Who Demystifies the Demystifiers? Nationalism, History Teachingand Historians' Debates in Post-Socialist Romania

Delcea Sergiu,

Central European University, Budapest

Conference paper for CEU ASN 2014 Expanded from The Politics of writinghistory: historians' debates and high-school history teaching in post-socialist Romania, inpeer-review student journal, Politikon, International Association ofPolitical Science Students, Volume 22, April 2014, ISSN - 1583 -3984

Abstract

After exhibiting one of the "hottest" instances of ethno-national related violence in allpost-socialist transitions, early 90s Romanian society seemed to have "cooled" down interms identitarian conflicts, hence making it even more surprising why an apparentlysmall-scale debate concerning history textbooks quickly spiraled to the point ofbecoming a fully-fledged public scandal against a Government dubbed as "Anti-Romanian". The aim of this paper is thus to contribute to the overarching researchquestion: Why did nationalism remain such a powerful force despite the fall of theCeausescu regime? To provide a comprehensive answer the article looks at two, tightlyinterwoven, sides of cultural reproduction: the politics of history-teaching in Romanianhigh-schools and its more general background - historians' debates on nationalism. Theconclusion reached through this analysis is that a conservation of rigid nationalisticthinking about history was generated by a distorted understanding ofprofessionalization of history qua science.

Introduction1

While the grass-roots outbursts of "hot" nationalism fizzledout after the violent clashes of the early 90s (prominent beingthe Targu Mures conflict), the out-of-the-blue intensepoliticization of a history textbook debate in 1999 and thequasi-meteoric rise to public fame of Prof. Boia's"demystification efforts" since the early 2000s showed thatnationalism remained at the very least a hot potato in Romanianintellectual and political millieus. This scenario is madepossible because cultural reproduction, an important element ofstability and cohesion(Paraianu:2001, 111 in Trencsenyi et al.(eds):2001), gets thrown into a whirlpool of marketability andpolitical decision-making. Perceptions of the past and theirmassification on the re-opened Romanian market thus become ofprime importance - if during the communist era historians workedhard to justify the political regime (Rachieru:2003, 249), the

1The paper shares in common parts from Delcea Sergiu, The politics of writing history:historians' debates and high-school history teaching in post-socialist Romania, in Politikon, TheInternational Association of Political Science Students Journal of PoliticalScience, Volume 22, April 2014, ISSN 1583 - 3984. This paper retains in fullthe analysis of the 1999 textbook scandal. While the second part also containsparts of the original article, this will be expanded by adding considerationson other works of the two main debaters and by better mapping some trends ofpost-socialist Romanian history-writing

annus mirabilis 1989 dictated that post-socialist Romanian scholarsreconsider approaches to the nation, state and history.

The aim of this paper is to focus on post-socialist Romanianhistory teaching and historians' debates about national history,trying to contribute a possible answer to a huge over-archingquestion: Why did nationalism remain such a powerful force despite the fall of theCeausescu regime? The question will be addressed through a dual-layered understanding of cultural reproduction: the effects ofmass-oriented public education and historians' debates (which area mixture of mass-orientation and scholarly elitist debates). Mymain argument is that although there has been a liberalization of historical researchand historiography in the post-socialist setting, a nation-building inner logic, so dear tocommunist state-makers, is still very much preserved - constructed, de-constructed orre-constructed (which is the gist of all "demystification" efforts) around the core issue ofa hard understanding of "nationhood". While the old historians arepreserving it via the classical proxy of anti-Hungarian rhetoric(and the age-old of myth of Romania protecting the "West"), thenew wave of "de-mystifying" historians have fallen to the otherextreme of considering Romanian history purely as a succession ofnational myths (with the apparent aim of creating a quasi-void onwhich a more European identity might be built - obviously, stillidentity-building!).

