The electoral story of AUR-Simion-Șoșoacă is about creating a monster to then have someone to heroically fight against. However, these stories can have two endings. To slay the monster or to be slain by it.
Romania does not have an extremist tradition in politics, like Germany, for example. This kind of radicalism is not specific to us. We tend to lean more towards banter or small understandings.
Even major crime in our country does not have the terrifying features seen in other countries. 90% of crimes start with "that evening/day I went to the pub and drank."
When such incidents have occurred and escalated, groups like the Legionnaires, for example, largely emerged because society's frustration with the flaws of the political class and governments surpassed the level, which is extremely high in our case, of tolerance. This frustration led to the adherence to deviant political phenomena.
What is happening now is no exception at all.
The Hand in the Thick Quagmire
"In Romanian society, more and more people are abandoned, unrepresented by the current political class, the authorities' credibility is shattered, education is poor, sources for promoting propaganda and manipulation are increasingly numerous and professional."
The issue is not whether AUR will ever come to power. The problem lies with this silent mass, this opaque and compact layer of society, which receives nothing and no one reaches out to. It is the majority today. If we do not understand that we are the ones who must offer them a solution, we are obliged to help and recover them; it is only a matter of time before a hand emerges from this thick quagmire to tighten its grip on all of us.
Ultimately, our luck is that those in AUR are intellectually unmovable and primitive individuals. But what will we do if an intelligent, charismatic figure emerges and mobilizes this potential explosive permafrost?" historian Mădălin Hodor stated in an interview with SpotMedia.ro in February 2022.
AUR and Șoșoacă are voices of people's frustrations, many of whom are otherwise peaceful, some even educated, who can no longer bear what is being served to them.
If they see no solutions anywhere, if they have no more hope, at least they can somehow vent their anger and helplessness. They seek revenge through voting because they feel unrepresented, unheard, humiliated by those they have repeatedly elected.
And the main driving force, as in Trump's victory in the USA, is economic for the vast, simple mass, without too many principled scruples.
In 2020, the AUR phenomenon caught the simplistic Romanian political class off guard. Where did AUR's 9% come from? The most convenient refuge was in conspiracy theories: the intelligence services created it.
I do not believe in this theory, although a certain connection is almost official, including the involvement of George Simion some time ago for actions outside the country, followed by a possible and with many precedents loss of control.
The AUR phenomenon was created by poor governance, constant defiance of the citizen, the ineptitude of "mainstream" politics, and its catastrophic results, especially economically.
And the appeal to communist nostalgia that Simion constantly makes is actually an appeal to the nostalgia for predictability, order, and the absence of the ostentation with which today's powerful people defy the common man.
Riding the Monster
Although simplistic, Romanian politicians are still cunning and have tried to turn this growing wave of frustration, as governance worsened, into an opportunity.
If there are those who feel the need to vent their frustration, there are also those horrified by this outburst, the more strident and anti-Western it is, people who have acquired some democratic and Western reflexes and find political grotesque displays terrifying.
And following this logic, the created monster was put to work: to mobilize the electorate scared of extremism, Roexit, the revitalization of communism, and primitive nationalism.
It was used in the European elections to justify the joint PSD-PNL list and consolidation with local elections. The plan was to use it for parties to have a common candidate for the presidential elections, but they did not agree on this.
And in the meantime, they continued to feed the monster. Involuntarily, out of incompetence and stupidity, but also voluntarily by amplifying and validating Simion's profile, and then by abusively removing Diana Șoșoacă from the presidential race.
Both Marcel Ciolacu and Nicolae Ciucă are interested in confronting the Simion specter, one looking towards the final showdown, the other aiming to get there.
However, all this fear projected onto Simion to exploit it electorally serves Simion, becoming increasingly attractive to the frustrated and disillusioned. If he is inflated beyond a critical point, it is possible that he may not be deflated and could create a critical mass.