Individual Democratic Institutions Research Fellowships 1994-1996

The research reports reproduced here are the responsibility of the individual authors. Their reproduction does not imply any form of official or unofficial endorsement by NATO. The reports are offered in unedited form, as presented by their authors, with a view to make their findings available to a wide audience. Title's First Tendencies Towards Authoritarianism: A Comparative Analysis of Russia and Bulgaria Georgi Dimitrov, Petia Kabakchieva, Jeko Kijossev [Back to Index] IV. The Bulgarian Transition Back at the zenith of communist (but de facto modernizational) achievements in the 70s, politicians at the top realized that in line with the national needs ensuing from what had been attained, a change was necessary. A change in ideology, cadres, organization and even, insofar as possible, foreign policy. The very "conquests of socialism" became both the basis and backbone of party infighting: apparatchiks vs "comrades-in-arms," technocrats vs ideologues, mavericks vs dogmaticists etc. That is why the scales increasingly tipped in favour of the exponents of the new tendencies regardless of the degree of self-awareness of innovation. Hence the main contradiction that nevertheless propelled Bulgarian domestic politics in the past 20 years: "what to change and how, in order to keep everything as it is." Todor Zhivkov is right in claiming that he had been ripe for "new thinking" long before Gorbachev (due to the country's incomparably poorer resources). It must have been just as tough for him to do both: develop "real socialism" and stay on the top. For the right of the supreme authority is legitimated only by the communist past and is therefore doomed to remain confined within its prospects. Thus, on the one hand, social contradictions transform as contradictions in the principles of power. On the other, the contradictions between the form and content of power plunge public affairs in a deteriorating crisis. The postponed socio-structural changes impeded the economy and, worse yet, life itself. The economy fails to reach the stage of "self-sustaining growth" (W. Rostow). The country plunges neck-deep in debt to foreign creditors. The electricity shortage deals a direct, mass and permanent blow to everyday life. Premonitions of understandable public discontent inspire the idea of the anticipatory blow against ethnic minorities (for ethnic clashes are among the first outbursts of social tensions). The practice of the so-called "regenerative process" complicated the situation even further. In the course of the crisis, the ruling regime started identifying less and less with the relics of communism, staking more and more openly on nationalist ideology - because the nation itself was identifying less and less with the representatives of "people power," with "the man from the people" as Todor Zhivkov loved being called. The first dissident gestures appeared. Notably, however, they did not target communism but its by then tangible crisis. That would prove crucial in the course of events after 1989. Despite its growing unpopularity and ever more obvious reliance on police rather than "the conquests of socialism," the Todor Zhivkov regime was stable enough (insofar as a satellite regime could be stable at all). In the late 80s, Bulgaria was falling headlong to Romania's level of ten years ago, but we saw that Ceausescu's power was unquestionable until the very last moment. In Bulgaria, open political opposition to socialism - especially with the memory of 1956, 1968 and 1980 still very much alive - was not a serious idea. Unlike the Todor Zhivkov type, the "socialist type of social structure" was popular with the public. What triggered open protest was, we repeat, not the principles of communism but the deviations from them. Thus by the end 80s the ruling regime had two oppositions, even though small in number(10). Both, however, were within the party: (overt (veteran orthodox communists) and covert (party technocrats who had fallen from grace as a result of the secondary ideologization of power on a nationalist basis). The regime could have certainly coped with both for years. By classical modernizational recipes - economic liberalization supported by political reaction - the tendency was already in motion. At this point, however, the inherently satellite nature of Bulgaria's communist power proved fatal. Moscow's withdrawn support spelt out the end of 35-year alternative-free government. Unlike Gorbachev, Zhivkov had effective control over the executive and could have put up stiff resistance to the November 10 coupsters - provided that he had had any alternative. However, domestic unpopularity and international isolation could have hardly put an 80-year-old on his mettle. The extreme political reactionary nature and social inefficiency of the Zhivkov regime, which encroached upon fundamental vital interests of the entire people (the lies about Chernobyl, the domestic environmental situation, the foreign debt, upset everyday life, the inspiring of the ethnic conflict) made his ousting problem-free. That very problem-free ouster, however, proved the worst problem of all - that of the character of the legacy of power. In modern societies, democracy is just a political mechanism of regulating civil interests that are conflicting but structured, economically motivated and antagonistic on a common plane. That very crucial prerequisite for effective democracy was missing in Bulgaria: hence the awkward birth of Bulgarian democracy.