The core of the problem lies at a crossroads between theoutward liberalization of Romanian historiography done under theold template of "historia magistra vitae" (Iggers:2010, 35-36) and theuse of discourses about the philosophy of history in a debatethat was intended to be political (Nalin:2002, 44), as obviousduring the late 90s history textbooks scandal. Starting from thelatter, I will expand the discussion and analyze the broadertopic of historical myth-making as a basis for identity-buildingin post-socialist Romania. To be precise, I am not arguing thatthe presence of some form of nationalism is the central cause ofRomanian laggard transition (Petrescu:2001 in Trencsenyi et al

(eds):2001). The aim of this paper is to understand how a fixedconceptualization of nationhood, presumed obsolete, stillimpacted post-socialist Romanian historiography and historyteaching2. The consequence of this continuation of patterns isthat a rigid understanding of nationalism was perpetuated (atleast in part), in post-1990s Romania, by a lack of modernizationof history as a science.

Structurally I will divide the paper into two main parts: ananalysis of the 2000 alternative textbook scandal and a wideningof the discussion through the debate between the "old guard"historians and the new "de-mystyfiers". Although the latter willconstitute the bulk of the paper, certainly such a broad topiccannot be fully mapped in the narrow confines of this paper (forin-depth analysis Iordachi&Trencsenyi:2003, 415-453) andtherefore I will focus on the debates spurred up by Lucian Boiaand his followers, and the rather recent critique put forward bya group of University Babes-Bolyai of Cluj lead by Ioan-Aurel Pop(member of the Romanian Academy). The Boia-Pop debate willcertainly be the backbone of the analysis, but works pertainingto other post-socialist Romanian historians (who did not engagein a direct debate with either the two protagonists of this paperor amongst themselves), shall also be added to better map out theintellectual climate to be analyzed. It feels methodologicallysounds to do this selection because Prof. Boia's works have beenbest-sellers (albeit not instantly in some cases), achieving thisstatus by taking a controversial stand on topics such as Romaniannational history and nationalism in general. Interestinglyenough, despite having originally been published before the 1999

2To be clear, I am not arguing that all Romanian historians fall into thismodel. What I am arguing is that on a large scale (i.e. mass-media and non-university school-teaching) this is the fundamental divide. As noted byParaianu in the early 2000s when the original textbook scandal erupted Westernacademic debates about Romanian history were not very well integrated into theRomanian academia thus making it methodologically sound to analyze the divideI have selected.

textbook scandal, Boia's opus had not achieved public notorietyuntil then. Certainly, any direct, quantitative link cannot beinferred it would be equally hard to assume that there isabsolutely no connection.

The alternative textbook scandal - What image of the nation isthe Romanian educational system disseminating?

After the abrupt fall of the Ceausescu regime, the Romanianpolicy-makers were faced with the daunting challenge of re-structuring an obsolete educational system, which was mass-producing obedience towards a unitary teleological vision of the"socialist nation" (Petrescu:2007 in Jarausch&Lindenberger:2007).The early reforming of this system was a tenuous process, tornbetween the need for a new approach, the overwhelming mass ofpersonnel inherited from communism and a very concrete lack offunds. History-teaching continued to be rather monolithic: whilecertain aberrations were abandoned, the core teleology and "hardtruths" (i.e. continuity, unity, nationhood) were maintained.

During the early 90s, public debate towards alternativetext-books and interpretations was limited, while grass-rootspressures for reforms tended to focus more on the quantitativeside (i.e. refurnishing schools, heating systems etc.) ratherthan on fundamental epistemological issues. History-teaching

reform in Eastern Europe followed three important dimensions:ideological reconsideration, lightening the syllabus and teacherinnovation (Nalin:2002, 41). In the following, I will attempt toanalyze the first two criteria in the context of the Romaniantext-book scandal, which escalated almost instantaneously from ascholarly debate into a fully-fledged political scandal where theopposition labeled the Government as having "Anti-Romanianfeelings". This scandal highlights that despite its outwardliberalization the post 1989 Romanian non-university educationsystem still aimed at mass-producing the communist creed of "goodRomanian citizens with a love of country and past"(Nalin:2002,43) The main point of contention in these early attempts atreforming the system was the introduction of alternative text-books for final year high-school students, which were supposed tofocus exclusively on Romanian national history. One interestingside-note must be made here: within the Romanian educationframework study of national history is reserved for the last yearof the high-school studies, which overwhelmingly overlaps withthe age of vote-right acquisition. Although a direct link is noteasily measurable, there seems to be an intricate underlyinglogic between a particular way of understanding Romanian historyand the transformation of students into "good" citizens.

