Mihai Burcea, Marius Stan, Mihail Bumbes, The Dictionary of Officers and Civil Employees of the General Management of Penitentiaries, Polirom Publishing House, vol. II, 2011. Foreword by Dennis Deletant

The Dictionary of Officers and Civil Employees of the General Management of Penitentiaries represents a useful work for the reconstitution of the multiple aspects of the communist concentration system. The concise style, the new and rich information confer this work the value of document: the professional and moral profiles of those who served this repressive institution outline its history. The second volume continues with the presentation of the employees who administrated the central apparatus of the communist prison system by means of the existing information within their professional files: name, date of birth, work experience etc. The history of Party members’ control procedures, the status of civil employees with the Ministry of Internal Affairs and their work relations with the military cadres are presented as well, together with the mass and public organisations where the military and the civil employees were enlisted. Local structures (penitentiaries, colonies and work units), an analysis of the military pension system and of the salary provisions regarding the military personnel with the Ministry of Internal Affairs, as well as statistics referring to prisoners incarcerated in the interval 1948-1989 will be detailed within the third and fourth volumes of the Dictionary.

Grigore Gafencu, Derniers Jours de L’Europe / The Last Days of Europe, Curtea Veche Publishing House, 2011

“Considering the finesse of his political judgement as minister of foreign affairs and representative of Romania in Moscow at such a dramatic moment, as well as his writing skills, Grigore Gafencu was perceived abroad, during World War II and the ten years that followed, as the most brilliant and representative Romanian personality”. Neagu Djuvara, historian

Grigore Gafencu (1892-1957) was a Romanian politician and diplomat, author of Preliminaries of the Eastern War. From the Moscow Agreement (23 August 1939) to the Hostilities in Russia (22 June 1941) /1944 and The Last Days of Europe. A Diplomatic Journey in 1939/1946. He also kept a diary which greatly contributes to the knowledge of the Romanian and international political life.

Angelo Mitchievici, Shadows of Paradise, Humanitas Publishing House, 2011

A refined analyst of Romanian communism, a subtle connoisseur of the relationship between intellectuals and totalitarianism in a century of ideological storms, Angelo Mitchievici discusses and presents the fascination with the USSR experienced by so many cultural and political personalities in Romania and France. From Romain Rolland and Henri Barbusse to Panait Istrati, Alexandru Sahia, Geo Bogza, Zaharia Stancu, Mihail Sadoveanu, G. Călinescu and Tudor Arghezi, we discover in Angelo Mitchievici’s book an authentic panorama of human blindness, of commitments and fervours subjected to the communist illusion. What I have once called the “frenzy of submission” is discussed here with minute – even surgical – rigour.

Angelo Mitchievici convincingly explores the circumstances which made the betrayal of intellectuals possible, along with the Soviet “icons” thanks to whom the most abject abdications seemed triumphs. In Shadows of Paradise, Mitchievici pinpoints, in a coherent and persuasive manner, the way in which the fascination exerted by the USSR surpassed the limits of temporary ideological intoxications in order to become the matrix of other similar pathologies related to the destruction of the critical mind. (Vladimir TISMĂNEANU)

Luciana M. Jinga, Florin S. Soare (co-ordinators), Corina Doboş, Cristina Roman, The Pro-natal Policies of the Ceauşescu Regime. Institutions and Practices, Polirom, 2011, vol. II

Romania was not the only country within the Communist Bloc where termination of pregnancy was forbidden by law. The way in which the communist regime in Romania devised demographic policies as well as their effects on the population made the Romanian case an exceptional one. By comparison with other communist countries in Central and Eastern Europe, Romania’s legislation on voluntary pregnancy termination was the most restrictive. It should be mentioned that the promotion of modern contraception methods was left out, while the socio-economic policies of the regime prevailed on the actual needs of large families.

The volume focuses on the anti-abortion laws and their consequences, from maternal and infant deaths to the improper care within public nurseries and kindergartens. By analysing both documents and institutional mechanisms, the authors underline the rigidity of a regime which continued its projects despite all signs indicating the failure of its demographic policies.

Grigore Gafencu, Préliminaires de la guerre à l’est, Curtea Veche 2011

According to the current typology of books, Grigore Gafencu’s volume, "Préliminaires de la guerre à l’est" belongs to the category of the so-called instant-books, i.e. works that were written immediately after the end of an important event, of great interest for the public opinion, anxious to know the circumstances it underwent or followed.

˝Préliminaires de la guerre à l’est˝ was written by Grigore Gafencu in 1942-1944, before the end of the Second World War. In the midst of the war, therefore without enjoying the so-called ˝epilogue rule˝ - the evaluation perspective that the historian is offered by the end of an episode, crisis, process, etc., a time when he knows the evolution of the events and is able to judge them -, Grigore Gafencu wrote his work in the absence of archives, of a historiographic and memorialistic literature regarding the issue.

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Daniel J. Mahoney, Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn: The Ascent from Ideology, Polirom, 2010

In Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Daniel Mahoney presents a philosophical perspective on the political condition of modern man through an exegesis and analysis of Solzhenitsyn's work. Mahoney demonstrates the tremendous, yet often unappreciated, impact of Solzhenitsyn's writing on twentieth century thinking through an examination of the writer's profoundly important critique of communist totalitarianism in a judicious and original mix of western and Russian, Christian and classical wisdom.

Daniel J. Mahoney is associate professor of political science at Assumption College in Worcester, Massachusetts. His previous books have dealt with Raymond Aron, Charles de Gaulle, Pierre Manent, and Aurel Kolnai. In 1999 he was awarded the prestigious Prix Aron.

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The Romanian edition of the foregoing volume was published in 2011 with the support the The Institute for the Investigation of Communist Crimes and the Memory of the Romanian Exile.

Cosmin Budeancă (coord.), Prison Experiences in Communist Romania, vol. 5, Polirom, 2011

The volume is part of the series entitled Prison Experiences in Communist Romania, which aims to broaden the perspective on the communist penitentiary system by publishing interviews with former political prisoners who have not told their detention stories so far. They present their personal views on the setting up of communism, the reasons and the methods of their arrest, the development of inquiries and trials, their liberation and socio-professional reinstatement.

The volume comprises 26 interviews.