''Conducător'' (, "
Leader
Leadership, both as a research area and as a practical skill, encompasses the ability of an individual, group or organization to "lead", influence or guide other individuals, teams, or entire organizations. The word "leadership" often gets vi ...
") was the title used officially by
Romania
Romania ( ; ro, România ) is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern, and Southeast Europe, Southeastern Europe. It borders Bulgaria to the south, Ukraine to the north, Hungary to the west, S ...
n dictator
Ion Antonescu
Ion Antonescu (; ; – 1 June 1946) was a Romanian military officer and marshal who presided over two successive wartime dictatorships as Prime Minister and ''Conducător'' during most of World War II.
A Romanian Army career officer who made ...
during
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
, also occasionally used in official discourse to refer to
Carol II
Carol II (4 April 1953) was King of Romania from 8 June 1930 until his forced abdication on 6 September 1940. The eldest son of Ferdinand I, he became crown prince upon the death of his grand-uncle, King Carol I in 1914. He was the first of th ...
and
Nicolae Ceaușescu
Nicolae Ceaușescu ( , ; – 25 December 1989) was a Romanian communist politician and dictator. He was the general secretary of the Romanian Communist Party from 1965 to 1989, and the second and last Communist leader of Romania. He was ...
.
History
The word is derived from the Romanian verb ''a conduce'', from the
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
''ducere'' ("to lead"), cognate with such titles as ''
dux
''Dux'' (; plural: ''ducēs'') is Latin for "leader" (from the noun ''dux, ducis'', "leader, general") and later for duke and its variant forms (doge, duce, etc.). During the Roman Republic and for the first centuries of the Roman Empire, '' ...
'', ''
duke
Duke is a male title either of a monarch ruling over a duchy, or of a member of royalty, or nobility. As rulers, dukes are ranked below emperors, kings, grand princes, grand dukes, and sovereign princes. As royalty or nobility, they are ran ...
'', ''
duce
( , ) is an Italian title, derived from the Latin word 'leader', and a cognate of ''duke''. National Fascist Party leader Benito Mussolini was identified by Fascists as ('The Leader') of the movement since the birth of the in 1919. In 1925 ...
'' and ''
doge
A doge ( , ; plural dogi or doges) was an elected lord and head of state in several Italian city-states, notably Venice and Genoa, during the medieval and renaissance periods. Such states are referred to as " crowned republics".
Etymology
The ...
''. Its meaning also parallels other titles, such as ''
Führer
( ; , spelled or ''Fuhrer'' when the Umlaut (diacritic), umlaut is not available) is a German word meaning "leader" or "guide". As a political title, it is strongly associated with the Nazi Germany, Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler.
Nazi Germany ...
'' in
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...
, ''
Duce
( , ) is an Italian title, derived from the Latin word 'leader', and a cognate of ''duke''. National Fascist Party leader Benito Mussolini was identified by Fascists as ('The Leader') of the movement since the birth of the in 1919. In 1925 ...
'' in
Fascist Italy and ''
caudillo
A ''caudillo'' ( , ; osp, cabdillo, from Latin , diminutive of ''caput'' "head") is a type of personalist leader wielding military and political power. There is no precise definition of ''caudillo'', which is often used interchangeably with " ...
'' in
Francoist Spain
Francoist Spain ( es, España franquista), or the Francoist dictatorship (), was the period of Spanish history between 1939 and 1975, when Francisco Franco ruled Spain after the Spanish Civil War with the title . After his death in 1975, Spai ...
.
It was first employed as an additional title by King
Carol II
Carol II (4 April 1953) was King of Romania from 8 June 1930 until his forced abdication on 6 September 1940. The eldest son of Ferdinand I, he became crown prince upon the death of his grand-uncle, King Carol I in 1914. He was the first of th ...
during the final years of the
National Renaissance Front
The National Renaissance Front ( ro, Frontul Renașterii Naționale, FRN; also translated as ''Front of National Regeneration'', ''Front of National Rebirth'', ''Front of National Resurrection'', or ''Front of National Renaissance'') was a Romani ...
regime,
[Cioroianu, p. 416] and soon after employed by Marshal
Ion Antonescu
Ion Antonescu (; ; – 1 June 1946) was a Romanian military officer and marshal who presided over two successive wartime dictatorships as Prime Minister and ''Conducător'' during most of World War II.
A Romanian Army career officer who made ...
as he assumed
dictatorial powers after September 14, 1940. Nominally, Antonescu was
Prime Minister
A prime minister, premier or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. Under those systems, a prime minister is not ...
and the role of head of state was filled by
King Michael, but all real power rested with Antonescu. According to historian
Adrian Cioroianu
Adrian Mihai Cioroianu (born January 5, 1967, Craiova, Romania) is a Romanian historian, politician, journalist, and essayist. A lecturer for the History Department at the University of Bucharest, he is the author of several books dealing with R ...
