The History of Social Work in Eastern Europe 1900 - 1960
Research Report - Bulgaria - Final Report
Kristina Popova, Milena Angelova
The History of social work in Bulgaria 1900 – 1960
First period /1900-1912/
1.
Economic, demographic and social cha racteristics of Bulgaria at the beginning of the
20th century
The analysis of the economic and social situation of Bulgaria at the beginning of the 20th century
reveals a typical rural economy country of small and middle scale farming and prevailing peasant
population. Basic economic entity was peasant household with family distribution of labour.
Traditional family and kinship circles played most important role in the social support of children,
elderly people and disabled people, mutual aid of fellow-villagers was the next important social net.
In this seemingly static picture a strong inside dynamics and big regional differences could be
observed. At the beginning of the 20th century many rural regions were involved in economic and
cultural modernizatio n processes. Nevertheless of the prevailing peasant population Bulgaria
underwent intensive economic and social transformation which introduced modern industry,
transportation and communication and new urban social strata as well. For the period of 15 years
the number of the industrial enterprises raised from 72 (1894) to 345 (1911) with an average
number of workers - 50 per factory. The total number of workers increased from 188 000 in 1900 to
332 000 in 1910 while the total population of Bulgaria for the same period increased from 3 744
283 to 4 337 513 people. The share of the working women reached 28, 2% with an average wage
two times smaller than the one eared by men. For a long time wage labour was negotiated only
between worker and employer and workers missed any social protection.
Until 1910 the peasant population grew at more accelerated rates then the urban one nevertheless of
the urbanization process. After 1910 the relative share of the urban population began to increase –
from 19, 1% in 1910 to 21, 4% in 1934. Small and middle size towns were prevailing with
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developed local industry and handicrafts, gardening, farming as additional activities. The few
bigger towns as Sofia, Plovdiv, Varna, Ruse (and Burgas lately) had a population between 50 000
and 300 000 inhabitants. Water supply and sewerage were introduced but quite slowly especially in
the villages: at the beginning of the 20th century only Sofia had a system of sewers; sewerage was in
process of construction in several other big towns. The Urbanization Low of 1911 demanded
compulsory construction of plumbing; building water supply in cooperative manner started in the
villages, but the process continued in the next decades.
At the beginning of 20th century electricity was installed in Sofia, Varna and Ruse. Concerning birth
and child mortality rates there was a small difference between towns and villages. The birth rate
was 40-45 per 1000, the mortality rate - about 160 per 1000. In 1895 the first midwife courses
opened and by the end of 1910 there were 219 trained midwives. The educational level changed
quickly: in 1911/1912 there were 3482 schools /for 3047 settlements / which covered 80% of
children. In 1887 the share of literate people was 10, 71% but literacy grew at accelerated rates in
the next decades:
Literacy rate of Bulgarian population in percentages
(children under the age of 6 were not included)
1892
1900
1905
Men
24, 31
36, 03
40, 66
Women
6, 57
11, 21
14, 67
But it was not earlier then the First World War when the number of literate men exceeded 50%.
2.
The beginning of the national insurance legislation and social legislation
Modern Bulgarian state which was founded in 1878 according to the decisions of Berlin Congress,
undertook first steps in social legislation by the 1880- ies. From the very beginning the state
introduced privileges for the participants of the national liberation movement and Law of Improving
Conditions of Poor Revolutionaries was initiated in 1880 to provide financial support and land
settlement for them.
By the end of 1880-ies the first pension fund was established and pension insurance for teachers,
priests, employees and military men was introduced. Worker’s insurance developed lately. During
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the Government of the National Liberal Party in 1905 industrial enterprises were obliged by law to
establish worker insurance funds against accidents; life and pension insurances including disability
pension were introduced in 1909. But the financial sources of the funds were miserable – mainly of
collected penalties. The Law of Female and Child Labour in Industrial Enterprises of 1905
introduced prohibitions and limitations to hiring children younger then 12 years and certain
categories of women; shorter working time for underage adolescents and suckling mothers was also
enacted.
Besides of the Low of Women and Child Labour of 1905 the Low of Artisan Enterprises obliged
masters to provide clean working conditions and enough healthy food to apprentices. In 1907 Work
Inspectorate was founded to supervise the implementation of the labour laws. After several years of
debates in the National Assembly the Low of Social Insurance was voted. The law appropriated
Bismarck tripartite system and provided for obligatory insurance of all workers and employees.
