Neo-Fascism in Romanian Politics and the Role of Social Media

Talk by Adina Marincea (Elie Wiesel National Institute for Studying the Holocaust in Romania) as part of the "Journalist Talks" series. With subsequent discussion.

Călin Georgescu’s success in the first round of the presidential elections in Romania in 2024 took many by surprise. A candidate with little notoriety in mainstream media, not included in the political surveys, with (neo)fascist affinities and an anti-science, conspiracist worldview, often reiterating Kremlin’s narratives, managed to win the votes of over two million Romanians. However, Călin Georgescu was not a new entry on the political scene, and his radical far-right views are the expression of a larger phenomenon: the resurgence of fascist thinking, that started as soon as the ‘90s and had its roots even deeper, in national-communism. This talk will provide an overview of the post-’89 build-up of a neo-fascist mindset and infrastructure that set the stage for its breakthrough into mainstream politics in the 2020 elections, when the populist right-wing party with neo-fascist overtones AUR gained seats in parliament. This moment marked the mainstreamization of far-right discourse, which was weaponized by Călin Georgescu in his 2024 electoral success. Social media such as Facebook and TikTok also played a role in boosting far right and neo-fascist parties and candidates, showing how the democratizing potential of such platforms can be weaponized to subvert democracy.

Adina Marincea is a journalist and researcher at the “Elie Wiesel” National Institute for the Study of the Holocaust in Romania.

Journalist Talks Series is a part of the seeFField project of the University Regensburg in cooperation with the Volkshochschule Regensburg.