The first major shock came as a result of Romania's effortsto join the EU, namely the late 90s-early 2000s Europeanrecommendation of moving towards liberalized history teachingemphasizing the European dimension of regional evolutions. In theautumn of 1999, historian Sorin Mitu was publicly scorn by theopposition parties for coordinating a text-book that introducedperceived identity-threatening topics: the idea of constructednationhood, the brief hint that mechanisms of the historicalimaginary plays a role in the image of the Romanian ethno-geneticprocess, the downplay of some national heroes (Paraianu:2001, 95-97 in Trencsenyi et al (eds):2001). As an accomplished historianMitu was trying to bring his text-book at a crossroads between

the aforementioned goals: attempting to tear down Romanianperennialism and lightening an overburdened curricula. Theintellectual background here is rather interesting to note: theEU directive involved integrating national histories into abroader narrative, which generated a divergence between Romanianhistorians acting as textbook authors - some continued to stressthe old myth of Romania having protected Europe from the Ottomaninvasion, while Mitu was pursuing the more delicate aim ofintroducing Western-inspired scholarly perspectives on Romanianhistory.

A broad comparative overview between Mitu's textbook and theavailable alternatives uncovers the following differences:instead of certainty the author proposes understanding theconstruction of a narrative (Iggers:2010, 41-43 and White:1973);instead of heroes of Europe medieval rulers approached as boyarswith personal aims and agendas; nationhood not as fact butconstruction, with state-hood being another purpose on the agendarather than an "eternal dream". By contrast, other manuals keptto the hardcore myths (Manea&Teodorescu:1994 for example),stating that the Romanian nation is a fact, a result of a 2000-year old teleological evolution (eerily reminiscent of thecommunist discourse). To further complicate the issue, Mitu wasnot outwardly anti-Hungarian: the arrival of the Hungarians inTransylvania is depicted in a moderate stance, with an eye onboth narratives, clearly leaning towards caution when looking at12-13th century sources (Mitu et al:1999 textbook). Much moreabrupt is the textbook's stance on 19th century nation-building:top-down elite-construction of the nation, an idea perceived asradical by hard-core historians and particularly by politicians.Instead of following main-stream public discourse which wasconstantly including issues on perceived Hungarian revisionism(Paraianu:2001, 105 in Trencsenyi et al (eds):2001), Mitu'stextbook hints towards the fact that Romanian and Hungariannarratives should be seen as intertwining histories.

The critique was violent, straight-forward and mirrored avery simple template: if Hungarian text-books state it as factthat the Romanian ethno-genetic process took place in the Southof the Danube, why should Romanian schools teach teenagers thatthe North-Danubian continuation narrative is a hypothesis and notfact?(A. Nastase apud Paraianu:2001 in Trencsenyi et al.(eds):2001) The siege mentality so dear to communist nation-forgers pervades this rhetoric and points towards an importantdirection: the Romanian education system, particularly throughhistory-teaching (Nalin:2002, 40), was mass-producing attachmentto a very organic definition of the nation. The point ofcontention raised in the Romanian media was not that of whetherhigh-profile Western academic studies (that Mitu was mirroring,being himself a prominent name in the field - Mitu:2001) aresuitable for high-school pupils, but that the author isfalsifying what "The Romanian Academy in its entirety hascertified" (C.T. Popescu apud Paraianu:2001, 107 in Trencsenyi etal (eds):2001). On the other hand, I disagree with generalassertion that in a turbulent political context a grass-rootslevel "longing" for the nation (Verdery:1993, 192), substitutingdistorted understandings of democratic values and practices(Gaber:2006, 35-39), was the logical fallback point. Rather Iwould concur with the argument that what should have been anacademic debate was quickly enveloped in politics, pointingtowards the direction that this clash was perceived by society asa manifestation of "conflicting interests" (Nalin:2002, 44-45).Consequently, it feels safer to assume that at a grass-rootslevel the scandal was perceived through a political lens:emphasizing a complete break with the old-guard politiciansinherited from communism, the Democratic Convention Government(which had been in power since 1996 on an agenda of completebreak with the past) appeared to back an anti-national version ofhistory, which meant a huge blow to their popularity.

