Anarchism in Romania

Anarchism in Romania developed in the 1880s within the larger Romanian socialist movement and it had a small following throughout all the existence of the Kingdom of Romania. After the Romanian Communist Party takeover in 1947, no other alternative political movement was allowed, so the anarchist movement faded away. Since the Romanian Revolution, a number of small anarchist organizations were created, but anarchism is still less visible than in Western Europe.

The earliest known Romanian anarchist was Zamfir Arbore, a Bukovina-born political activist who was originally active in the Russian Empire, before fleeing to Switzerland, where he met Mikhail Bakunin toward the end of his career. Nevertheless, Arbore was an isolated case, he was not part of any active movement in Romania.

Another forerunner of Romanian anarchism was Paraskev Stoyanov, of Bulgarian origin, born in 1871 (or 1874) in Giurgiu, where his father, an active campaigner for national liberation, had fled Turkish persecution. Stoyanov had a solid education and became a surgeon. After primary school in Bucharest, he adhered to socialist ideas through high school, then to anarchism after reading Peter Kropotkin's pamphlet "An Appeal To The Young". Thus, in high school, he founded book clubs for students studying socialism and anarchism and began to spread anarchism among the workers in Romania, coming to be considered the "father" of anarchism in the country. He translated into Romanian Errico Malatesta's numerous pamphlets, including "For The Voters", "Between Peasants " and "Anarchy".

Starting with the 1880s, in the Romanian Old Kingdom, there were socialist movements in Bucharest and in Iași, with the former being more radical, having some anarchist tendencies. Between 1884 and 1890, a social studies circle named "Drepturile omului" (Human Rights), discussing the ideas of Bakunin, Élisée Reclus and Peter Kropotkin, ideas brought to Romania by people who studied in Western Europe. A reorganization of the movement by Ioan Nădejde stopped the anarchist tendencies which, nevertheless, persisted within the movement, the main figure being Panait Mușoiu.

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