Radical right populist entrepreneurs and the use of religious representations through popular culture: George Becali as the ‘Saviour of Romania’

Abstract

While there are a few significant studies on the varieties of populism in post-socialist Romania, little scholarly work on populists’ ethos of religious inspiration exists. This article addresses this lacuna from a cultural studies perspective, exploring popular culture’s productions of religious inspiration employed by the radical right populist entrepreneur George Becali, and it argues that the diversity of religiously encumbered cultural productions provide a significant insight into fleshing out the mechanisms of his messianic neo-populism. By employing a critical visual analysis and hermeneutics, this article aims to illuminate how a populist entrepreneur attracts potential supporters by using the rhetoric of nativism and ‘neo-traditional, autochthonous culture and religion’, purporting to reveal a mutual cultural ground between the messianic leader and ‘the people’. His political strategies are oftentimes packaged in cultural formats and discourses emphasising local religious symbolism that turns him into a ‘Saviour of the Nation’. Yet, at the same time, the article demonstrates that popular culture can also constitute a foundation for resisting the populist’s kit of religiously loaded visual rhetoric.

The Spectacle of “Patriotic Violence” in Romania: Populist Leader George Simion’s Mediated Performance

“…"; "God will give us a united Romania"). This mix of unionism, Orthodoxy, and peoplecentrism is congruent with other research that underlines the religious character of Romanian populism (Asavei, 2022;Corbu et al, 2017).…”

“…In a country ranked as the most religious out of 34 European countries (Evans & Baronavski, 2018), the Orthodox Church remains Romania's most important religious denomination (85.3%, according to the 2022 census), exerting a considerable sway on local politics (Turcescu & Stan, 2005), even openly supporting AUR (Gherghina & Mișcoiu, 2022). Both Corneliu Vadim Tudor and Gigi Becali promoted Orthodox values and traditional gender roles, which are equated with "Romanianism" (Soare & Tufis, 2021), their discourses encompassing anti-elitist, ultranationalist, antisemitic, anti-Roma, anti-Hungarian, and homophobic rhetoric (Asavei, 2022;Corbu et al, 2017). Apart from adopting similar discourses, AUR condemns what they believe is a political establishment built on the legacy of a pre-1989 Romania (Popescu & Vesalon, 2022).…”

‘The world’s shortest highway’: Entrepreneurial populism and the making of a personal campaign

“…Mandachi is not alone in the landscape of Romanian entrepreneurial populism. Arguably the most famous populist entrepreneur is George Becali, a controversial figure due to his ultra-conservative, anti-Roma, homophobic and sexist stances (Asavei, 2020). There are several features tying Becali and Mandachi together.…”

“…been subordinated to the self-promotion of its initiator and coordinator, the campaign rapidly evolving into a highly personalised form of activism. We understand this evolution as a particular instance of 'entrepreneurial populism' (Heinisch and Saxonberg, 2017) and thus contribute to the discussion about varieties of populism in Eastern Europe (Asavei, 2020;Stanley, 2017). In this article, we examine the construction of these discourses, their inherent contradictions and the role of business celebrities in the development of populist entrepreneurialism.…”