Although alternative manuals had existed for quite some timein the Romanian education system, this complete deviation fromthe norm happened to overlap with an EU recommendation, whomRomania had recently started negotiating with. Consequently,there is yet another paradox: the intellectual origin of Mitu'spurported "Anti-Romanian" character is not based on Europeandiscourse, but on globalization a la americaine! (C.T. Popescu apudParaianu:2001 in Trencsenyi et al (eds):2001) The siege mentalityis obvious: if the EU cannot be directly blamed due to immediateinterests, the need for a new scapegoat arises. Reflected in thehistory textbooks the issue was simple: Romania's return toEurope is natural because ever since the Middle Ages Romanianshave protected Christian Europe from the "onslaught" of theOttoman Empire. Quite to the contrary, the image of the USbecomes blurred in with that of a "West" that abandoned Romaniaat Yalta, the 1918 unification became a purely Romanian victoryrather than a contextual exploitation of Wilson's 14 points andso on (these were not novel issues but rather a continuation ofwhat communist historiographers had stated for over 20 years).Instead of an integration of regional narratives, the Romanianeducation system made it clear to its pupils that EU integrationis not an ongoing process but part and parcel of some sort of"national pride".

One interesting fact is that despite the rather fiercepolitical clash, a coherently organized bottom-top pressure fromhigh-school teachers, either for or against the incriminatedtextbook, did not coalesce. Prima facie this would seem to hinttowards a purely political, shallow (i.e. without an actualacademic-theoretical substance) nature of the whole scandal, ifone is to only factor in the apparent apathy of history teachers,which should be prime actors in this equation. However, becauseof the structuring of the Romanian education system, teachers areindeed prime actors but in a different stance: the post-socialistteacher-centered model of education embedded into a very rigid-

hierarchical Ministerial structure means that high-schoolteachers have de facto either the option not to choose saidalternative textbook, or even upon choosing it, enough autonomyas to not follow it strictly in their actual teachings. In acontext of economic shortage and a growing shadow economy ofprivate tutoring (Popa&Acedo:2003,2006), high-school teachers'low prioritizing of the political scandal, albeit paradoxical,does not seem shocking!

Summing up, there are a few key issues to be noted. from thehistory text-book scandal: despite outward liberalization theeducation system was still focused on an identity-building styleof cultural reproduction; while nationalist rhetoric is not anoutward and open tool of electoral competitions and politics,there seems to be a rather tacit acknowledgment that certain"lines" connected with national identification must not becrossed clearly pointing towards the direction that nationalismqua ideology was still a force in post-socialist Romania.

Beyond the textbooks - historians, historiography and nationalismin post-communist Romania

The point here is to analyze the intellectual background onwhich the Romanian textbook scandal fell: it is not only that apoliticized education system disseminates a nation-buildingrhetoric, but academic debates also seem to revolve around it.Although this stepping back to a more theoretical level mightseem a bit far from the very concrete issue of high-school text-books, one can argue that it is impossible to consider text-bookauthors as a "special group" of historians to be delineated fromthe broader academic debates. Most aforementioned authors are

university professors fairly well connected with the zeitgeist ofhistorians' debates in Romania hence solidifying the link betweenthese seemingly disengaged lines of analysis.

To being with, in the post-socialist context nationalhistoriographies in Eastern Europe were expected to depart fromtheir underlying parochialism and start employing a more"Western" framework and methodology (Iordachi&Trencsenyi:2003,416). Yet, I disagree with Rachieru's idea that the rebranding ofRomanian historical works as "a history of.." rather than"history of.." shows a sign of alignment to Western standards ofplural histories (Rachieru:2003, 256) - for instance one of heranalyzed books, F. Constantiniu's "A sincere history of Romanians"seems more like old habits in new wrappings than a truemethodological innovation. On the other hand, it is undoubtedlytrue that Romanian historians were departing from the cannon ofmilitary-political descriptive histories (although Rachieru'snote that social history was being gradually introduced intoworks on Romanian history comes across as a bit enthusiastic whencompared with Iordachi's detailed account of a lack of anauthentic social history in Romanian historiography -Iordachi:2003). The envisaged liberalization would entail arenouncing of the communist teleology, a re-consideration of theexaggerations concerning Romania's history. In reality though,reconciliation with the past was a feeble process which glossedwith remarkable ease over communist influence on historiography,considering it a mere compromise with the totalitarian staterather than analyzing its very intricate effects.

