Nicușor Dan defeated George Simion in Romania’s presidential election on 18 May. Mihaela Mihai writes that while Dan’s success has been hailed as a victory for pro-European liberalism over the far right, there is an urgent need to address the sources of resentment that nearly carried Simion to power.
In December 2024, Romania – an EU and NATO member – sent international shockwaves when its Constitutional Court annulled the first round of the country’s presidential elections, which had placed a far-right candidate in pole position.
Due to campaign finance fraud and foreign interference in the electoral process, the Romanian state pulled the emergency brake on Călin Georgescu, a pro-Russian, anti-NATO and anti-EU candidate. Through a series of measures that one could describe as militantly democratic, Romania’s European orientation was temporarily safeguarded, and the elections were rescheduled for 2025.
On Sunday 18 May, Romanians voted in the much-anticipated rescheduled presidential race. The vote was a runoff between the pro-European liberal mayor of Bucharest, Nicușor Dan, and George Simion, the current president of the far-right Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR).
A high turn-out, the depreciation of Romania’s national currency at the prospect of a far-right presidency, and strong mobilisation in urban areas carried Dan to victory. He won 53.6% of the overall number of votes, but only 44.1% of the large vote by the Romanian diaspora.
Simion and the diaspora
Romania has the largest diaspora in Europe, with 6.5 million Romanians living and working abroad, contributing 2% of Romania’s GDP. In terms of the distribution of Romanian votes in Europe, one aspect is particularly striking: Simion won in all major Western European countries – Italy, Germany, France, Spain and the UK. These countries are hosts to large Romanian communities, in which construction, agricultural and hospitality workers are predominant. Moreover, it is in these countries where incidents of exploitation and discrimination have been amply documented.
While more than 80% of Romanians are employed in these countries, they have faced a barrage of negative stereotypes portraying them as “benefit tourists”, “criminals” and “white but not quite”. They have often been systematically underpaid or employed in menial jobs that the local populations reject. Austria’s cynical blocking of Romania’s entry into the Schengen area and the numerous charter flights transporting Romanians to Western Europe to work without any consideration for their health during the COVID-19 pandemic are just two glaring examples of Romania’s second-rate European status.
Until very recently, AUR was the only party that directly addressed the European diaspora. Since he founded AUR in 2019, Simion has been campaigning intensively abroad, reaping electoral gains. While Western and Central European far-right populists focus on immigration and the demonisation of Muslim populations, the Romanian far right has highlighted the demographic costs of the country’s integration into Western capitalism after 1989.
Aggressive nationalism and an ideal of demographic reconstruction motivated AUR’s leaders to focus on an electorate neglected by the centrist parties. The opposition between the elites and the “many and forgotten” was thus skilfully mobilised by Simion to broaden his electorate, inside and outside Romania. In addition, AUR combined far-right ideology with left-wing, social justice elements in a way that resonated directly with the often frustrating and difficult experience of many Romanians, for whom emigration did not mean prosperity and dignity, but exploitation, humiliation and disappointment.
Classist disdain
The diaspora’s support for Simion and his party must also be understood in a context where Dan’s supporters tend to confirm the far right’s accusation of elitism and disdain for the downtrodden. Mostly representing the emergent middle class concentrated in large urban centres, Dan’s campaign promoted a message of respectability, expertise and competence, which was juxtaposed with Simion’s populist “flaunting of the low”.
A mathematician with a PhD from a top Parisian university, the uncharismatic Dan has thus galvanised an electorate that cares deeply about social decorum and who aspires to be fully recognised as part of a much-idealised “European civilisation”. This is a European civilisation into which – they suppose – Simion’s uncouth voters could never integrate.
Dan’s supporters long for an effective expert, a morally unpolluted technocrat, who can rise above the corrupt “swamp” of Romanian politics and finally deliver on the European dream of prosperity and dignity. For this sector, apolitical technical knowledge is the only safe bet against the risks posed by incompetent and corrupt leadership. Though Dan himself adopted a careful tone and sent a message of unity, his supporters have often vituperated against Simion’s coarse public performances and vulgar language, displaying a great deal of classist disdain for him and his electorate.
In doing so they did nothing but validate the populist Manichean message opposing the elite to the “real” people and further fuelled the already intense political polarisation in the country. In particular, they exacerbated the class and home/diaspora cleavages that Dan must now carefully address.
Enduring challenges
As the newly elected president, Dan faces the difficult challenge of forming a government that understands the need to tackle the systemic sources of the current wave of far-right resurgence, at home and abroad. This is no easy task against the background of a very high deficit. The imminent danger may have been averted but, in the absence of robust economic and political measures to address inequality and the resentments it produces, democracy will remain fragile.
The distribution of Simion’s support among the diaspora should also raise important questions for Western European policymakers. They should note the specific Eastern European resentments that Simion has capitalised on and the potential for their capture by sovereigntist populists peddling a powerful social justice message.
Note: This article gives the views of the author, not the position of EUROPP – European Politics and Policy or the London School of Economics. Featured image credit: aaddyy / Shutterstock.com