The nostalgia for the times when all were “younger and lovelier” overlaps the then political regime, creating different types of discomfort against the reality. But not even Russia would go back to the USSR. The current Russian elites want domination of the ”Russian world”, including on account of recollections of the youth/childhood times in the Soviet times. But this would be something different, Victor Juc, director of the Institute of Legal, Political and Sociological Research, stated in a public debate staged by IPN.
Even if Moldova’s right to existence is permanently questioned through assertions in the public sphere, Victor Juc does not think that the state existing between the Prut and the Nistru is a failed state. “It’s true that the authority of the Republic of Moldova as a state, of the state institutions is very low, for different reasons. These have been permanently examined: the justice system, corruption, neglect of meritocracy, lack of professionalism and ignorance of the administrative and managerial process,” said the expert, referring to the vices of the governments that ruled the last 30 years.
Moldovan society is profoundly fragmented according to different criteria and the geopolitical criterion is one of them. “Those who long for the Soviet Union realize that the USSR cannot be restored, even according to the model of Yugoslavia, which contracted continuously in the process of dismemberment. They reoriented themselves to the Eurasian Union and the Russian Federation as a decisive element. In fact, the Eastern course is associated with the Russian Federation. Consequently, society in the Republic of Moldova is stratified not only socially and demographically, but also geopolitically as it wasn’t developed and measures weren’t taken to modernize and democratize it,” stated Victor Juc.
The political pundit noted that together with his mate, professor Pantelimon Varzari, they wrote a work urging that the European integration idea should become a factor for mobilizing the social energies or even ‘a country idea’.
“But we see that society in the Republic of Moldova does not accept this idea. About one third or one fourteen considers that the strategic direction should be different. We see that society in the Republic of Moldova is profoundly divided according to different criteria. The state does not enjoy great confidence and, as a result, the people, primarily the young ones, leave. And it does not go to the quality of life and other socioeconomic conditions only, but also to psycho-emotional satisfaction,” he said, noting that Moldova needs a country, modernization project and hard work should be done to meet the Copenhagen and Madrid criteria so as to open negotiations on the Community acquis or the ‘nostalgia’ will expand in Moldova if the situation worsens.
The debate entitled “100 years of USSR and 31 years without USSR: Nostalgia for Chimeras. Sources, ways of promotion and effects of nostalgia” was the 258th installment of IPN’s project “Developing Political Culture through Public Debates” that is supported by the Hanns Seidel Foundation.