The tropes of "unity" and "nationhood" (myths if we are touse Boia's terminology) seem to be largely unaffected by thepurported liberalization of discourse as far as the late 90s - aplethora of Romanian historians (Constantiniu, Berindei, Giurascuetc.), including I-A. Pop, publish detailed books about "medievalRomanian institutions" or "Romanian heros" (Rachieru:2003, p.

256-258). While this can be in part rightly attributed to thelatency of Western academic debates about Romanian historyactually permeating Romania's intellectual environments(Paraianu:2001 in Trencsenyi et al.:2001), the degree of unitarythinking still seems too strong. In addition, Boia's originalopus had already been published in Romania in 1997, but failed togain much traction. Of notable interest is Constantiniu's "Asincere history of the Romanian people" which made notableprogress in terms of marketability by blending in historicalanalysis with a more down-to-earth discourse (Rachieru:2003) - atechnique which has been upgraded and masterfully exploited byLucian Boia in later best-sellers (for instance the essay-like"Why is Romania different? - Boia:2013). What emerges is a verycomplicated picture: a large number of communist-educatedhistorians faced with political pressures for reconsideration,free from oppressive ethno-national ideological boundaries andpossibility of Western cooperation, yet faced with the novelrules of demand-and-supply liberalized markets in a democracywith an unclear place in Romanian intellectual and politicalhistory. Unsurprisingly, this provides a fertile ground forvicious circle effects both for de-mystification efforts as wellas for hard-core supporters of the old interpretations.

In the following, I will argue that in fact this viciouscircle effect did happen in the case of the most systematiceffort at de-mystification. However, before any conclusions oncultural reproduction can be made a brief overview of the mainspokes-persons for both sides of the debate is needed. In theRomanian context, a huge shock was generated by Lucian Boia's1997 pioneering (according to Rachieru:2003, 255) work History andMyth in Romanian Consciousness (for a synthetic presentation of theauthor's main approach see Stancu:2012, 56-67; Boia:2001)followed by an ample series of publications, by the same author,dedicated to the mechanisms of historical imaginary, amethodology that had previously not gained much ground with

Romanian historians. Interestingly enough, after an initialpublishing frenzy around the core concepts of "myths" andhistorical imaginary (Boia:1998, Boia:1999a, Boia:1999b,Boia:2000), the author slowly move away into slightly differenttopics (Boia:2013b, Boia:2006, Boia:2014b), which he claimed toexploit in a similar methodology, but has been ratherinconsistent in this approach. Ioan Aurel Pop is a member of theRomanian Academy since 2010, with a specialization in medievalinstitutions (Pop:2003 for instance), with a consistent number ofpublications devoted to the wider idea of Romanian national historyand heritage (Pop:1998, Pop:2004, Pop:2005). Firstly respondingto Boia in 2002 (re-edited in 20113), Pop goes into a painstakingdissection of just one book, more than anything else: referencesto Boia's numerous other publications are at best sporadic, andPop is more intent or "vindicating" Romanian historians and partsof Romanian perennalism than he is to singling out methodologicaland theoretical inconsistencies.

By employing a constructivist definition of historical mythsBoia attempts a blending in of modernist theories on nationalism(Boia often quotes Anderson's classical works for instance,Anderson:1991) and Hayden White's approach to historiography(White:1993), reaching the conclusion that what is being taughtas Romanian history is mostly a well-plotted narrativeinstrumentalized from its earliest beginnings qua science for thesole purpose of nation-building. Boia borrows heavily fromconstructivist thinker of nationalism (for instance Boia:1999adraws on Hobsbawm's invented traditions and a Gellnerianunderstanding of nation-building) and the gist of his thinking isepitomized by the following idea: since unity and the nation arebeing considered by historians as fundamental for Romanianhistory, this points towards a very fragmented polity who washeld together by powerful symbolic myths, most of which revolved3 which at the time of this paper remains the only wide-scale scholarly critique from Romanian authors

around organic ties and cultural homogeneity. He goes on to arguethat historians cannot seek truth but must contend with puttingforward convincing narratives, inextricably linked with moraljudgments (Pop:2011, 20-25). However, despite his attempt attreating historical narratives in a metahistory tradition(White:1993), Boia is rather unsystematic and even vaguecontending himself sometimes to argue that the historicalimaginary is everything that lies outside a cause-effect chain!(Boia:2000). Well-written, his 1997 opus not surprisingly shocked(although it is important to say that for some years the book wasnot a best-seller) violently contradicting the cause-effectteleology employed by the bulk of Romanian historians.

