“一带一路”倡议下保加利亚知识产权保护制度研究

鉴于保加利亚在"一带一路"经济圈上的特殊地位,论文以比较视角分析了保加利亚知识产权制度与中国的差别,认为两国在著作权领域主要是权利内容的不同,专利和商标领域体现为申请程序与司法救济程序的差异,动植物品种与生物技术发明保护表现为保护水平的区别。不同产业的中国企业进入保加利亚从事商贸活动,需有针对性地关注知识产权法律风险,建议文化创意型企业重在考虑著作权内容及其保护期限,一般工商业企业应重视专利和商标的申请程序及司法救济,农业或农业加工企业应关注动植物品种权的保护范围。     

Understanding Open Data Policy: Evidence from Bulgaria

This paper provides an overview of Bulgaria’s policy on open data by using the framework of a novel Open Data stage model, showing that the country is still at the first stage of opening data. We also present a detailed overview of the data landscape of the public sector in the country and outline the first milestones and successes in its efforts to publish some of that data for reuse. A complete data audit reveals persistent technological and cultural barriers to publishing public sector information but also outlines the potential of doing so. The paper summarizes the limited knowledge about the actual benefits of open data and proposes moving beyond anecdotal evidence and usage metrics toward a more complete impact evaluation.     

Influential News: Impact of Print Media Reports on the Fulfillment of Election Promises

Building on the mandate theory of democracy and literature on media coverage of elections, this article theorizes why information regarding party promises that is transmitted through the media could affect the former’s fulfillment. Utilizing a unique data set composed of 2,676 promises issued by 14 legislative parties over a 15-year period in post-communist Bulgaria, the study is among the first to longitudinally analyze the role of media in pledge fulfillment, while controlling for institutional and other explanations. The conclusions demonstrate that media reporting of election promises affects the fulfillment of pledges made by coalition parties, when more than one outlet has printed a promise, and under conditions of strong ideological divisions within the cabinet. Furthermore, the impact of media reporting is greater for pledges that do not otherwise have a high likelihood of being fulfilled.     

Populism and democratic crisis in semi-presidential countries

This article demonstrates how different political opportunity structures in semi-presidential countries either enable or inhibit the overreach of populist presidents. In Turkey, for example, political leverage has been used to hamstring the opposition and transform a democratic regime into an authoritarian one. In Bulgaria, democracy also faded under a populist prime minister. Ukraine’s democracy had a checkered history, with frequent changes of power culminating in presidential breakdown. The Czech Republic introduced popular elections for the president to strengthen legitimacy, but that exposed the regime to conflict between the president and the prime minister.     

Challenges to democracy building and the role of civil society

This article addresses the issue of the challenges of democracy building and the role of civil society in this process by focusing on three countries in southeastern Europe, Albania, Bulgaria, and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia. Since the 1990s, when these three post-communist states undertook the democratization process, formidable challenges and obstacles to the democratization process have been encountered by all three states which facilitates a comparative analysis, while differences remain as well, especially since Bulgaria became a member of the European Union in 2007. The development of an indigenous civil society is perceived as both a necessary prerequisite for a qualitative democracy to develop and be maintained in these societies, and as a project under construction that needs to be culturally contextualized to be relevant to the population it purports to serve.     

From the economy of deficit to the black-market: car theft and trafficking in Bulgaria

Official and victimisation data show that despite falling rates for motor vehicle thefts, much of the EU ‘organized crime’ related thefts have remained almost stable. Nevertheless, the car-theft market in the EU has changed, and so has the role of traditional destinations for stolen vehicles, such as Eastern Europe. The paper examines the demand, supply, and regulation factors that shape the structures of the vehicle theft market in Bulgaria, and smuggling patterns and offender behaviour in source countries, in particular Spain. We argue that such nuanced historical approach that takes into account a wider range of factors in destination countries can help explain the recent transformations in Europe’s vehicle-theft markets.

Counting citizens: the transfer and translation of census categories from the international statistical congresses to the principality of Bulgaria (1872–1888)

This paper examines the nineteenth-century census as an early information technology and a medium for the transnational exchange of ideas in the nineteenth century. In particular, it considers how the ideas discussed by the International Statistical Congresses were directly applied in the newly established kingdom of Bulgaria in the first censuses from 1881 to 1888. It then examines how the legacy of Ottoman rule and the categories of the nineteenth-century Ottoman censuses unconsciously influenced the first census of Bulgaria, despite the desire of the new rulers to mark a significant break with the past. It also demonstrates how the nationalist feeling in the multi-ethnic former territory of the Ottoman Empire influenced the seemingly neutral categories of the first census. These categories then began to produce an implicit representation of the ideal Bulgarian citizen and so started the process of exclusion of the Turkish-speaking or Muslim population from full membership of the new body politic.     

Transnational networks and kin states: the Turkish minority in Bulgaria, 1878–1940

This paper focuses on the development of national identity and the formation of political organizations in the Turkish minority in the early years of the formation of the Bulgarian state from 1878 to the 1940s. It studies transnational aspects of nationalism, which is usually considered territorially bounded, by studying the impact of connections between the Turkish minority and the Ottoman Empire and later with Turkey. In addition to studying inter-state relations and their reflection in the legal and political sphere, this paper studies the flow of ideas across borders, transnational networks among political activists, and the resulting cleavage formation. Findings show that transnational connections and actors played dual roles. The circulation of political activists, contributed to the formation of national organizations which played a crucial role in (re)formulating national identity. Transnational connections increased political activity in the name of the Turkish minority. Through these organizations the community was able to make collective demands from the Bulgarian state. However, transnational connections carried debates and divisions in the Ottoman Empire and Turkey to the Turkish minority in Bulgaria. By dividing the community, they decreased the capacity for collective action.     

Threads intertwined: German national egoism and liberalism in adolf fischhof's vision for Austria

Bulgarian majority and Turkish minority relations have remained peaceful in the post Communist era despite a significant potential for civil strife. These antagonisms were a product of Bulgaria's historical political development.The most recent episode of forced assimilation policies under the Communist regime was a critical grievance contributing to the democratic transition in 1989. Unlike in neighboring Yugoslavia, communal ethnic conflict did not escalate to violence with political liberalization and the emergence of democratic political competition. A critical factor in the political formula for maintaining interethnic peace in Bulgaria has been Turkey's comparatively constrained behavior as a “motherland state” with regard to the Turkish Diaspora in Bulgaria.     

State Support in the Market: Women and Tourism Employment in Post-Socialist Bulgaria

In many former Eastern Bloc countries, economic transition has been responsible for drastic declines the social and economic well-being for both men and women. In general, however, women have tended to experience relatively greater losses since 1989. Through a detailed case study of women's employment in the tourism sector of post-Communist Bulgaria, this chapter will argue that state support for certain economic sectors can help improve the relative economic welfare of women. Using both qualitative and quantitative data, this study finds that state support for viable economic sectors with relatively high wages that employ a critical mass of women can help to ease the difficult transition from centrally-planned to free-market economies.