Confronting ethnic issues: The role of nonprofit organizations in Bulgaria

East European Quarterly

Volumn 31, Issue 3, 1997, Pages 311-327

  Snavely, Keith ^a   Chakarova, Lena ^b  

^a SOUTHERN ILLINOIS UNIVERSITY   (United States)

^b Center for Administration   (Bulgaria)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 0040687773     PISSN: 00128449     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: None     Document Type: Article

References (25)

1. Ivanka Nedeva, "Balkan Troubles, Bulgarian Hopes," World Policy Journal, 11 (Fall 1994), p. 132
2. Traian Stoiianovich, Balkan Worlds: The First and Last Europe (Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe), pp. 275-276.
3. The concept of a nation based on ethnicity stands in contrast to envisioning a nation as people in a geographical area who share a community of interests. In a 1991 interview, Michael Ivanov, ethnic advisor to Bulgaria's President, Zhelu Zhelev, ably expressed the latter concept of nationhood: "I ardently support the concept of a nation in the political sense...a nation is a community of people rallied by the idea of a common state. Once the state as such has been established, the idea is to preserve and develop it as an entity. In this respect, Bulgaria is a single-national state, where ethnic, religious, and linguistic varieties exist." (Valeryia Vaseva, "I Have Never Questioned the Bulgarian Origins of Muslims in the Western Rhodope Area," Trud, 6 January 1994.
4. Reprinted in JPRS East European Report 94-004-S, 1 February 1994, pp. 12-13.
5. Dimitrina Dimitrova, "The Influence of Communist Style Administration on Ethnic Conflict in Bulgaria," in Russell F. Farnen, ed., Nationalism, Ethnicity, and Identity (New Brunswick: Transaction Publishers, 1994), p. 396.
6. Zoltan D. Barany, "Nobody's Children: The Resurgence of Nationalism and Status of Gypsies in Post-Communist Eastern Europe," in Joan Serafin, ed., East-Central Europe in the 1990s (Boulder: Westview Press, 1994), p. 23.
7. F. Stephen Larrabee, "Long Memories and Short Fuses: Change and Stability in the Balkans," International Security, 15 (Winter 1990/91), p. 78.
8. F. Stephen Larrabee, "Long Memories and Short Fuses: Change and Stability in the Balkans," International Security, 15 (1990/91), Ibid.;
9. Vaseva, "I Have Never Questioned."
10. In an interview in 1991, Osman Oktay, organizational secretary of the Central Council of the Movement for Rights and Freedoms, declared the organization's concern for the defense of rights for all people, no matter their ethnicity. He asserted that many had "abused the fact that 80 percent of the membership consists of Bulgarian Turks." (Stefan Arabadzhiev, "Is the Movement for Rights and Freedoms Terrible for Bulgaria and Bulgarians?" Prava I Svobodi, 25 February 1991.
11. Reprinted in JPRS East European Report 91-065, 14 May 1991, p. 4.)
12. However, in 1994, party leader Ahmed Dogan was more willing to concede that being a broad-based party was more a goal than a reality: "For at least another 10-15 years, the movement is bound to remain in a state of transition between an ethnic and a national party." (Valeriya Veleva, "DPS Counts on Winning 30 Parliamentary Seats with Help of 300,000 Gypsy Votes," Trud 29 November 1994.
13. Reprinted in FBIS-EEU-94-230, 30 November 1994, p. 4.)
14. Ivanka Nedeva, "Democracy Building in Ethnically Diverse Societies: The Cases of Bulgaria and Romania," in Ian M. Cuthbertson and Jane Leibowitz, eds., Minorities: The New Europe's Old Issue (Prague: Institute for East-West Studies, 1993), p. 127.
15. Ivanka Nedeva, Minorities: The New Europe's Old Issue Ibid., pp. 126-127.
16. Andrezej Karkoska, "A Call for Confidence-Building Measures for Minorities in Eastern Europe," in Ian M. Cuthbertson and Jane Leibowitz, eds., Minorities: The New Europe's Old Issue (Prague: Institute for East-West Studies, 1993), pp. 219-221.
17. Andrezej Karkoska, Minorities: The New Europe's Old Issue Ibid., p. 223.
18. Municipalities in Bulgaria function more as regional governments than as municipalities as found in the context of the United States. The whole of the nation is divided into municipalities. Each municipality is composed of cities, towns and villages.
19. Michael L. Wyzan, "Bulgaria: The Painful Aftermath of Collectivized Agriculture," RFE-RL Research Report, 2 (17 September 1993), pp. 34-41.
20. Barany. "Nobody's Children," p. 241.
21. Nicolae Gheorghe, "Roma-Gypsy Ethnicity in Eastern Europe," Social Research, 58 (Winter 1991), pp. 834-835.
22. Zoltan D. Barany, "Living on the Edge: The East European Roma in Post-Communist Politics and Society," Slavic Review, 53 (Summer 1994), pp. 321-324.
23. In addition there exist nonprofit organizations working on problems of ethnic minorities outside the country, such as the Bassarabian Bulgarians and Bulgarians in neighboring Balkan countries. An example of an organization active in this field is the Sts. Cyril and Methodius Foundation, one of the wealthiest foundations in Bulgaria.
24. Keith Snavely and Uday Desai, "Bulgaria's Nonprofit Sector: The Search for Form, Purpose and Legitimacy," Voluntas, 6 (April 1995), pp. 25-26.
25. Nedeva, "Balkan Troubles."