Anticorruption initiatives of Bulgarian civil society: assessment of their influence on systemic corruption.

Abstract

The article studies the participation of Bulgarian civil society in corruption counteraction on the national levels. It determines the extent of the “capture” of the state by corruption and underlies the systemic character of corruption in this country despite over a decade of EU membership. It is emphasized that the modern corruption practices in Bulgaria originated in the late 1980s and early 1990s: the overthrow of the communist regime and transition to market economy caused the emergence of informal groups of the former communist nomenklatura. It is noted that these groups still control the decision-making processes in the country by their activities in the “shadow zone” of politics, economy, and justice. Corruption significantly reduces the effect of the EU financial assistance and is an obstacle to Bulgaria’s accession to the Schengen Area. The author notes that corruption counteraction has been included in the agenda of public policy only since the formation of I. Kostov’s democratic government in 1997. The final decision concerning the European integration vector in Bulgaria’s development led to the government and civil society cooperation in defining the national anti-corruption policy.

The analysis of the pace of reforms in Bulgaria made it possible to conclude that this country has fallen into a post-communist trap, being in the “grey zone” between socialism and capitalism: de facto, several families form the Bulgarian politics; the media owners usually have close ties with the political elite, leading to lack of quality investigative journalism and to pronounced self-censorship of journalists; none of the Bulgarian ex-government officials have been convicted of corruption crimes. What makes Bulgaria significantly different from the other Central and Eastern European countries (especially Romania and Slovakia) is that the protest actions are not strong enough to force the authorities to take them into account. The largest surge in anti-corruption protests (three “waves”) was noted in 2013: 1) protests of socio-economic nature, complemented by anti-corruption demands (January – February); 2) protests against corruption and oligarchic political system (June – July); 3) student anti-corruption protests (November). The author emphasizes that currently the Bulgarian civil society remains relatively weak in its anti-corruption activities. The main obstacles to the effective work of the non-governmental sector include a rather limited participation of the NGOs in the public and political life, lack of solidarity etc.