.

What happened?

A fascist candidate won the first round vote for president, with 22.9% of votes cast. The win came as a shock for a large part of the political and media establishment. Calin Georgescu used a highly effective TikTok influence campaign to reach voters with simple and emotive messaging.

He will be joined in the 2nd round by Elena Lasconi, the candidate for the centrist USR (19.18% of the votes cast).

Who is Georgescu?

He ran on a combination of ultranationalism, religious extremism, and anti-Western views. Most notably, he believes Romania should not be a part of the EU or NATO, and that it should withdraw all support for Ukraine. He has praised Vladimir Putin and has copied his themes and imagery (strongman, horseback riding, judo…). He has also praised leaders of the 20th century fascist Legionary Movement, which perpetrated the Holocaust in Romania.?

He has said he is on a holy mission from God to awaken and save the Romanian people. He believes abortion and homosexuality should be illegal, and that viruses like COVID are not real.

Why did he win?

It is likely his win is down to:

?? A highly effective social media influence campaign

?? Simple messaging portraying Georgescu as an anti-system candidate

?? Widespread dissatisfaction with the country’s main parties

A segment of Romania’s electorate since 1989 has always been favorable to ultranationalist views, but this segment has typically been served by the two main parties (social democrats and liberals), which managed to toe the line between populism and being pro-EU and pro-NATO.

Amid a cost of living crisis, the Romanian political class has also been largely unable to articulate clearly why supporting Ukraine in the face of Russian aggression is in Romania's own best interests.

The dissatisfaction with traditional parties has helped create the right environment for a candidate like Georgescu, despite him being from the same political class that has dominated Romania since 1989. Georgescu has positioned himself as the candidate for peace who would make Romania safe.

Russian interference remains a big question. Georgescu has bragged about running a campaign on 0 budget, but that raises serious questions over how he was able to run a large and sophisticated TikTok campaign of influence that included the use of both bots and paid ads through influencers.

What does this mean?

Last weekend’s results raised alarms about a country generally thought of as a highly reliable partner for NATO in Eastern Europe.

Georgescu’s surge has turned both the presidential and parliamentary elections into an informal referendum on Romania’s geopolitical stance: whether it continues to be part of the Western world and its institutions or turns towards Russia and its sphere of influence.?

In this week’s parliamentary elections, it is expected that far right parties will make gains, likely buoyed by Georgescu’s round 1 victory.?

It remains to be seen whether the shock of Georgescu’s win will lead to a higher overall turnout than last week's 52%, with pro-EU voters turning up in larger numbers to prevent a parliamentary majority and president all coming from the far-right.