Wednesday, 19 March 2025, 6pm
ÖAW PSK-Building, 5th floor, Georg-Coch-Platz 2, 1010 Vienna

and online via Zoom

The Perils and Prospects of Negotiating with Terrorists

While the brutal overthrow of Salvador Allende by General Augusto Pinochet in 1973 was condemned as a “reactionary coup” in the Romanian press, Romanian leader Nicolae Ceauşescu chose to maintain relations with Chile - the only country in the Eastern Bloc to do so. Although in part motivated by economic factors, by keeping the status quo Ceauşescu was able to negotiate the transport of thousands of Chileans to Romania, some of whom permanently settled there. This presentation explores the perils and prospects of Romania’s engagement with a reactionary regime that perpetrated terror against its own citizens. I demonstrate that, in the end, the prospects of negotiating with terrorists outweighed the perils: Ceauşescu retained his status as a maverick and Romania showcased its commitment to human rights and global solidarity, all the while providing vital support to thousands of Chileans. The discussion will be placed within the broader context of Ceauşescu’s policies in Latin America and his complex relations with leaders in the Global South.

This event takes place in the context of the research project “Foreign policy thinking in communist Albania and Romania”, funded by the Austrian Science Fund (FWF) and in collaboration with the University of Vienna’s Research Group New Cold War Studies.

Jill Massino is an associate professor of history at UNC Charlotte, where she teaches courses on modern European and comparative history. Her research examines gender, citizenship, and everyday life in socialist and postsocialist Romania and her publications include Gender Politics and Everyday Life in State Socialist Eastern and Central Europe, (co-edited with Shana Penn; Palgrave, 2009); Ambiguous Transitions: Gender, the State, and Everyday Life in Socialist and Postsocialist Romania (Berghahn Books, 2019); and Everyday Postsocialism: History Doesn’t Travel in One Direction (co-edited with Markus Wien, Purdue University Press, 2024). Her current project is entitled Friends in Need: Romania and the Global South during the Cold War.

Zoom
Meeting-ID: 661 0683 3381
Kenncode: RgYC0z