A coherent reaction in the form of a book appeared as earlyas 2002, but got better traction rather late in 2011, in theguise of Ioan Pop's Istoria, Adevarurile si Miturile[History, Truth and Myths].Written with a collective tone, Pop proceeds with a step-by-stepanalysis of Boia's framework and arguments reaching the followingconclusions: the lax use of myths (which have a conceptualbackground and framework of their own) makes it possible toconsider any passed event as fiction for the simple fact that themodern historian did not partake in them directly, but relies onwritten accounts, which according to Boia are meaninglessstories; the critical reader of History and Myth is left with asense of having been taken through an exercise in conveniencesampling by putting together seemingly methodologicallyinconsistent examples; Boia's approach to nationalism gives theimpression that nation-building is a normatively undesirableprocess of elite-manipulation, myths representing the only pointof cohesion of the national community. The response to Boiadraws heavily from Pop's previous works and hence bears a greatimprint of methodological nationalism (to be seen in Pop:1998) -assimilationist stance on the role of minorities in nationalhistory (Rachieru:2003, 255), a rather large appreciation for thehomeland (Pop:1998, p. 164 hints towards the Romanian's organic

possession of the territory as the cradle of the nation; andthroughout the book in general geography is used as argument forRomania being a European country) and a normative judgment ofnational history (that was neither pure, nor horrible, Pop:1998, p.164). The 2002/2011 book encompasses a blending in of criticismaimed at methodology, with epistemological concerns, attemptingto "rehabilitate" the image of the Romanian historian, but is asort of review-vendetta more than a classical academic argument.

For the sake of space I will not provide a thoroughindividual analysis but rather focus on the purported aims of thedebaters: reconciliation with the past in the sense of betterdelineating the place of nationalist rhetoric and nation-buildingprojects in Romanian history, with an eye on regional Europeanintegration. In itself this points to a clear direction: Romanianhistorians seem to take a very normative approach to nationalism,focusing on the new teleology of EU integration4. It isimportant to bear in mind this stake since it appears to be thecenter of the normative vicious circle around which both sides ofthe debate gravitate. The interesting fact is that instead offocusing on certain methodological aspects that are obviouslyshaking in Boia's argumentation, critics have responded in apredictable manner: national teleology - as was for instanceobvious in the recent public scandal around Boia's last book(Boia:2014) which dared to attack the "Romanian historical righton Transylvania"5. What will be drawn is therefore the ratherlogical conclusion that both discourses fall into the trap of the

4Again I emphasize that it is beyond any shadow of a doubt that therehistorians who fall outside the framework of this debate, but Boia and hisfollowers seem to have gained public notoriety to rival that of the 1999textbook scandal.On the other hand, Pop's reply although not highly mediatizedis written as a collective response, thus permitting the use of overarchingcategories such as "Boia and his followers", "main-stream Romanianhistorians". 5 http://activenews.ro/ultima-carte-lui-lucian-boia-transilvania-nu-apartinut-niciodata-romaniei-protest-la-libraria-humanitas_1833263.html - Last accessed25th May 2014 - the pejorative sign reads "Trust me, I'm a historian!"

East/West divide framework (Brubaker:1998 in Hall(ed):1998), thusensuring the survival of some forms of nation-building rhetoricand logic.

