If you follow us on Twitter (and you really ought to) then you would have noticed we had a thing or two to say earlier today about Prince Charles, currently visiting Romania to launch a programme dedicated to ‘preserving Romania’s rural traditions and village culture.’ According to this Associated Press report the Prince views Romania’s villages as ‘the country’s most valuable assets, and a prime example of sustainable development.’ I bet he does.
For anyone wanting to sustain poverty, which is exactly what Charles and his ilk – who believe in a natural order of things, which reinforces their divine right to lord it over the lower orders – want, then the Romanian countryside is indeed a model of that natural order. The vast majority of people live in utter poverty, often without basic facilities, while a few, landed gentry- including Charles himself, who owns an enormous estate in Transylvania – enjoy the kind of lifestyle they can only dream of.
Leaving aside the whims of a few wealthy aristos, what the Romanian countryside really needs is progress. It needs a spurt of growth that will create wealth and drag as many people as possible – preferably all – out of poverty. Now, like all growth, that spurt will no doubt be unsustainable. So what? The industrial revolution was unsustainable. Didn’t make it wrong.
Many locals fawn over Charles whenever he visits, ad his wish to preserve the status quo in the villages is indeed well supported in Romania – surprisingly so until you learn what went on here two decades ago: systemization.
The systemization programme, which called for little less than the destruction of almost every village in Romania, was horrific, and wrong, and at the time Charles was part of an informal coalition of high profile people who rightly spoke out against it. As such, the programme never fully got off the ground. Yet scars are deep, and memories long, and today, the most visible legacy of systemization is a fear, heavily prevalent in the countryside, of modernisation.
Romania’s countryside should not be destroyed. Even the most staunch advocate of progressive politics would agree with that. But a campaign of massive public works and improvement in living standards is necessary.
Here are just five things which need to be done in the Romanian countryside and which should be beyond the opposition of anyone with an interest in improving people’s lives:
1. Running water in all homes
2. All homes to be connected to the national electricity grid
3. All homes to be connected to mains gas
4. Encouragement (via tax breaks or subsidies) for companies investing in rural towns and providing non-agricultural jobs to rural residents
5. Good public transport from villages to towns
Too much to ask?
Perhaps, but only when all that’s done – when life in the countryside is worth living, in other words – should we start to think about preserving it.
{ 9 comments… read them below or add one }
OMG, I can't even sleep anymore, can you imagine Romanian policemen with 1000-1500 RON pensions?! I can do whatever I want, I can go for fake VAT recovery, I can setup claims against insurance companies and with 1000 Euro I can buy Basescu's personal guards if I want =))
I'm telling you guys, this is huuuuuge, if you want to make a few millions in 2-3 years be prepared when this law comes out!
You're gonna show 100 Euro to the police and their knees will shake!
Check this out:
http://www.realitatea.net/pensiile-speciale-vor-f…
Who wants to bet with me that as soon as this happens I'm gonna bring 2 containers of fake merchandise from China with no setback? The poor customs officers are gonna scream for 1000 Euro bribe
Yes Sir, I missed the train from the 90's, I was too young but here's my chance again…
I am sure those living in rural poverty would be reassured to know that their grinding way of life is keeping you interested and giving you a sense of adventure
My interest in Romania is with the intact rural life. Take it all away and I would have no reason to come here. Up until recently, Romania represented true adventure. When I spent a year in Maramures in 2003 I had an Iridium Satellite phone with me as there was no other way to call out! I really think that your argument Craig is too simplistic. Romania has preserved a way of life that went by the wayside in Western Europe 100-200 years ago. To modernize now takes an extremely nuanced approach as you are mixing 21st century technology with medieval belifs and village structure.
I can understand you having something against Charles and all he stands for but I can’t believe he wouldn’t agree with your sensible list of things needed for villages (who can disagree with running water and elec for all?) But surely the best solution for all villages is to offer incentives to introduce small renewable energy systems. If every household could have a sewage-to-biogas system in their yard they could produce their own cooking gas; and modern biomass power stations that run off farm waste could provide enough hot water for whole communities, as well as sell green elec to the grid. And there are all sorts of ecological ways of purifying water and improving agriculture. I don’t see why these “sustainable, renewable, ecological” approaches are designed to keep the locals in poverty; surely they are the key to get out of it.
Your suggestions are just as unattainable as the ones proposed by Prince Charles. There must also be taken into account the sheer size of Romania (a bit smaller than the UK), with about half of the population living in absolute rural environment. Another important aspect is the mentality of the Romanian countryside dweller shaped over centuries of domination by aggressive and greedy imperial and local overlords, not speaking the last five decades of communist half backed industrialisation of a near-medieval mostly-rural society. In order to modernise they need a sea change in their mental make up. That would add manifolds to the costs that I don’t even dare to think about. The process will thus most probably take about two generations in Romania. Instead waiting for allocating vast amounts of money that anyway will go down the drain or in the pockets of the local pathetic Romanian elite, they shall concentrate developing zones suitable for genuine rural modernisation like the areas around large towns or the wonderful zone of Saxon Transylvania, rightly promoted by Prince Charles as one of the best assets of this country.
I said I wasn't going to post on this blog anymore, but if you think that's what we need for the countryside in order to make the area modern – then I think it's gonna happen when Ceausescu will be born again.
No way Sir, we don't have the people and the money to make such terrible changes. We are already in debt by 80 billion $ and we have done almost nothing with the money, financial crisis part II (with 25% inflation) is about to come in the next 10 years so the perspective of moving to Mars is closer than the perspective of having a modern countryside.
What you suggest is expensive and takes far longer than traditional methods of providing the basics to people. Biomass power stations are far more expensive than good old coal, and relying on them would mean making people wait longer and pay more for their electricity. This is why China continues to build coal-fired power plants apace, and not those which rely on renewables: coal is cheaper and will drag more people out of poverty quicker. Imagine if western Europe had ignored coal! We'd still be living off the land and dying at 35.
Well Geronimo it is a tricky situation from my viewpoint since although rural life is difficult, it is a fully lived existence in touch with the land. To those of us not living it, rural life looks really tough, hence Craig's list of suggestions above. But if it the only life you have ever known, then you view rural life in a different way. What makes the world interesting is that there are still places that are not like everywhere else.