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Romania Social Mobility
Declining social mobility was another important factor
in the
growing discontent among the citizenry. The economic
development
following the imposition of communist rule created
considerable
upward mobility. The fast-growing industrial sector
demanded more
laborers, skilled workers, and managers. The
ever-expanding state
bureaucracy required an army of clerks and administrators,
and the
regime needed thousands of writers, artists, and
philosophers to
help create the new socialist man and woman. The rapid
development
of free education created a demand for teachers. In 1969
more than
83 percent of the working population were the product of
this mass
social mobility and held positions of greater status than
had their
fathers. More than 43 percent of those in upper-level
positions had
working-class origins, and 25 percent had peasant
backgrounds. In
contrast, only 14 percent had roots in the intelligentsia.
As the economic transformation slowed, such phenomenal
social
mobility was no longer possible. Fewer positions at the
top were
being created, and they were becoming less accessible to
the
children of workers and peasants. The new economy demanded
skilled
personnel, and educational credentials became more
important than
political criteria for recruitment into high-status
positions.
Statistics showed that children of intellectuals and
officials were
far more likely to acquire these credentials than were
children of
peasants and workers. In the late 1960s, when peasants and
workers
constituted over 85 percent of the population, their
children made
up only 47 percent of the university student body, whereas
children
of the intelligentsia filled 45-50 percent of university
slots.
Moreover, members of the intellectual elite were more
likely to
find places for their children in the most prestigious
universities
and faculties, whereas students from worker and peasant
backgrounds
were concentrated in the less sought after agricultural
and
technical institutions.
Such inequalities persisted into the late 1980s,
largely
because children of the intelligentsia had better
opportunity to
acquire language facility and positive attitudes toward
learning.
Furthermore, these families were more able to prepare
their
children for the competitive selection process through
private
tutoring. Some resorted to bribery to obtain special
consideration
for their children. A child from an intellectual family
had a 70
percent chance of entering the university; the child of a
worker or
peasant had only a 10 percent chance.
Despite the regime's repeated assaults on the
intelligentsia
and the ideological efforts to elevate the status of
blue-collar
work, most citizens continued to aspire to intellectual
professions. Studies conducted in the 1970s at the height
of the
ideological crusade against intellectualism and the
privileged
class revealed that the majority of young Romanians
planned to
pursue higher education. Virtually none declared any
desire for a
blue-collar career. And yet as a consequence of the
party's effort
to channel more of the population into production jobs,
opportunities for professional careers grew increasingly
rare.
Enrollment in technical schools had increased to 124,000
by the end
of 1970, which provided a surfeit of low-paid, low-status
engineers.
In the 1980s, it appeared that the boundaries between
the
social strata were beginning to harden. Research conducted
in the
mid-1980s suggested that some 87 percent of citizens born
into the
working class remained blue-collar workers. The
intelligentsia
showed an even greater degree of self-reproduction, and
the rate of
downward mobility from the intellectual elite into other
social
categories was remarkably low--lower in fact than in any
other
European member of Comecon. The hardening stratification
along
traditional lines gave evidence of a growing class
consciousness,
which was most evident among the intelligentsia, whose
values,
attitudes, and interests differed from those of other
segments of
society. Workers, too, exhibited increased class
consciousness, as
their aspirations and expectations went unfulfilled. Not
only did
social mobility in general decrease, it also declined
within the
working class itself, creating greater potential for
social unrest.
Data as of July 1989
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