« Activities « Conference Papers
5-6 March 2026
Silvia Marton, PI, participated in the international conference “The Royal Coffers. European Monarchies and their Financial Behavior between 1650 and 1950”, organized at the Technical University from Darmstadt (Institut für Geschichte) on 5-6 March 2026. She presented the paper titled ““In the Hands of a Camarilla”: Accusations of Corruption and Despotism against Rulers in Romania“.
She discussed the interlocking accusations made against Alexandru Ioan Cuza (1820-1873, r. 1859-1866) and his successor, the Prussian-born Carol Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen (1839-1914, r. 1866-1914). Contemporary critics accused both of them of despotic rule, of promoting questionable national and international financial networks, of being patrons of corruption and the corrupt, and of governing with and for their “camarilla.” Such allegations were particularly strong in the 1860s and 1870s when both rulers embarked on sustained railway construction. Railway construction worked as a magnifying glass for the allegations that targeted these two monarchs.
The paper zoomed in on the transition from Cuza’s rule to Carol’s and on the close reading of the debates on the 70 km long Bucharest-Danube (Giurgiu) railway concession, the first railway built in the country, initiated in 1865 by Cuza and inaugurated in 1869 by Carol. The main argument was that corruption had a decisive role in the regime change. Financial and political corruption was a major incentive to strengthen parliamentarism and to boost parliamentary control of the monarchy and the executive. Additionally, corruption allowed to describe more explicitly the good regime and its radical opposite, despotism or corrupt xenocracy.