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Romania Joint Party-State Organizations
Joint party-state organizations were an innovation in
Romanian
political life; the Constitution made no reference to
them.
Ceausescu used the organizations to increase his authority
and
minimize the possibility of government action that could
challenge
the power structure. At the beginning of 1989 there were
nine joint
party-state organizations. Five of them were headed by
either
Nicolae or Elena Ceausescu: the Defense Council; the
Supreme
Council for Economic and Social Development; the National
Council
for Science and Education; the National Council for
Science and
Technology; and the National Council of Working People.
The
remaining party-state organizations were the National
Council for
Agriculture, Food Industry, Forestry, and Water
Management; the
Central Council of Workers' Control of Economic and Social
Activities; the Economic and Social Organization Council;
and the
Silviculture Council.
The names of these organizations themselves bespeak the
ambiguity and redundancy of their powers. Alongside the
existing
ministries and other central organizations, three of the
joint
party-state organizations dealt with economic problems,
two with
science, two with agriculture and forestry, and two with
social
problems. The new structures were accountable to both the
PCR
Central Committee and the Council of Ministers or the
State
Council. The regional branches of some of the party-state
councils
were placed under the direct supervision of local party
committees.
One of the most important joint party-state
organizations and
the first to be created (in 1969), the Defense Council had
decision-making powers for high-level military affairs. At
the
inception of the Defense Council, its chairman, Ceausescu,
automatically became supreme commander of the armed
forces. After
1974 the president of the republic became ex officio
chairman of
the Defense Council. Some observers considered the
creation of the
council a move to weaken Ceausescu's opponents in the
armed
forces.
The membership of the Defense Council reflected its
importance.
Besides the chairman, other members were the prime
minister, the
minister of national defense, the minister of interior,
the
minister of foreign affairs, the chairman of the
Department of
State Security, the chairman of the State Planning
Committee, the
chief of staff--who held the position of ex officio
secretary--and
three other members. Among the members in the late 1980s
was
General Ilie Ceausescu, the president's brother, who was
the chief
of the Higher Political Council of the Army and the
official
historian of the regime.
The Supreme Council for Economic and Social
Development,
created to supervise development of the national economy
and to
coordinate social and economic planning, had fourteen
sections,
which paralleled both the existing ministries and State
Planning
Committee departments with similar areas of concern.
Another joint
party-state organization, the Central Council of Workers'
Control
of Economic and Social Activities had broad authority to
make
overall economic policy and to ensure plan fulfillment
(see Administration and Control
, ch. 3).
Data as of July 1989
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