On the occasion of the 30 years since the overthrow of socialism and the restoration of capitalism, the Romanian Academy assigned the conduction of a research regarding the romanian public opinion on several issues.
The survey, which took place between 12 April and 3 May 2019, was conducted by the INSCOP Research Institute and the Laboratory of Informational War and Strategic Communication (LARICS). The research included issues such as the national pride of the Romanian people and their view over a possible union of the country with the Republic of Moldova.
However, the most interesting outcome of the survey is the percentage of those who have a positive view over the old "communist regime", despite the persistent bourgeois anticommunist propaganda that exists in Romania for 30 years.
More specifically, the 27.2% of the participants replied that "communism" (socialism) offered many positive things to Romania in comparison with today's capitalism. A negative opinion about communism (socialism) was expressed by the 29.6% of the respondents. But this is not the end of the story.
A 34.3% of Romanians did not answer directly to the question but, instead, they made a distinction, dividing the "communist period" in two periods.
— The first period, from 1947 to 1965, which has been known as the "Romanian People's Republic (RPR)". This phase of socialism in Romania receives extaordinary positive views by the respondents.
— The second period, from 1965 to 1989, the period of Nicolae Ceausescu which has been known as the "Socialist Republic of Romania" receives more negative opinions.
In the same question, 8.9% of the participants in the survey did not give any answer.
The assumption from this interesting research is that a total of 61.5% of Romanians have a positive view on communism, at least for the first period of socialist construction, from 1947 to 1965. The negative views are concentrated on the period of Ceausescu's leadership, when Romania left the Warsaw Pact, adopted a pro-western stance and began strengthening aspects of "market economy" within the socialist system.
The results of the above survey confirms a tendency that exists in Romania for more than a decade. In July 2010, a similar research conducted by the Romanian Institute of Evaluation and Strategy (Institutul Român pentru Evaluare şi Strategie —IRES) had shown that 63% of the Romanians regarded life under socialism (pre 1989) as better and a 43% of them would vote for Nicolae Ceausescu if he was a candidate in the elections.
It is in the same country - member of the European Union - that the bourgeois state has outlawed the Communist Party and its symbols and persecutes any political activity related to socialism-communism.