At the end of the 19th century questions of public health were often discussed and a bill was drafted
providing for subordinate role of private physician practice and recommending a net of district
physicians to be developed but the bill was not voted. In 1903 the more conservative Law of
Preserving Pubic Health was voted which was effective up to 1929 when the Law of National
Health was appropriated. An important role in the social and health policy of the state played the
obligatory introduction of school physicians the so called teacher-physicians (1904). This way
personal health files were introduced and child health started to be on consistent observation which
improved the medical treatment of children. In the conditions of a very low health culture
dominated by traditional prejudice and magic practices the teacher-physicians contributed a lot for
the developing of health education.
3.
Social activities of municipalities
At the beginning of 20th century there were 80 urban and 2067 village municipalities. The Law of
Urban and Village Municipalities of 1886 obliged the municipalities to take care of poor people but
in reality a very limited part of municipality budgets was used for developing of public services,
hospitals and charity. For construction of municipality buildings and schools, plumbing and
sewerage the municipalities were to take loans and their financial dependence increased. Several
municipalities made a considerable advance in social activities, for example Plovdiv municipality
opened social houses for orphans and elderly people and provided medical treatment to poor people.
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4.
Social pro blems in the public debates at the end of 19th and the beginning of 20th century
At the beginning of 20th century after series of divisions of political parties the political system
stabilized including 10 political parties. In the right political space there were the National,
Progressive Liberal, Liberal, National Liberal and Young Liberal Parties; the political center was
occupied by the Democratic Party, in the left political space – the Radical Democratic Party,
Bulgarian Agrarian Union and two Social Democrat Parties (after the division to unionists and
reformists in 1903). Topics as poverty, social injustice and the need of social policy took an
important place in the public debate. Those problems were introduced mainly by the left parties but
the legislation was initiated by the National Liberal Party which was on power from 1903 till 1908
and by the Democratic Party (1908 – 1911).
Most of Bulgarian intellectuals were coming from the insecure middle class of the small town and
prevailing amo ng them was the opinion that the disintegration of the patriarchal order and the
penetration of modern urban culture would destroy the material and the spiritual culture of family.
Very strong among the intellectuals and especially among the teachers was the ideological influence
of the Socialism and the Russian Populism. The Social Democrat Party was founded in 1891, later
left social movements as “Love for poor” and journals as “Poor’s defender”, “Workers’ friend”
appeared. Their eloquent names reveal a very strong influence of the ideas about social equality and
justice. According to the Marxist interpretation of the social situation in Bulgaria the capitalism had
destroyed the old social order without creating a new one. Big city was blamed for the new
negative phenomena – crime, prostitution, homeless and uncontrolled children.
The political interpretation of poverty was influenced by the debates in other countries the
Bulgarian parties had contacts with and by the many translations of Karl Marx, Karl Kautsky,
Edward Bernstein, Sombart and others. According to the program documents of the social
democrats most important role in the social policy had to play the state and the municipalities. On
the pages of the political and the cultural journals as “Democratic Review” “Common Mission”,
“New times” many articles devoted to the social questions appeared translations, comments and
reviews as well. In the journals the modern political discourse on social problems developed,
illustrated by fiction characters of poor women, children, farm-hands, maids, consumptives.
In the first years of 20th century professional associations in Medicine, Law, Economics, Pedagogic,
History, and Social Science introduced a new expert discourse. By that time health and social
situation of Bulgaria was not investigated and the first generation of experts contributed for the
knowledge of life conditions, nutrition, and health statistics of Bulgarians. On the pages of the
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Proceedings of their associations the first researches on child mortality, homeless children, bad
living conditions, child malnutrition, tuberculoses, child delinquency, prostitution, connection
between first menstruation and nutrition pattern appeared.
At the beginning of 20th century a wave of publications presented Bulgarian social life into
scientific dimensions. The authors, specialists with academic education, most of them graduated
abroad, introduced the standards of the modern Medicine, Economics and Pedagogic. Such
publications were: “Medical Observations on the Pupils of the Schools of the Capital” (1900)”What
do the Bulgarian Pupils Eat and Dress with?” (1912), “Child Mortality in Bulgaria and the Ways of
Fighting it”, “Child Lawcourts” (1908), “The Lodgings of the Workers of Factories and other
Industrial Enterprises” (1909) and many others. The publications drew public attention on the new
groups of people who needed social protection; new scientific standards developed to describe their
situation and new organizations were founded to support them - “Soup Kitchen for Pupils” (1897),
“Association for Fight against Tuberculoses”, (1907), “Child Playgrounds” (1904), “Union for
Fighting Child Delinquency” (1909). The unions were organized in a different manner from the
traditional charity organizations.
In 1908 during the Government of the Democratic Party the preparation of the new Charity Law
Draft was initiated in order to introduce regulations into the increasing number of charity activities.