, through the use of the term, Antonescu meant to highlight connections with Germany, and after the
fall
Autumn, also known as fall in American English and Canadian English, is one of the four temperate seasons on Earth. Outside the tropics, autumn marks the transition from summer to winter, in September (Northern Hemisphere) or March ( Southe ...
of the
Iron Guard
The Iron Guard ( ro, Garda de Fier) was a Romanian militant revolutionary fascist movement and political party founded in 1927 by Corneliu Zelea Codreanu as the Legion of the Archangel Michael () or the Legionnaire Movement (). It was strongly ...
from shared government (the ''
National Legionary State
The National Legionary State was a Totalitarianism, totalitarian Fascism, fascist regime which governed Kingdom of Romania, Romania for five months, from 14 September 1940 until its official dissolution on 14 February 1941. The regime was led by ...
''), his own personal regime.
The term was occasionally used in official discourse as a reference to
Nicolae Ceaușescu
Nicolae Ceaușescu ( , ; – 25 December 1989) was a Romanian communist politician and dictator. He was the general secretary of the Romanian Communist Party from 1965 to 1989, and the second and last Communist leader of Romania. He was ...
, leader of the
Socialist Republic of Romania
The Socialist Republic of Romania ( ro, Republica Socialistă România, RSR) was a Marxist–Leninist one-party socialist state that existed officially in Romania from 1947 to 1989. From 1947 to 1965, the state was known as the Romanian People ...
, starting in the
period
Period may refer to:
Common uses
* Era, a length or span of time
* Full stop (or period), a punctuation mark
Arts, entertainment, and media
* Period (music), a concept in musical composition
* Periodic sentence (or rhetorical period), a concept ...
after 1971, at a time when the
Romanian Communist Party
The Romanian Communist Party ( ro, Partidul Comunist Român, , PCR) was a communist party in Romania. The successor to the pro-Bolshevik wing of the Socialist Party of Romania, it gave ideological endorsement to a communist revolution that woul ...
grew in membership but decreased in importance due to
Ceaușescu's increasing personality cult. It was used in parallel with the rarer ''cârmaci'' ("
helmsman
A helmsman or helm (sometimes driver) is a person who steering, steers a ship, sailboat, submarine, other type of maritime vessel, or spacecraft. The rank and seniority of the helmsman may vary: on small vessels such as fishing vessels and yacht ...
"), in turn borrowed from similar rhetoric in
totalitarian state
Totalitarianism is a form of government and a political system that prohibits all opposition parties, outlaws individual and group opposition to the state and its claims, and exercises an extremely high if not complete degree of control and regul ...
s such as
North Korea
North Korea, officially the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), is a country in East Asia. It constitutes the northern half of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and shares borders with China and Russia to the north, at the Yalu River, Y ...
and
China
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...
under
Mao Zedong
Mao Zedong pronounced ; also romanised traditionally as Mao Tse-tung. (26 December 1893 – 9 September 1976), also known as Chairman Mao, was a Chinese communist revolutionary who was the founder of the People's Republic of China (PRC) ...
.
While references to the Party as the "
vanguard of the working class" fell out of use,
power became centered on Ceauşescu's prerogative to issue orders to the political apparatus.
The choice of the term was also meant to highlight a symbolic connection with the
Princes of Wallachia and the
Princes of Moldavia (another comparison in use was that between Ceaușescu and the
Dacia
Dacia (, ; ) was the land inhabited by the Dacians, its core in Transylvania, stretching to the Danube in the south, the Black Sea in the east, and the Tisza in the west. The Carpathian Mountains were located in the middle of Dacia. It thus r ...
n leaders of Antiquity).
[Gallagher, p. 61] Additionally, during the same period, Communist sources began depicting Antonescu in a favorable light.
Starting from a model applied to the entire
Eastern Bloc
The Eastern Bloc, also known as the Communist Bloc and the Soviet Bloc, was the group of socialist states of Central and Eastern Europe, East Asia, Southeast Asia, Africa, and Latin America under the influence of the Soviet Union that existed du ...
by
Polish
Polish may refer to:
* Anything from or related to Poland, a country in Europe
* Polish language
* Poles, people from Poland or of Polish descent
* Polish chicken
*Polish brothers (Mark Polish and Michael Polish, born 1970), American twin screenwr ...
political scientist Andrzej Korboński, differentiating Communist leaderships in types of ''primus inter pares'' (collective leadership) and ''primus'' (personal rule), Cioroianu concluded that Romania's choice for the latter alternative was most likely based on local political tradition. In Cioroianu's view, Ceaușescu's system drew its other major source of legitimacy from
political clientelism
In the politics of Representative democracy, representative democracies, a political machine is a party organization that recruits its members by the use of tangible incentives (such as money or political jobs) and that is characterized by a hig ...
