Paper Doves in Flight: Poland & The World After Communism

I'm just sitting here waiting for the other Southern Slavic country. You know, that one.

(But don't rush it, let it simmer as long as it needs. Even if I most wait a fortnight and a three halves for it to come, I will.)
 
What with how ambivalent many Bulgarians are about the country's Communist past, plus the problems of the 90s, I think Bulgaria regressing into some authoritarian or semi-authoritarian regime wasn't so far-fetched now that I think about it.
Completely out of the question. No one would have the authority to be able to create such a regime, least of all the demoralized Socialists. And this is discounting the fact that Bulgaria was firmly into the US sphere of influence almost immediately after democratic reforms began.

The goals of NATO and EU membership helped keep the country on course, helped by the PMship of the committed Atlanticist and economic reformer Ivan Kostov, who is a politician I have a lot of time for despite him being well to my right.
These two things are not the same. It was the EU admission that was popular and had difficult entry requirements. Bulgaria was going to almost certainly join NATO once the US government had made expansion in Eastern Europe a priority.
As for Kostov being an economic reformer, I should only point that destroying something with the intention of building it up anew (but never doing so) has nothing to do with economic reform.
 
Completely out of the question. No one would have the authority to be able to create such a regime, least of all the demoralized Socialists. And this is discounting the fact that Bulgaria was firmly into the US sphere of influence almost immediately after democratic reforms began.

These two things are not the same. It was the EU admission that was popular and had difficult entry requirements. Bulgaria was going to almost certainly join NATO once the US government had made expansion in Eastern Europe a priority.
As for Kostov being an economic reformer, I should only point that destroying something with the intention of building it up anew (but never doing so) has nothing to do with economic reform.

We're talking about a country which had last been a democracy (of sorts) in the early *1930s*, which all the lack of democratic traditions and institutions that that implies. Frankly, I think that Eastern Europe was very lucky to have *only* Belarus regress into authoritarianism (well, and Russia). See the Arab Spring for an example of a revolutionary wave in a long-tyrannical region gone awry.

As for the NATO accession, I think you're letting your personal anti-NATO views color your opinions – I'm strongly pro-NATO, and I freely admit mine do. My parents weren't in Bulgaria at the time, but it's hard to believe that the country joined up if there was little domestic support for it.

As for Kostov, as I said, neither me nor my parents were there at the time (me being just a small kid anyways), but pegging the lev to the Mark really did help stabilize a desperate situation even by ex-Eastern Bloc standards. I count that as "reformism".
 
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We're talking about a country which had last been a democracy (of sorts) in the early *1930s*, which all the lack of democratic traditions and institutions that that implies. Frankly, I think that Eastern Europe was very lucky to have *only* Belarus regress into authoritarianism.
An authoritarian regime requires a dictator. Who exactly would have filled this role in the 1990s in Bulgaria?
And comparisons with Belarus are not really pertinent. Belarus was in a very different situation than Bulgaria in the 1990s - far less dependent on Europe, most importantly.

As for the NATO accession, I think you're letting your personal anti-NATO views color your opinions – I'm strongly pro-NATO, and I freely admit mine do. My parents weren't in Bulgaria at the time, but it's hard to believe that the country joined up if there was little domestic support for it.
I am strongly anti-NATO (though I support Bulgaria's membership for pragmatic reasons), but I don't see why you think that my opinion would show in what I wrote. NATO membership was never really popular compared with the EU and it's also true that requirements for NATO entry were easier compared to the EU. I don't think either of these statements is under dispute. And as NATO is dominated by the US, it's usually their opinion that matters and they were clearly supporting NATO's eastward expansion since the early 1990s.

As for Kostov, as I said, neither me nor my parents were there at the time (me being just a small kid anyways), but pegging the lev to the mark really did help stabilize a desperate situation even by ex-Eastern Bloc standards. I count that as "reformism".
Good for you. I was here at the time and I was old enough to understand what was happening. As for pegging the lev for the mark, this was a good move. However, this was an idea of the previous government which was adopted by Kostov (and he opposed it initially). What I counted as destruction was the incompetent, thoroughly corrupt privatization of industries and services carried out under his government.
 
Just finished up the entire TL. Hoping for an update soon, once you return from your fishing trip.

Is there any chance of an update on Russia?
 
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