A Reader's Guide to Bulgaria
Economics
Background
The most detailed study of Bulgaria's economic development under Communism
is that of George Feiwel, Growth and Reforms in Centrally Planned
Economies: The Lessons of the Bulgarian Experience (New York: Praeger,
1977), which argues that Bulgaria was more successful than the other CMEA
states. In retrospect it can be said that Feiwel underestimated the costs of
Bulgarian economic strategy, particularly those associated with ecological
damage and the extensive linkages with the Soviet economy. In The
Bulgarian Economy in the Twentieth Century (New York: St. Martins
Press, 1986) John Lampe places the Communist years in historical perspective,
pointing out the persistence of traditional patterns and problems despite the
conversion to the Soviet economic model. Lampe also draws attention to some of
the severe economic problems that were becoming apparent by the beginning of
the 1980s.
Market Reforms, Business, and Investment
Valley of Roses, central Bulgaria
The attempts to develop strategies of reform are the subject of
chapters by Michael Wyzan and Ognian Pishev in Orjan Sjoberg and Michael L.
Wyzan, eds., Economic Change in the Balkan States (New York:
St. Martin's Press, 1991). Ognian Pishev, until recently Bulgaria's ambassador
to the United States, was one of the architects of the economic program of the
Union of Democratic Forces. Sinclair Roche, in Doing Business in
Bulgaria (New York: Kogan Page, 1993) surveys Bulgaria's commercial
legislation and trade agreements with particular attention to the conditions
surrounding foreign investment. The outlook and habits of Bulgarian managers
are explored by Dotcho Mihaylov in Personality and Value Characteristics
of Bulgarian Managers, a 1993 study sponsored by
Friedrich-Naumann-Stiftung of Germany. Current information on economic
developments in Bulgaria may be sought in the English-language
Reports issued by the Bulgarian National Bank and in the surveys
published by the Financial Times. A weekly business
survey, 168 Hours Bulgarian Business News, is published by the
Bulgarian conglomerate 168 chasa.
Back to the Table of Contents of the Reader's Guide to Bulgaria.