(resulting in what he called "an orbital political system").
The new political relations, largely based on the ''Conducătors charisma, were likened to various other dictatorial regimes of the 20th century, and included by
Houchang Esfandiar Chehabi and
Juan José Linz
Juan José Linz Storch de Gracia (24 December 1926 – 1 October 2013) was a Spanish sociologist and political scientist specializing in comparative politics. He was Sterling Professor Emeritus of Sociology and Political Science at Yale Univers ...
among the various "Sultanistic regimes"the title itself has drawn comparisons with other ones created by dictatorial leaders for themselves: ''
Aryamehr
Aryamehr ( fa, آریامهر, Âryâmehr, ) was the title used in the Pahlavi dynasty by Shahanshah Mohammad Reza Shah of Iran. It means ''Light of the Aryans''.
History
''Aryamehr'' was granted as a secondary title by a session of the joint H ...
'' (used by Iran's
Mohammad Reza Pahlavi
, title = Shahanshah Aryamehr Bozorg Arteshtaran
, image = File:Shah_fullsize.jpg
, caption = Shah in 1973
, succession = Shah of Iran
, reign = 16 September 1941 – 11 February 1979
, coronation = 26 October ...
), ''Mobutu Sese Seko Kuku Ngbendu Wa Za Banga'' (in
Joseph-Désiré Mobutu
Mobutu Sese Seko Kuku Ngbendu Wa Za Banga (; born Joseph-Désiré Mobutu; 14 October 1930 – 7 September 1997) was a Congolese politician and military officer who was the List of heads of state of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, presiden ...
's Zaire), the
Imperial designation of
Central Africa
Central Africa is a subregion of the African continent comprising various countries according to different definitions. Angola, Burundi, the Central African Republic, Chad, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Republic of the Congo, ...
(under
Jean-Bédel Bokassa
Jean-Bédel Bokassa (; 22 February 1921 – 3 November 1996), also known as Bokassa I, was a Central African political and military leader who served as the second president of the Central African Republic (CAR) and as the emperor of its s ...
), ''Benefactor de la Patria'' (imposed by
Rafael Leónidas Trujillo
Rafael Leónidas Trujillo Molina ( , ; 24 October 189130 May 1961), nicknamed ''El Jefe'' (, "The Chief" or "The Boss"), was a Dominican dictator who ruled the Dominican Republic from February 1930 until his assassination in May 1961. He ser ...
in the
Dominican Republic
The Dominican Republic ( ; es, República Dominicana, ) is a country located on the island of Hispaniola in the Greater Antilles archipelago of the Caribbean region. It occupies the eastern five-eighths of the island, which it shares wit ...
), and ''Conqueror of the
British Empire
The British Empire was composed of the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates, and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It began with the overseas possessions and trading posts esta ...
etc.'' (in
Idi Amin's Uganda).
Influence
Several
Serbia
Serbia (, ; Serbian language, Serbian: , , ), officially the Republic of Serbia (Serbian language, Serbian: , , ), is a landlocked country in Southeast Europe, Southeastern and Central Europe, situated at the crossroads of the Pannonian Bas ...
n sources have repeatedly alleged that the
Croatia
, image_flag = Flag of Croatia.svg
, image_coat = Coat of arms of Croatia.svg
, anthem = "Lijepa naša domovino"("Our Beautiful Homeland")
, image_map =
, map_caption =
, capit ...
n politician , a member of the
League of Communists of Croatia
League of Communists of Croatia ( sh, Savez komunista Hrvatske or SKH) was the Croatian branch of the League of Communists of Yugoslavia (SKJ). It came into power in 1945. Until 1952, it was known as Communist Party of Croatia (''Komunistička ...
inside
Communist Yugoslavia
The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, commonly referred to as SFR Yugoslavia or simply as Yugoslavia, was a country in Central and Southeast Europe. It emerged in 1945, following World War II, and lasted until 1992, with the breakup of Yugo ...
and a confidant of
President
President most commonly refers to:
*President (corporate title)
*President (education), a leader of a college or university
*President (government title)
President may also refer to:
Automobiles
* Nissan President, a 1966–2010 Japanese ful ...