Since the paternalistic argument is rather straight-forwardI shall start by analyzing cultural reproduction through thislens. Although Pop's approach is not stereotypical of the old-guard historians, his nuancing does not hide the perennialisttone: the Cluj historian argues that there is an un-deniable"core" to nationhood (although he is very far from the classicaluse of the notion in Benner:2001, 155-174) and it is the "honesthistorian's mission" (a phrase that he uses obsessively) touncover the truth (similar approach as in Berindei:1997). Forthis type of discourse national identity is salient (and thenation is immanent as for instance Pop works with the assumptionof a nation in 14th century France or argues for Romanianmedieval institutions), the purpose of historians being to comeas close as possible to a purist type of objectivity inuncovering the national past. This discourse would aim to go beyondnormative debates since in this line of thinking a historical factcannot be good or bad, it simply exists. The immediate proxythrough which this intellectual strand of thought reaches main-stream audiences is simple and potent: ancient hatreds. Bycontinuous referrals to purported Hungarian revisionism thisdiscourse remains at least latent in Romania - Rachieru isextremely precise when she notes that in Pop's 1998 workminorities are only used to highlight differences or to explainthe superiority of Romanians in Transylvania! (Rachieru:2003,257). The vicious circle is rather obvious: even if free frompolitical constraints, historians will continuously uncover thetruth that will always be a part of a national past regardless ofmethodology and outward liberalization of discourse.Consequently, instead of escaping the oppressive ethno-centrismof communist historiography, paternalist post-socialist Romanianhistorians continuously operate within its framework ensuring its

cultural reproduction (albeit in a more toned-down fashion). Inthis sense there is no reconciliation to be done with the past:communism did not have an impact on Romanian nation-hood whose"natural" place is in the European community from whom it wastemporarily disconnected (which can be easily spotted multipletimes in both Pop:1998 and Pop:2002)

The case of the de-mystification trend is somewhat morecomplicated as it supposedly draws on a purely Westernmethodology .Boia's main point is that history writing cannot beseparated from the historian's belief system hence making it afutile effort to search for "truth" since history itself is anarrative. Two important consequences can be drawn from hereabout Boia's approach: although modernist in the sense ofrecognizing the importance of constructionist approaches, thereis a pervading sense of normative judgment. The veil seems to bebetter lifted when one takes a closer look at Boia's subsequentworks that complement his opus: Romanian national history is notonly a myth, but it is a bad myth in the sense of espousing non-Western values (Boia:1999a). Since the shortcomings of thisEast/West ethnic/civic approach are well documented, for thepurpose of this paper suffice it note a more subtle observationon the Romanian de-mystification trend: in itself it creates themyth that "everything is a myth", which is envisaged as afoundation for a new identity-building in a Western-civic-normative understanding! Boia is certainly spot-on when showingthat the Romanian national heroes are symbolic fictions(Boia:1997, p. 232 - Romanian version of the book used for thisreference), however, he does not get out of the inner logic ofnation-building, albeit in a different scope: the teleology ofcivic nationhood and "Western liberalism". Certainly, thecommunist template is abandoned, yet the inner logic of identitycreation through history is maintained. The normative argument ofthis de-mystification is that once the realization that Romanianhistory is a string of myths is acknowledged, a new identity can

be constructed, supposedly better managing the delicate regionalintegration of historical narratives.

There is one underlying thread connecting these two issuesin a very subtle way: both strands consider themselves as "de-mystifiers". In a very ironic twist the early 90s historiansconsidered their mission to de-mystify communism, Lucian Boia andhis followers claim to de-mystify the entirety of Romanianhistoriography and its nationalist-orientation, while Ioan Popopens his laborious critique with the clear aim of tearing downthe "Lucian Boia myth"! (Pop:2011, 120) Acknowledging the verystrong point that one can analyze this issue through the obviousneed for truth in the post-socialist setting (Nalin:2002, 44), Idraw attention to another important dimension to be noted here:if myths are, by and large, considered identity building blocksthen de-mystification efforts clearly signal the presence ofperceived identity-threats and nation-building rhetoric. In thepost 90s Romanian environment the issue of reconciliation withthe past is aligned with delineating a "true" historicalidentity: a communist-shaped one, or an older version rooted inthe perceived democratic inter-war (hence communism beingperceived as a past-discontinuous). This seems to point towardssome sort of "new nation syndrome" (Petrescu:2007, 39 inJarausch&Lindenberger:2007), again strengthening the argument ofcultural reproduction towards identity-building. Even if oneconcurs with Pop's idea that society rarely listens tohistorians, the overarching sense of a vicious circle persists:post-socialist Romanian historiography is spinning aroundeveryone "de-mystifying" everyone for the sake of "truth".Although Boia and his followers disagree with the idea that thehistorian is looking for "truth" they are putting forward thevery normative argument that "Eastern" nationalism is the solecause of Romania's economic and political problems (a rathersimilar argument to be found in Petrescu:2001 in Trencsenyi etal. (eds):2001). This is the point of the myth that "everything

