Nurturing unrest: international media and the demise of Ceauşescuism

Abstract

The present paper analyzes, in a comparative perspective, the role international media played in the demise of the communist regimes in East-Central Europe. It argues that international media identified and, by means of sophisticated methods of mass communication, overemphasized the structural flaws of the communist system. Thus, international media contributed significantly to the shaping of the political cultures of resistance in communist countries and speeded up the process that culminated with the final demise of communist regimes. This paper demonstrates that, due to the specificity of the Romanian communism, i.e., the nature of the regime and community political cultures, international media had a strong impact on the collapse of communism in Romania. International media, Radio Free Europe most prominently, nurtured unrest in Romania by supporting the few radical dissidents in that country during the 1980s and providing a continuous flow of information concerning the unfolding of events in East-Central Europe during the revolutionary year 1989.