On 23rd August 1944, following the collapse of the pro-Nazi dictatorship of Ion Antonescu, Romania changed sides and abandoned the Axis to join the Allies. Justice and Restitution in Post-Nazi Romania explores the hopes, struggles and disappointments of Jewish communities in Romania seeking to rebuild their lives after the Holocaust. Focusing on the efforts of survivors to recuperate rights and property, Stefan Cristian Ionescu demonstrates how the early transitional government enabled short term restitution. However, from 1948, the consolidated communist regime implemented nationalizations which dispossessed many citizens. Jewish communities were disproportionality affected, and real estate and many businesses were lost once again. Drawing on archival sources from government documentation to diaries and newspaper reports, this study explores both the early success and later reversal of restitution policies. In doing so, it sheds light on the postwar treatment of Romanian Jewish survivors, and the reasons so many survivors emigrated from Romania.

‘This landmark study of Romanian Jewish survivors’ efforts to reclaim their homes and businesses draws upon Ionescu’s meticulous research and his insight and compassion. It tells many stories: the international politics of Allied pressure on Romania; the domestic politics of the consolidation of Romania’s communist regime; the institution of new repressive policies by that regime. At its heart, however, stand the survivors and their amazing agency, tenacity, and resourcefulness.’

Debórah Dwork - The City University of New York

‘This book tells the intricate and ironic story of how in five years after the Holocaust a relatively successful, though cynical program of returning the stolen real property of Romanian Jews turned into a process of dispossession that encouraged emigration. A ground-breaking contribution to Romanian and Jewish history and to the study of both the Holocaust and the early Cold War.’

Peter Hayes - Northwestern University