But during the tree years of their governments the Democrats did not succeed to elaborate and vote
the law.
5.
Women’s movement
First women’s unions were founded in small towns by the middle of the 19th century when Bulgaria
was still part of the Ottoman empire. They were charity organizations mainly establishing
kindergartens and supporting the education of poor girls. By the end of the 19the century the role of
the female teachers in such organisations increased. The fight for providing equal access of women
to university education united women organizations and the Bulgarian Women’s Union was
founded at the beginning of the 20th century. The periodical of the Union “The Voice of Women”
started; the priority task of the Women’s Movement was obtaining equal political rights and
suffrage. The union “Consciousness” (chaired by Ekaterina Karavelova – teacher, writer and
journalist, the wife of the former Prime Minister Petko Karavelov) won the recognition as a leading
women’s union. The women writers introduced new literature topics as poverty, cruel destiny of
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small girls – housemaids, homeless children. The story of Ekaterina Karavelova “St. George’s
Day” (the day of hiring maids) related about eight years old girl which was severed from her native
house to serve as a maid in the town. The story was translated into many languages and was
included in many literary collections. The newspaper “The Voice of Women” published translations
of famous activists of the International Women’s Movement as Lily Brown’s “Spiritual Life of
Woman” and Helene Lange ’s “The History of the German Women’s Movement”. The Women’s
Movement took a stand to the debates about women and children labour, to the access of women to
education and profession, to social insurance and other social problems.
6.
Religion and charity
6.1
East Orthodox Church
During the 19th century asylums for elderly people and for disabled people existed to some of the
biggest Christian Orthodox monasteries and town churches. Life and work conditions and social
control in these institutions depended on the local traditio ns and varied a lot. In some of them the
inmates enjoyed social respect, in others life conditions were close to the prison ones. In many of
the cases the inmates depended on individual charity and religious compassion. But their presence
in the towns was quite visible because they were the only institutions promoting the idea of social
responsibility and care.
By the end of the 19th century the institutionalization of the local organizations started, many of
them developed into modern homes for elderly people and for disabled ones. Christian Orthodox
Parochial Unions took the responsibility for the organization and the maintenance of the small local
institutions. The first Christian Union was founded in the small town of Chirpan in 1905, by the end
of 1930- ies there were such unions all over the country. Social care for elderly people was the
priority of these unions and the regulation in this field started.
Since 19th century an important role for the local social institutions played charity funds based on
donations and testaments. In every little town at least 6 -7 such funds established to support the
maintenance of different local institutions, the managing boards of the funds usually included local
priests and representatives of church trustees or local authorities. From the beginning of the 20th
century the role of the local Christian Orthodox Fraternities increased and they took the initiative
of establishing charity institutions. For a long time the leadership of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church
(which got independence from the Greek Patriarchate in 1870) did not regulate charity activities; it
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opened Exarchate Hospital in Istanbul and several orphanages. The central institution of the
Orthodox Church – the Holy Synod, and the eparchies became more active in charity in the eve and
during the wars (1912- 1918) and especially in the 1920- ies and 1930- ies.
On the pages of the church periodical “Church Newspaper” and other religious editions social
problems were also discussed but for a long time the Orthodox Church realized her mission only in
the dissemination of moral religious ideas and the traditional compassion.
Some charity institutions were organized by the Catholic Church and the Protestant Missions in
Bulgaria, mainly in Sofia and Plovdiv. The Greek women’s union in Plovdiv organized a
kindergarten in the 70- ies of the 19th century.
6.2
Muslim and Jewish charity
At the beginning of 20th century the Muslim population in Bulgaria was a considerable part of the
country population. After the migrations at the end of 19th century the Muslim population remained
15% (1905). 15th offices of mufti were in charge of the religious affairs of the Muslims, they
controlled also the charity institutions.
By that time Jews were about 40 000 people, they had the earliest and the best run charity
institutions in Bulgaria.
7.
Bulgarian Association Red Cross (BARC)
In 1885 Bulgarian Red Cross was founded, its first representative was the bishop of Tarnovo
Kliment. During the short Bulgarian-Serbian war nuns volunteered as nurses answering the appeal
of the bishop. Later the Red Cross played very important role in organizing the first courses for
professional nurses (1900) and for the preparation of nurses for free work in hospitals and medical
services (1910). Tsarica Eleanora who came to Bulgaria in 1907 as wife of the Tsar Ferdinand
contributed also for opening of such courses and for the charity in the country.