is a myth": identity-void on which a purported "better" national-identity be constructed. Either side seems to fallen into ateleological trap: national-identity as a salient category (be itconstructed, or perennial the pervading idea seems to be thatthere it is a clear developmental-historical goal). Certainly,both sides acknowledge that the goal of EU integration is an on-going progress, nonetheless they seem tied down to finding a"hard-core" starting point for a quasi-historical quasi-culturalargument of why Romania should join the EU.

Last but not least one important point should be tackledhere: does history teaching matter that much? In his critique toBoia, Pop argues that society does not listen that closely tohistorians making it hard to assume that there would be some sortof grass-roots pressure against a perceived obsolete philosophyof history (Pop:2011, 180). Certainly, this argument does holdsome validity in the sense that it is extremely hard (if notimpossible) to assume that society is made up of socialscientists that would immediately react to a change such as thatproposed by Mitu's textbook. Nonetheless I draw attention againto the important issue of politicization. Even if society doesnot listen to historians and their debates, it seems safe toassume that when politicians render the impression that thetextbook will fuel sensitive issues such as purported Hungarianrevisionism, society is likely to respond. The obsessive use of"what history are we teaching our children?" rhetoric is likelyto directly influence the significantly greater electorateschooled in communism (the 10 years since the fall of communismwere not sufficient to consider a generational change), who wassocialized with the fundamental myths of continuation, unity andthe nation. Consequently it seems rather clear that culturalreproduction in post-socialist Romania was still revolving aroundnational identity. This scandal highlights that despite anoutward rhetoric of breaking with the ethno-centered communistapproach to nationalism, the underlying truth is that national

identification was still a key coordinate of post-socialistRomanian society and its politics

Conclusions

Broadly speaking, historical discourses in post-socialistRomania seem to gravitate around the attempt of putting forward ahard-core argument of why Romanian's particular historicaltrajectory recommends it as a natural enlargement goal for theEuropean Community.

The 1999-2000 alternative text-book scandal and the vicious"de-mystification" circle seem to be powerfully intertwined:although oppressive ethno-national discourses are not used inpolitical competitions, there is an institutionalized culturalreproduction that ensures the presence of a latent nationalistdiscourse. The background is not purely political rhetoric, ashistorians themselves seem to be locked into a debate in whicheveryone espouses a more "truthful" history than the other. Thecriticism that society does not follow historians fails whenfaced with the institutionalization of a rigid ethno-centeredapproach to history. Certainly, the polarization between thetext-books and historians must not be directly equated with asocietal polarization. On the other hand, polarized historicalnarratives seemed to point towards normative stances more thanactual methodologies of historical research: the teleology of theEast/West ethnic/civic divide.

To be fair to the sides, I am not arguing that they areputting forward pseudo-scientific research, rather that theconclusions they seem to draw have less to do with history than

with the politics of nation-branding and nation-building.Consequently, post-socialist Romania seems to be exhibiting anexaggerated identity crisis based on its efforts to join the EUand the continuous struggle for reconciliation with the past. Thenatural backlash effect of the communist ethno-centered discourseis that open nationalist rhetoric does not raise much politicalsupport (being perceived as extremist), yet socialization isstill done under a very rigid pattern that continuouslyemphasizes the mythology of continuation, unity and nation-hood.Institutionalized cultural reproduction seems be revolving arounda different type of discourse (certainly, it is far-fetched tocall either Boia and his followers or the critics as"communists"), which touches however on a hard-core set of issuesthat is continuously preserved.

All things considered, nationalism in post-socialist Romaniaappears not to be a freak occurrence, nor is it a persona non grataof public discourse. The efforts of tearing down socialistlegacies (institutional and intellectual) seem locked, for thetime being, in a vicious circle. Nonetheless, open and fairdebate has taken a fairly solid grip in the Romanian environment,leaving the door open for the possibility of reconciliation withthe past and a fair reconsidering of Romania's place in anintegrated regional narrative.

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