Josip Broz Tito
Josip Broz ( sh-Cyrl, Јосип Броз, ; 7 May 1892 – 4 May 1980), commonly known as Tito (; sh-Cyrl, Тито, links=no, ), was a Yugoslav communist revolutionary and statesman, serving in various positions from 1943 until his deat ...
, was an active campaigner for Croatian independence. Among other allegations, Krajačić was accused of having adopted the nickname "''Conducător'' of
Separatism
Separatism is the advocacy of cultural, ethnic, tribal, religious, racial, governmental or gender separation from the larger group. As with secession, separatism conventionally refers to full political separation. Groups simply seeking greate ...
", as a compliment to Ceaușescu's dictatorial stance.
[MacDonald, p. 192]
See also
* ''
Führer
( ; , spelled or ''Fuhrer'' when the Umlaut (diacritic), umlaut is not available) is a German word meaning "leader" or "guide". As a political title, it is strongly associated with the Nazi Germany, Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler.
Nazi Germany ...
''
* ''
Duce
( , ) is an Italian title, derived from the Latin word 'leader', and a cognate of ''duke''. National Fascist Party leader Benito Mussolini was identified by Fascists as ('The Leader') of the movement since the birth of the in 1919. In 1925 ...
''
Notes
References
*David Berry, ''The Romanian Mass Media and Cultural Development'', Ashgate Publishing, Aldershot, 2004
*Henry E. Brady, Cynthia S. Kaplan, "Eastern Europe and the Former Soviet Union", in David Butler, Austin Ranney, ''Referendums Around the World: The Growing Use of Direct Democracy'',
American Enterprise Institute
The American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, known simply as the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), is a center-right Washington, D.C.–based think tank that researches government, politics, economics, and social welfare. ...
, Washington D.C., 1994
*Ion C. Butnaru, ''The Silent Holocaust: Romania and Its Jews'', Praeger/Greenwood, Westport, 1992
*
Houchang Esfandiar Chehabi,
Juan José Linz
Juan José Linz Storch de Gracia (24 December 1926 – 1 October 2013) was a Spanish sociologist and political scientist specializing in comparative politics. He was Sterling Professor Emeritus of Sociology and Political Science at Yale Univers ...
, ''Sultanistic Regimes'',
Johns Hopkins University Press
The Johns Hopkins University Press (also referred to as JHU Press or JHUP) is the publishing division of Johns Hopkins University. It was founded in 1878 and is the oldest continuously running university press in the United States. The press publi ...
, Baltimore, London, 1998
*
Adrian Cioroianu
Adrian Mihai Cioroianu (born January 5, 1967, Craiova, Romania) is a Romanian historian, politician, journalist, and essayist. A lecturer for the History Department at the University of Bucharest, he is the author of several books dealing with R ...
, ''Pe umerii lui Marx. O introducere în istoria comunismului românesc'' ("On the Shoulders of Marx. An Incursion into the History of Romanian Communism"),
Editura Curtea Veche
Editura Curtea Veche (Curtea Veche Publishing House) is a Romanian publishing house with a tradition in editing works of Romanian literature. After the Romanian Revolution of 1989, Curtea Veche started editing more foreign books, such as BBC #REDIR ...
, Bucharest, 2005
*Tom Gallagher, ''Theft of a Nation: Romania since Communism'', C. Hurst & Co., London, 2005
*Barbara Jelavich, ''History of the Balkans'',
Cambridge University Press
Cambridge University Press is the university press of the University of Cambridge. Granted letters patent by Henry VIII of England, King Henry VIII in 1534, it is the oldest university press
A university press is an academic publishing hou ...
, Cambridge, 1983
*
Gail Kligman
Gail may refer to:
People
*Gail (given name), list of notable people with the given name
Surname
* Jean-Baptiste Gail (1755–1829), French Hellenist scholar
* Max Gail (born 1943), American actor
* Sophie Gail (1775–1819), French singer and ...
, ''The Politics of Duplicity: Controlling Reproduction in Ceausescu's Romania'',
University of California Press
The University of California Press, otherwise known as UC Press, is a publishing house associated with the University of California that engages in academic publishing. It was founded in 1893 to publish scholarly and scientific works by faculty ...
, Berkeley, Los Angeles, London, 1998
*David Bruce MacDonald, ''Balkan Holocausts? Serbian and Croatian Victim-Centred Propaganda and the War in Yugoslavia'',
Manchester University Press
Manchester University Press is the university press of the University of Manchester, England and a publisher of academic books and journals. Manchester University Press has developed into an international publisher. It maintains its links with th ...
, Manchester, New York 2002
{{DEFAULTSORT:Conducator
Socialist Republic of Romania
Fascism in Romania
Romania in World War II
Heads of state of Romania
Romanian words and phrases
Titles of national or ethnic leadership