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Social care for various groups of children: charity initiatives and foreign activities
In 1898 on the initiative of Ferdinand Urbich??? first private school for deaf-and-dumb children
opened in Sofia. From 1901 the state took considerable part of the maintenance of the school which
allowed a free boarding- house for poor children to open to it, from 1906 the school became a state
institution.
The Ministry of Education investigated the experience of Russia, Germany and Austria in training
blind children and Institute for Blind People with workhouse and musical school opened in 1905.
The wave of emigrants from Macedonia and Odrin Thrace following the Ilinden uprising against the
Ottoman domination in 1903 attracted the attention of foreign charity missions.
Relief funds were sent from Europe and the United States. On the initiative of the Irish
philanthropist Pierce O’ Mahoni??? orphanage “Saint Patrick” for emigrant’s children and orphans
was founded in Sofia. In 1905/1906 with the support of British donors cultural-charity union
“Consolation” of the town of Bitola (Macedonia) opened a soup kitchen for poor children to the
church “Saint Virgin Mary”; later an orphanage for 40 children was also established. After the wars
orphanage “Bitola” was founded in Sofia by the Macedonian Women’s Union as a continuation of
the Bitola’s orphanage. In the years 1900 -1905 the first nursery/creche?? “Evdokia” opened
where abandoned children were taking care of. The crèche put an end to the practice of the Sofia
Municipality foundling and abandoned children to be given to wet-nurse.
During the first decade of 20th century public discussions about social policy and responsibility
intensified, research centers established and new scientific standards in social care developed. The
basic agents of social care emerged clearly: Women’s Unions, Local Christian Unions, and Unions
for Protection of Homeless Children, Soup Kitchen Unions and others.
Nevertheless of the fact that many small owners ruined because of industrialization big groups of
landless and unemployed people did not appear in Bulgaria to press for special work legislation and
establishment of institutions of work and social control of the type of Workhouses in Britain. Still
there was not any coordination between the various social initiatives and the state social policy was
not mature. Municipality social activities were insignificant and European patterns of modern
municipal social work like Elbenfeldersystem for example, were introduced mainly after the First
World War. Professional assistance initiatives popular in Germany, Austria and Belgium did not
find a proper response in Bulgaria
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Second period 1912 – 1918
1.
Bulgaria during the Balkan wars and the World War I
Bulgarian society went through a hard period in the years between 1912 and 1918, suffering the
consequences of three wars in a row.
Despite the clashing interests an the complicated relations among the neighboring countries, the
Balkan Union, including Bulgaria, Serbia, Greece and Monte Negro and directed against Turkey,
was formed on Russia and Bulgaria’s initiative. After a short period of preparation, on 5/18 October
1912 broke the Balkan War, which gave rise to a series of military conflicts that continued till the
fall of 1918.
In the course of the eight months of military operations in which the country was involved, 600 000
people were mobilized, 350 000 of whom participated in military actions on the very front line. At
the end of the war, the number of war victims was 84 454 – killed on the battlefield, injured, or died
of diseases and wounds.
The war, however, led to favorable conditions for the dissolution of the tightened knot of
contradictions among the Balkan Union countries. The rivalry among the allies, their strivings
towards gaining domination and as many territories that formerly belonged to the Ottoman Empire
gave way to breaching the preliminary agreements among themselves. A new coalition was formed
– now intended only against Bulgaria. In this critical situation, Romania came forth, laying her
claims to territorial compensation at the expense of the expansion of its Balkan neighbors. A new
complicated knot of territorial conflicts tightened up, which consequently led to the outbreak of the
Second Balkan War in 1913. As a result of the aggravated interrelations, on 17 June 1913, the
former allies entered a new war. The military operations ended on 16 July, 1913. Bulgaria suffered
a bitter defeat. The after-war situation she found herself in, was defined as “First national
catastrophe”. And the situation was indeed catastrophic not only in terms of the military defeat, the
territorial losses and the economical collapse, but also in terms of human losses – countless were
those who got killed, injured, or found themselves orphans, widows and refugees after the end of
the war.
A year after the Balkan Wars, as a result of the fact that Triple Alliance and Central Powers
suffered a marked set-back in their inter-affairs, broke World War I. The Bulgarian army entered
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the war in the fall of 1915 on the side of Central Powers and participated in military operations till
the end of September 1918.
When it was decided that Bulgaria would engage in the war, about 616 000 people (of 5 million
inhabitants at that time) were called up for service. With a view to the further expansion of the
military actions, 875 000 more Bulgarians were mobilized.
In this war Bulgaria lost more than 150 000 people – killed on the battlefield, dead of diseases and
wounds, or taken hostages. The wounded were more than 300 000 (160 000 of whom remained
disabled for life).
The long- lasted war brought along severe aggravation of the economical situation in the country.
