WHAT ARE THE CHARACTERISTICS OF „O ȚARĂ CA AFARĂ” (A MODERN COUNTRY)?
Let’s be honest and admit that, 12 years ago, when Romania joined the EU, we all expected more. Most of the expectations we had back then have not come to fruition because of us, as a people. The EU cannot modernize Romania from the outside.
„A Modern Country” is what the people in the streets indisputably demand. This project is about how we use the European Union – the funds, the legislation, the regulations, assumed obligations, reports, debates – to modernize Romania from the grass roots up.
„A Modern Country” targets very specific issues, like the Romanian Centennial coming and going without the country being united by highways, despite having European money designated for this particular purpose. It explores why we lack selective waste collection. And why at the height of our modernity we have piles upon piles of plastic bottles in our forests. It is about the tens of thousands of poor children in our country. The same country with the highest dropout rate in the EU. The same country that designated most of its European funds to reduce the dropout rate. It is about how we have failed to digitize state institutions, although we have the right to do so as European citizens. The right to not have to carry documents from one institution to another by hand; there were also European funds allocated to solve this problem. We as a country have become inured to these shortcomings and we take them in stride, usually with a shrug and an exclamation of “That’s just how it is in Romania!” or that there is nothing we can do. We can absolutely do something about it and there are clear solutions to these problems.
This project is about change and growth and doing what is best for the Romanian people- “A Modern Country”. It is up to us to make this change. It is all on us- those of us who chose to stay.