In November 1996 a coalition of parties, perceived as reformist and democratic, won the elections in Romania, based on a message against corruption and delays in the economic reform which had characterized the previous PDSR government.

During the last four years, the coalition managed to lose most of its support due to its lack of ability to implement economic reforms, increased poverty (40% of the population lives with less than $4/day) and because the Romanian government was perceived as heavily corrupt and inefficient. The Parliament scored in the public opinion polls as the institution with the lowest degree of trust and appreciation.

In November 2000, Romania managed to get more negative press in two weeks than it did in the previous four years. The electorate punished heavily the main party of the former ruling coalition: The National Paysan Christian Democrat Party (NPCDP). NPCDP and its allies did not even make it in the parliament. The Social Democracy Party of Romania (SDPR), the former ruling party won a comfortable plurality of 48%. The surprising and disturbing result were the 26% that the Greater Romania Party (GRP) managed to get in the first round. GRP is an extremist party that had always had a fairly modest presence (8-13% in the opinion polls) had suddenly jumped in the preference of the electorate.

If the SDPR victory was expected and normal, the high score of GRP and especially the type of electorate that voted for him, according to the exit polls announced after the first round, is extremely surprising:

The GRP won in relatively well off counties, until now traditionally anti –communist and pro democratic, based especially on the votes of the 18-35 age group, the least touched by the previous communist propaganda. No simple explanation exists for this phenomenon and many questions arise for the democracy activists :

• What prompted a large part of the electorate to switch their vote to GRP?
• What is the level of political and civic education of these voters?
• How did they get their political and civic education? If any?
• Aren’t the civic education programs (public or private) and their design in some measure responsible for this result?

A number of sociologists, political analysts and opinion leaders from Romania are anxious to meet and debate the issues above.

Objectives

The objectives of this project are:

• To sparkle the public debate on the issue of education for democracy,
• to signal to the civic organizations and to the donors the grave issues facing Romanian society if it is capable to vote in such a manner
• to start a discussion aimed to lead at more effective strategies for NGOs active in the civic and political education fields.

A white paper on civic and political education issues based on November 2000 elections

A white paper concerning the results of the elections and the civic and political education issues arising from November 2000 election will be drafted by the Foundation for Pluralism. The role of the paper will be to insure a disciplined and focused discussion on the two main questions:

"Do we need a strategy for democratic education?" and " What are the roles of the public and non-governmental organizations in this strategy?"

The paper will be distributed to the main sociological studies institutes, think tanks, newspapers, grant making foundations.

The round table

A roundtable concerning the need of a strategy for education for democracy in Romania will be organized by The Foundation for Pluralism at mid February 2001. The opinions and the research results of the analysts will be shared with the participants.

The discussions intensely moderated, will need to answer several questions:

• Do we have sufficient data at present to explain the results of the elections? If not, what else needs to be found out? How much does it cost? Who can do it?
• Is there a need for a special effort in education for democracy? Or are these results an expression of a regular behavior?
• If additional efforts for democratic education are needed, do we need a strategy as well? There are actors in Romania willing to implement such a strategy?
• If yes, who can do it? Who should do it? Will anyone do it?

Expected outcome

The discussions will be recorded and transcripts together with position papers presented, will constitute the basis for a concept paper that the Foundation for Pluralism will edit and publish. The paper will be presented to the media, donors, public and private institutions working in this sector.

If the paper will rise enough interest, a group to elaborate a civic education strategy will be set up and resources sought to elaborate it.

Current stage

The round table took place on March 24 in Bucharest, at the UNITER conference room. the meeting was attended by: Mrs. Renate Weber, president - Foundation for Open Society,  Randall Tift,  senior - democracy advisor USAID, Alin Teodorescu, director - IMAS, Stelian Tanase, redactor sef  - Sfera Politicii, Andrei Stoiciu, advisor to the President - Presidency of Romania, Dan Petrescu, founding member - Foundation for Pluralism, Adrian Badila, Board member - CENTRAS, Alexandra Luminita Petrescu, president - Foundation for Pluralism.

The bilingual (English and Romanian) white paper was printed and  distributed to partner NGOs.