Mentored by critic Garabet Ibrăileanu, he objected to the Poporanists' cultural conservatism, prioritizing instead Westernization and Francophilia; however, Ralea also mocked the extremes of modernist literature, from a position which advocated "national specificity".

He viewed Romanians as naturally skeptical and easy-going, and was himself perceived as flippant; though he was nominally active in experimental psychology, he questioned its scientific assumptions, and preferred an interdisciplinary system guided by intuition and analogies.

Ralea willingly cooperated with the communists and the Ploughmen's Front before and after their arrival to power, serving as Minister of Arts, Ambassador to the United States, and vice president of the Great National Assembly.

His diplomatic mission, tinged in scandal, was cut short by Foreign Minister Ana Pauker; Securitate operatives regarded him as a suspicious opportunist and contact for the Freemasonry, keeping him under close surveillance upon his return.

He was colleagues with another future sociologist, D. I. Suchianu, with whom he made visits to the café-chantant and planned to write his first book (a French-language study of human intelligence); both men took top honors in their respective class.

Supported by Ibrăileanu and Gusti, Ralea was eventually moved to the Logic and Modern Philosophy Department, as an assistant professor to Ion Petrovici, while also employed as lecturer in social pedagogy.

[35][60] Ralea offered much praise to rationalist modernists such as Alexandru A. Philippide, and hailed Tudor Arghezi, the eclectic modernizer of poetic language, as Romania's greatest poet of the day.

[69] Pandrea's Manifesto was at once a plea for aestheticism and Christian mysticism, a critique of "that famed social justice" idea, and an explicit denunciation of Ralea, Ibrăileanu, Suchianu and the Sburătorul group as "dry", "barren", all too critical.

[80] He was still involved in psychological research, with tracts such as Problema inconștientului ("The Problem of the Unconscious Mind") and Ipoteze și precizări privind știința sufletului ("Hypotheses and Précis Regarding Spiritual Science").

[109] At Dreptatea, protesting against the Guard's assault of the leftist intellectual Alexandru Graur, Ralea decried fascism in Romania as an "island of Doctor Moreau", an experiment in the growth of "blind and absurd mysticism".

"[120] Ralea also allowed PCdR intellectuals such as Ștefan Voicu and Lucrețiu Pătrășcanu to publish essays in Viața Românească, and hosted news about social life and culture in the Soviet Union.

"[123] In January 1937, at the PNȚ Youth Conference in Cluj, Ralea spoke of the "peasant state" as a "neo-nationalist" application of democratic socialism, opposed to fascism, and in natural solidarity with the trade unions.

As witnessed by the Swiss diplomat René de Weck, Ralea was restating his Valori ethos at cabinet meetings, in front of Axis representatives, declaring that the Allies stood for "humanistic civilization".

Maniu received him and listened to his pleas, but denied him readmission and invited him to create his own coalition from shards of the Renaissance Front, promising him some measure of leniency "for that hour when we shall be evaluating the past mistakes that have thrown this country into dejection.

"[130] Their separation remained "unbridgeable";[191] eventually, Ralea reestablished the PSȚ, and attracted into its ranks a Social Democratic dissident faction, led by former PSDR theoretician Lothar Rădăceanu.

[192] The two reestablished contacts with the PCdR and other fringe parties: moving between Bucharest and Sinaia (where he owned a villa on Cumpătul Street),[96][193] Ralea was involved in trilateral talks between the communists, the Ploughmen's Front of Petru Groza, and the National Liberal inner faction of Gheorghe Tătărescu, helping to coordinate actions between them.

[203] Blocked out of the National Democratic Bloc coalition,[130][204] which included the PNȚ, the PSDR, and ultimately the PCdR, Ralea watched from the side as the August 23 Coup deposed Antonescu and pushed Romania into the anti-Nazi camp.

[96] His friend and PSȚ colleague, Grigore Geamănu, was more directly involved in the coup, helping PCdR leader Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej to escape from Târgu Jiu camp and join the other conspirators.

As noted by Zavarache, Ralea now understood that his influence on political life was "exceedingly minor", aware that Groza himself was merely a communist "puppet"; "consequently, he sought to preserve those offices which could ensure him a comfortable lifestyle".

[228] According to researcher Diana Mandache, Foreign Minister Ana Pauker sensed that Ralea could reach out to, and placate, the international Freemasonry, while at the same time pushing ahead with a leftist takeover of the local Masonic Lodges.

[248] As he confessed to Dragomirescu, he postponed returning to Romania because feared for his safety: Ralea had been told that Gheorghiu-Dej, his personal friend, was no longer in control of the Communist Party, having been branded a Titoist by Joseph Stalin (both rumors were false).

[254] In November 1948, he had been accepted into the recently purged Romanian Academy, at the same time as Balmuș, Raluca Ripan, Grigore Moisil, Ștefan Milcu, Camil Petrescu, and PCdR historian Mihail Roller.

[270] Pandrea, who had fallen out with the Workers' Party regime and spent time in prison, later alleged that Ralea, "the impenitent servant", cultivated the friendship of communist women, from Pauker to Liuba Chișinevschi [ro].

[284] In August, he led a delegation to Moscow (whose other members included Oțetea, Tudor Arghezi, Marius Bunescu, George Oprescu, and Constantin Prisnea), where he signed for the partial return of the Romanian Treasure by its Soviet takers.

[289] According to memoirist C. D. Zeletin, Ralea and Vianu had a "courageous and noble" stand after the student protest of 1956: acting together, they obtained the release from Securitate custody of Dumitru D. Panaitescu, son of the critic Perpessicius.

Slama-Cazacu recalls his habit of reading articles, including scientific ones, "at a glance", and once appointing the staff of a psychology journal "with his nonchalant and hurried manner, calling out the names of people as he happened to see them in the room";[309] Pompiliu Constantinescu also remarked of "petulant" Ralea: "Here is a soul who will not stand for the label of specialization!

[318] In a 1972 piece, communist intellectual Paul Georgescu acknowledged Ralea's comparative superficiality, noting that he knew less literary history that Călinescu, less aesthetics than Vianu, less philosophy than Mircea Florian, and less sociology that Henri H. Stahl; but also that his improvisation in such fields came with "fertile results", particularly since it applied itself to a "living reality".

"[320] This political pedagogy was also once highlighted by Ralea's enemy-turned-ally, Petre Pandrea: "[L'idée de la révolution... is written] with a sincerity that defies chauvinistic hypocrisy and does not shy away from tearing the masks off of so many things viewed as sublime or holy by the innocent folk, or treated as such by Tartuffe-esque scoundrels.

[328] His core statement was summarized in 1937 by a sympathetic reviewer, Ion Biberi, as: "one cannot reach the universal unless it is by expressing one's national reality"; this prompted the nationalists at Neamul Românesc to note that Ralea had validated their own thesis, and would therefore qualify as a "retrograde" by left-wing standards.

[357] According to psychologist Edgar Krau, Ralea and Herseni gave credibility to "the tenet that the individualistic ethics of capitalism disunites and hurts people"; however, they ignored the reality of communism, which was "not [its] collectivism, but the all-pervading party tuition".