The Politics of Duplicity: Controlling Reproduction in Ceausescu’s Romania. By Gail Kligman. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998. 358p. $44.95

Gail Kligman analyzes the reproductive policies of the Ceausescu regime and the responses of experts and the population to those policies. Drawing on extensive interviews with ordinary men and women as well as experts and on archival research, the author provides a wealth of informa- tion about demographic trends and reproductive policies in Romania from the outset of the communist era to the violent overthrow of the Ceausescu regime in late 1989. Kligman traces the way in which communist leaders used legislation, measures to "protect" women in the workplace, propaganda, and control of the media and other sources of information to propagate their desired model of women and influence reproductive choices. She analyzes the role of key profession- als, such as demographic experts and, particularly, physicians and other medical personnel, in the making and implement- ing of reproductive policies. She also considers the role of international actors, including the United States, in perpet- uating the Ceausescu regime.