Abstract
The idea of gender equality has been and still is an exogenous concept in Romanian culture. Initially introduced and institutionalized by communist ideology after World War II along with other utopian egalitarian principles, gender equality remains to this day a somewhat alien concept in practice for the majority of the Romanian population. Nevertheless, in the early twenty-first century, with renewed economic growth and more liberal governance in Romania, the gender equality debate has intensified, and multiple advocacies now compete on the political and social arenas. The most notable actors shaping current attitudes toward women in Romania are the Orthodox Church, political parties, feminist organizations, and the media.
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Notes
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Quoted in Ibid.
Ibid., p. 231.
Gail Kligman, “Abortion and International Adoption in Post-Ceausescu Romania,” in Feminist Studies, vol. 18, No. 2 (Summer 1992), pp. 405–419, p. 407.
Liliana Coica et al., “Raport national privind egalitatea de sanse intre femei si barbati” (National Report regarding the Equality of Opportunities between Men and Women), Bucharest (6 March 2002), at http://turing.cs.pub.ro/cec-wys/documente/raport1.pdf, p. 8.
International Labour Organization (ILO), “Facts and Figures on Gender Equality-Romania,” http://www.ilo.org/public/english/region/eurpro/budapest/download/gender/romania.pdf, pp. 2–3.
The activity rate is a measurement of the labor force participation rate of a specific segment of the population. In this case, the segment is defined as people between 15years of age and retirement age that are employed or seeking employment. The activity rate is represented as a ratio of this segment to the whole population of the country.
ILO,”Facts and Figures”, p. 3.
Svetla Dimitrova, “Un raport evidenţiază problemele legate de egalitatea dintre sexe în Europa de Sud-Est” (Report Highlights Gender Equality Problems in SE Europe) in Southeast European Times, 16 May 2005, at http://www.setimes.com/cocoon/setimes/xhtml/ro/features/setimes/articles/2005/05/16/reportage-01.
Sabrina P. Ramet, “Sliding Backwards – The Fate of Women in Post-1989 East-Central Europe,” in Kakanien Revisited (June 2005), at http://www.kakanien.ac.at/beitr/fallstudie/SRamet1.pdf, p. 3.
Dimitrova, “Un raport”.
Ibid.
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“Sexul slab intareste politica” (The Weaker Sex Strengthens Politics), 10 February 2005, at http://www.romania.dk/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=139.
Ibid.
Ramet, “Sliding Backwards”, p. 1.
Emilia Nistorescu, “Femei in structurile BOR” (Women in the Romanian Orthodox Church), interview with His Holiness Damaschin, bishop of Slobozia and Calarasi, at http://www.crestinortodox.ro/interviuri_Femei_in_structurile_BOR-25–6136.html.
The main difference between the two parties is that while the Christian-Democratic People’s Party has not won enough votes in the last election to be represented in Parliament, the Greater Romania Party has enjoyed astounding success in recent years. In the 2000 election, Corneliu Vadim-Tudor, leader of the party and an infamous extreme right-wing politician, won 33% of the presidential vote, and his party won an average of 20% for the two chambers of parliament. Although his popularity decreased thereafter, in the 2004 election, Vadim-Tudor was third in the presidential election (12.5%), and the Greater Romania Party won a sizable 13% of votes for parliament. [Biroul Electoral Central (Central Electoral Bureau), http://www.bec2004.ro/rezultate.htm].
Speech of Sen. Ioan Aurel Rus, “Şedinţa Senatului din 17 mai 2004” (Senate Meeting of May 17, 2004), transcript of proceedings from Romanian Parliament, http://www.cdep.ro/pls/steno/steno.stenograma?ids=5679&idm=2,1&idl=1.
Speech of Sen. Mircea Mihordea, “Şedinţa Senatului din 26 mai 2003” (Senate Meeting of May 26, 2003), transcript of proceedings from Romanian Parliament, http://www.cdep.ro/pls/steno/steno.stenograma?ids=5505&idm=3,08&idl=1.
Mihaela Miroiu and Liliana Popescu, “Post-Totalitarian Pre-Feminism,” in Henry F. Carey, ed., Romania Since 1989 – Politics, Economics, and Society (Lanham, Md.: Lexington Books, 2004), pp. 297–314, at 298.
Ibid., p. 299.
Ibid., p. 301.
Ibid., p. 307.
Cristina Chiva, “Taking Women Seriously – Equal Opportunities and Romania’s Accession to the European Union,” pp. 2–3, http://www.eumap.org/journal/features/2001/dec/womseriousandromaniasaccess.
Enikõ Magyari-Vincze, “Gender (In)equality in the Post-socialist Romania,” presented at the Gender and Power in the New Europe, the 5th European Feminist Research Conference, 20–24 August 2003, Lund University, Sweden, p. 7.
Ibid., p. 8.
CIA World Fact-book: Romania 2006, http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/ro.html.
Gallup Poll Organization, Rural EuroBarometer, released 25 February 2003, http://www.gallup.ro/download/EuroBarometrulRural_2002.pdf, p. 22.
http://www.reviste.ro/index.php?z=reviste_pe_categorii&id=26 (online directory of Romanian magazines, grouped by subject matter).
Alexandra Oprea, “The Erasure of Romani Women in Statistical Data: Limits of the Race-versus-Gender Approach,” Open Society Institute (2003), at http://www.eumap.org/journal/features/2003/april/romastats, p. 1.
Ibid., p. 5.
Gallup Poll Organization, “Romanians support larger-scale participation of women in politics,” 21 July 2003, http://www.gallup.ro/english/poll/releases/pr030721/pr030721.htm.
Rural EuroBarometer, p. 93.
Cristina L. Olteanu, “Cultul Elenei Ceauşescu în anii’80” (Elena Ceausescu’s Cult of Personality during the 80s), 2004, at http://www.unibuc.ro/eBooks/istorie/ciupala/cultuleneceausescu.htm, p. 19.
Catherine Lovatt, “Women in Politics: The Legacy of Elena Ceausescu,” in Central Europe Review, Vol. 1, No 3 (12 July 1999).
Gallup Poll Organization, “Survey on Violence Against Women in Bucharest” (27 May 2003), at http://www.gallup.ro/english/poll/releases/pr030527/pr030527.htm.
Miroiu and Popescu, “Post-Totalitarian”, p. 302.
CREDO (Resource Center for Human Rights), “Planificarea strategica a retelei ONG-urilor in domeniul social (2004–2006)” (Strategic Planning of the Social NGO Network), June 2004, http://credo.md/arhiva/documente/OD%20PlanStratSocialNetDraft06.pdf, p. 6.
Ramet, “Sliding Backwards”, p. 1.
Silvia Branea, “Private and Public Attitudes on the Gender Topic: A Case Study of Romanian Students,” www.genderomania.ro/book_gender_post/part4, p. 7.
Unicef – Romania – Statistics: 2004, http://www.unicef.org/infobycountry/romania_statistics.html.
Miroiu and Popescu, “Post-Totalitarian”, p. 310.
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Oprica, V. Gender Equality and Conflicting Attitudes Toward Women in Post-Communist Romania. Hum Rights Rev 9, 29–40 (2008). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12142-007-0027-1
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12142-007-0027-1