Racordarea societăţii româneşti la modele europene: instalarea consulatelor străine în Moldova şi Ţara Românească
Connecting the Romanian society to the European models: the establishment of the foreign consulates in Moldavia and Walachia

Summary/Abstract: Based on the initial stage of the modernization process through which the Romanian Principalities were going between the end of the 18th and the beginning of the 19th century, this study tries to present, in a brief manner, the establishment of the foreign consulates on Romanian territory. This process was mainly determined by the interest of the powerful European countries of that time, in setting up – under the form of these classical diplomatic institutions – strategic points in Moldavia and Walachia. These institutions were not only used as a way to defend the interests of the citizens of the respective countries, but also as important sources of information and influence for the governments of the countries they represented. Chronologically, the order of their establishment is the following: the Russian consulate in 1781; the Austrian consulate in 1783; the Prussian consulate in 1786; the French consulate in 1795; and the English consulate in 1803. The presence and activity of the foreign consulates in Iasi and Bucharest – fact underlined at the end of the article – made the Romanian political elite aware of its European identity, and at the same time guaranteed its integration into an international circuit of unanimously accepted laws and values.

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