The Legacy of Decree 66/770 in Romania: Women’s Collective Memory of a Transgenerational Trauma

Abstract

The trauma Romanian women endured under Ceaușescu’s pro-natalist policies, particularly Decree 770, persists long after 1989 as a form of collective memory. This memory is not only conveyed through literary and cinematic works, with critical reflections emerging only in the early 2000s, after a decade of societal silence. The legacy of forced motherhood and unsafe abortions has also resulted in widespread mistrust of medical institutions and poor sexual education, perpetuating a preference for abortion over contraception to this day. This transgenerational trauma continues to influence women's reproductive health, reviving taboos and reinforcing societal roles in contemporary Romania. In this paper, the legacy of such policies is explored through a combined perspective of biopolitics and memory studies considering three generations of Romanian women: socialist mothers, their Decrețeii daughters and their daughters in turn who outlived the abortion ban after 1989.