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From the Pandemic to a Sea of Ignorance: On Bulgaria’s Neoliberal Educational Reform

Note from LeftEast editors: We publish this article in collaboration with the regional portal Bilten, where it originally appeared in Croatian. The correlation between educational and social inequalities in Bulgaria has long been at the center of public debate. However, rarely do we hear reform proposals beyond the existing neoliberal educational model based on competition, decentralization […]

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Bulgarian elections of 2021: repackaging the same old (TV) story

Bulgaria held inconclusive general elections on April 4, 2021. The hitherto center-right ruling party GERB won them but with a result preventing it from forming a government. A nascent anti-GERB coalition is shaping up in Parliament, led by “There is such a people”: a new formation headed by a famous Bulgarian TV host.

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(Post)pandemic struggles in social reproduction: Women’s labour before and during the COVID-19 pandemic in Bulgaria

Note from the LeftEast editors: The present text, which we co-publish together with TSS, is part of a series of publications and webinars on the topics of social reproduction, (women’s) labor, and migration in East-Central Europe and beyond. The video from the webinar (Post)pandemic struggles in social reproduction, where this text was first presented, can be seen here(in […]

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(Post)pandemic struggles in social reproduction: What did Bulgarian teachers learn from the pandemic?

Note from the LeftEast editors: The present text, which we co-publish together with TSS, is part of a series of publications and webinars on the topics of social reproduction, (women’s) labor, and migration in East-Central Europe and beyond. The video from the webinar (Post)pandemic struggles in social reproduction, where this text was first presented, can be seen here […]

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[Podcast] Neda Deneva: Being taken care of. The case of medicalizing birth-giving.

Note from LeftEast editors: We share this podcast with the permission of its producers from Contrasens. “Contrasens” is a podcast which explores current themes in the field of the social sciences. The project aims to bring to the forefront and make as accessible as possible research conducted by sociologists, anthropologists and other specialists from related […]

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Sick Leave: the Hidden Class Wars in Bulgaria

Note from LeftEast editors: We republish this from the Croatian portal Bilten, where it originally appeared. Bulgaria has some of the lowest wages and lowest productivity rates in Europe, and, not surprisingly, some of the highest rates of out-migration. Employees and employers agree on that, but on little else. Yet with the country’s economy growing […]

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We Asked on the Legacy of Corbynism: Mariya Ivancheva

What has the Corbyn project meant – as a model, an inspiration, or otherwise – to you and people in the milieu(x) in which you organize? What was at stake with this project was in equal measure painfully distant and painfully close to the contexts I am immersed in, and to an extent represent. In […]

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Let Jock Palfreeman Speak! Part I of a Two-Part Interview

In this interview originally published in Bulgarian on dversia.net, the leader of the Bulgarian Prisoners’ Association speaks with Polina Manolova on the loss of justice, his activism, and left alternatives. Polina Manolova: On 19th of September 2019 Jock Palfreeman was granted parole after serving almost 12 years in Bulgarian prison for fatally stabbing a neo-Nazi […]

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“Eastern Europe’s extraordinary 30-year revival.” A Bulgarian immigrant’s anecdotal response

A few weeks ago, I stumbled upon a video of the Bulgarian Prime Minister Boyko Borisov circulated by a Bulgarian Facebook group. The video began with an excerpt of a speech by the Prime Minister delivered to his party at the beginning of the year. In it, pondering the falling popularity of his government, he […]

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I, the caregiver – stories from “the grey zone”

“I hope that politicians will pay greater attention to the people who work as unlicensed labour – the thousands of caregivers, help personnel, child caregivers. The relations between foreign workers and bosses are unequal and demands for labour contracts will never be fulfilled without political will. It is necessary both for the legalisation of our work and for accessible services for the ill and children.”