Lucreţiu Pătrăşcanu
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Lucreţiu Pătrăşcanu, (November 4 1900, Bacău—April 17 1954, Jilava, near Bucharest) was a leading member of the Communist Party of Romania (PCR), a lawyer, sociologist and economist. For a while, he was a professor at Bucharest University.
Early life
Pătrăşcanu was born into a leading political family. Nevertheless, he became a socialist in his youth, and joined the Socialist Party of Romania in 1919. Professionally, he was educated at the University of Leipzig and wrote studies of social history. Pătrăşcanu served as the Romanian Communist Party's representative to the Comintern in 1934 and 1935 during which he is thought to have developed doubts about Stalinism.
Interwar and World War II
He put these questions aside in order to prioritize opposition to fascism and remained active in the PCR. He was imprisoned during World War II and spent time at the Târgu Jiu internment camp with Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej and the "prison faction" of the Party (i.e.: the communists inside Romania, virtually all imprisoned at various stages of the war, as opposed to those who had taken refuge inside the Soviet Union). In 1944, he was under house arrest in Poiana Ţapului.
He represented the Communist Party (together with Emil Bodnăraş, a Soviet agent) during the clandestine talks with the National Liberal and National Peasants' parties, aimed at overthrowing the Ion Antonescu dictatorship. This then lead to the arrest of Ion Antonescu and Mihai Antonescu at the Royal Palace in Bucharest, during the August 23 Coup (1944). He also represented Romania during the armistice talks in Moscow later that year. Pătrăşcanu joined the Central Committee of the party in 1945 - after having returned to Romania with the Red Army late in the previous year.
During Soviet occupation, he served on the Politburo from 1946 to 1947 and held power in the new governments, as Minister without Portfolio (1944) and Minister of Justice (1944-1948). Pătrăşcanu was considered leader of the party's "Secretariat Communists" (perceived as less willing to follow Stalin's directions). He was also one of the initiators of purges and persecutions, being responsible for the appointment of prosecutors.
Trial, execution and legacy
Pătrăşcanu was arrested in 1948 on Gheorghiu-Dej's initiative, and was interrogated by the Securitate, which was at the time run by Soviet advisors, but refused to co-operate. He was kept in detention until 1954 when he was executed after a show trial. He was rehabilitated posthumously in 1968 by Nicolae Ceauşescu, in the latter's attempt to discredit his predecessors and establish his own legitimacy.
Ceauşescu profited on the enduring perception of Lucreţiu Pătrăşcanu's activities as patriotic and verging on dissidence, while shadowing his fundamental role in the creation of the new penal system in Romania. In fact, although he was frequently quoted and displayed by the regime, Pătrăşcanu's life was usually described in brief and vague sentences.
Works
- Un veac de frământări sociale, 1821-1907 (A Century of Social Unrest, 1821-1907)
- Probleme de bază ale României (Fundamental Problems of Romania)
- Sub trei dictaturi (Under Three Dictatorships)
- Curente şi tendinţe în filozofia românească (Schools of Thought and Tendencies in Romanian Philosophy)
See also
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