Learning Democracy and Market Economy in Post-Communist Romania

This study starts from the assumption that an important requirement for the success of democratic consolidation in post-communist countries is that citizens accept the two defining dimensions of the new regime, democracy and market economy, and the values associated with these. Since these are main components of the political culture, a series of important questions arise: How does political culture change? Is there a single political culture, or are there different patterns of political culture? How do these patterns evolve over time? How can these patterns and their evolution be explained? In my research I analyze these issues by studying the Romanian political culture from the beginning of the transition to the moment Romania became a member of the European Union. To answer these questions I use seventeen years (from 1990 to 2006) of data which will allow me to identify the different patterns of political culture in Romania and to explain their evolution over time.