As World War II ended, Romania, a former Axis member which had overthrown their pro-Axis government, was occupied by the Soviet Union as the sole representative of the Allies.

On 6 March 1945, after mass demonstrations by communist sympathizers and political pressure from the Soviet representative of the Allied Control Commission, a new pro-Soviet government that included members of the previously outlawed Romanian Workers' Party was installed.

[9] Overall, from the 1950s to the 1970s, the country exhibited high rates of economic growth and significant improvements in infant mortality, life expectancy, literacy, urbanization, and women's rights, but then stagnated in the 1980s.

However, rapid economic growth fueled in part by foreign credits gradually gave way to an austerity and political repression that led to the violent fall of his totalitarian government in December 1989.

The Paris Peace Treaties did not acknowledge Romania as an allied co-belligerent, as the Romanian army had fought hard against the Soviets for the better part of the war, changing sides only when the tides started to turn.

The Communists, as all political parties, played only a minor role in King Michael's first wartime government, headed by General Constantin Sănătescu, though their presence increased in the one led by Nicolae Rădescu.

He also balked at Comecon's goal of turning Romania into the "breadbasket" of the East Bloc, pursuing an economic plan based on heavy industry and energy production.

In an effort to reinforce his position, Gheorghiu-Dej pledged cooperation with any state, regardless of political-economic system, as long as it recognized international equality and did not interfere in other nations' domestic affairs.

In October 1956, Poland's communist leaders refused to succumb to Soviet military threats to intervene in domestic political affairs and install a more obedient politburo.

Poland's defiance and Hungary's popular uprising inspired Romanian students to organize meetings in București, Cluj and Timișoara calling for liberty, better living conditions, and an end to Soviet domination.

[22] All strata of society were involved, but particularly targeted were the prewar elites, such as intellectuals, clerics, teachers, former politicians (even if they had left-leaning views), and anybody who could potentially form the nucleus of anti-Communist resistance.

A decision to put into practice the century-old project for a Danube–Black Sea Canal served as a pretext for the erection of several labor camps, where numerous people died.

One of the most notorious and infamous brainwashing experiments in Eastern Europe's history took place in Romania, in the political prison of Pitești, a small city about 120 km (75 mi) northwest of Bucharest.

The government decision was directed towards creating a cordon sanitaire against Tito's Yugoslavia, but was also used as an intimidation tactic to force the remaining peasants to join collective farms.

Under a policy of de-Russification the forced Soviet (mostly Russian) cultural influence in the country which characterized the 1950s was stopped and Western media were allowed to circulate in Romania instead.

Romania under Ceaușescu maintained and sometimes improved diplomatic and other relations with, among others, West Germany, Israel, China, Albania, and Pinochet's Chile, all for various reasons not on good terms with Moscow.

[28] Universities were also founded in small Romanian towns, which served to train qualified professionals, such as engineers, economists, planners or jurists, necessary for the industrialization and development project of the country.

Conservation plans were made, especially during the 1960s and early 1970s, but all were halted after Ceaușescu embarked on what is known as "The Small Cultural Revolution" ("Mica revoluție culturală"), after visiting North Korea and the People's Republic of China and then delivering a speech known as the July Theses.

[36] Despite all this, living standards in the country remained some of Europe's lowest and as early as 1981, there were clear signs of public discontent, such as riots and an angry mob throwing rocks at Ceaușescu's helicopter while it made a flight to Transylvania that October.

[37] By 1985, despite Romania's huge refining capacity, petroleum products were strictly rationed with supplies drastically cut, a Sunday curfew was instated, and many buses used methane propulsion (they were mockingly named "bombs"); taxis were converted to burning methanol.

Beginning in 1974, systematization consisted largely of the demolition and reconstruction of existing hamlets, villages, towns, and cities, in whole or in part, with the stated goal of turning Romania into a "multilaterally developed socialist society".

By 1988, with perestroika and glasnost policies in effect in the Soviet Union and China undergoing economic reforms, Romania's Stalinist sociopolitical system began to look increasingly out-of-place, but all attempts were made to keep the populace isolated from events going on outside the country.

[38] The revolt started at the enterprise of Trucks Brașov, as a strike that began on the night of 14 November, on the night-shift, and it continued the next morning with a march downtown, in front of the Council of the Romanian Communist Party.

Very soon it was seen that the regime wants to hide it, to cancel it, practically not to respond to claims, not to take measures, to change anything, not to turn this protest into a public debate or even inside the party, in the Political Executive Committee.

"[This quote needs a citation] The students–Mihnea Paraschivescu, Grațian Vulpe, the economist Dan Căprariu from Cluj and others–were arrested and investigated by the Securitate at the Rahova Penitentiary [ro], accused of propaganda against the socialist society.

[citation needed] On 16 December, a protest broke out in Timișoara in response to an attempt by the government to evict the dissident pastor László Tőkés from his church flat.

Ceaușescu soon fled by helicopter from the rooftop of the CC Building, only to find himself abandoned in Târgoviște, where he and his wife Elena were finally tried by a drumhead court-martial, convicted after an hour and a half, and executed by firing squad moments after the verdict and sentence were announced on 25 December.

For several months after the events of December 1989, it was widely argued that Ion Iliescu and the National Salvation Front (FSN) had merely taken advantage of the chaos to stage a coup.

While, ultimately, a great deal did change in Romania, it is still a subject of contention among Romanians and other observers as to whether this was their intent from the outset, or merely pragmatic playing of the cards they were dealt.

[48] On the other hand, after the fall of the communist regime, Romania began shifting its political and economic policies from support (albeit tepid) for Moscow to aligning itself with Brussels and Washington by joining NATO in 2004 and the European Union in 2007.