Short-living governments sought a way out of this situation by introducing regulatory state
measures in the economical sphere. In order to guarantee the living of the population, Laws of
social foresight (1915, 1916) were adopted, and a special institution was founded – Department of
economic care and social foresight (1917).
In the course of the wars, the left-wing parties in the country gained popularity, and at the end of the
wars, for the first time representatives of the Bulgarian Social- Democratic party and the Bulgarian
People's Agrarian Union (BPAU) took part in governments.
2.
Tendencies in the development of social care during the wars
The display of social sensitiveness in the first two decades of the 20th c. led to a common tendency
towards charity, which, although would hardly come out of the town areas, produced many new
community structures: women’s, Red Cross and Christian associations; associations organizing free
soup kitchens and providing for orphans and sick children, etc. During the wars, and especially
during World War I, those civil initiatives grew even bigger. The war years (1912 – 1918) made
people looks spontaneously for different forms of mutual help, as well as organizes various
charitable undertakings.
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2.1
Bulgarian Association Red Cross (BARC)
In the war period, the Association had undeniable authority. It provided the army with nurses and
Samaritans; engaged 175 foreign doctors at its own expenses, launched the first sanitary trains, and
opened military hospitals.
Even before the outbreak of the Balkan War and the call for war effort, BARC run a voluntary
sanitary service. During the war time, the qualified medical and sanitary personnel in Bulgaria
consisted of 728 doctors, 275 pharmacists, 115 assistant-pharmacists, 216 dentists, 468 doctor’s
assistants, 411 sanitary agents and 320 medical students- volunteers (the data is acquired from the
1914-statistics). The Association’s primal objective at that time was to train hospital attendants
capable of giving first aid and taking care of sick people. In the period between 1912 and 1913,
BARC trained about 1 500 men and 1 000 women, including 102 nurses. 14 hospitals were financed
by the Association’s budget.
During World War I, the Association equipped 3 special sanitary trains, which provide the sick and
injured soldiers with transportation and provisions.
The Association focused its efforts also on supporting the growing number of refugees. The
committees, especially those in the bigger towns which were most heavily populated by refugees,
canalized their efforts in helping those people.
During the wars, the Association had a network of 119 branches situated on whole territory of the
country (only three of them were settled in villages). Their task was to raise funds together with the
local charitable organizations for various groups of people in need.
2.2
International charitable missions
At Bulgarian Association Red Cross’s request sanitary missions from many European national Red
Cross associations came to the country. 11 such missions functioned during the Balkan Wars (these
were representatives of Red Cross in Austro-Hungary, Germany, Great Britain, Russia), 4 – during
World War I (German, Austrian, Hungarian, and representatives of the Malta Order).
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2.3
Bulgarian Orthodox Church
Bulgarian Orthodox Church joined Bulgarian Association Red Cross /BARC/ in its attempts to help
people in need. The Holy Synod encouraged its priests and parish trustees to support BARC’s work
in helping war invalids, soldiers’ families and orphans, and to donate 5% of their income for
BARC’s financial needs.
2.4
Women’s associations
Till 1918 there had been about 142 charitable organizations in the country. The activity of the
numerous women’s associations, however, came to the fore during the war years. Many were those
women who took part in various initiatives organized by the Red Cross. Their work was or primal
importance with the view to the future institutionalization of social care, for quite many of those
women who volunteered as nurses and Samaritans during the wars would later become the most
active members of public charity (mostly intended for children) after the war.
2.4.1 The “Samaritan” Association and courses for Samaritans
On the eve of the Balkan War, on the initiative of Tsaritsa Eleonora, a course for Samaritans was
organized in Sofia, and BARC was in charge of it.
Samaritan organizations of “ladies-volunteers” appeared in the early 1885. The national
“Samaritan” Association, however, was founded in 1910 under the patronage of Tsaritsa Eleonora
as an association of women who wanted to be trained for voluntary nurses. Till 1915 about 440
women received training in the “Samaritan” Association course. The Association participated in the
wars by organizing refreshment stalls and a medical service at the Sofia railroad station.
2.4.2 Women’s refreshment stalls during the wars
At the beginning of the Balkan War, a “ladies’ committee” was initiated in Sofia. The ladies set
themselves the task to open a refreshment stall at the station, the purpose of which was to welcome
the numerous passing-by sick and wounded soldiers and to provide them with beverages and food.
Subsequently, the ladies’ committee and the like obtained financial support on the part of the State
sanitary inspection.
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2.4.3 The Women’s Labor Department at the Bulgarian Women’s Union
On the initiative of the then chairwoman of the Bulgarian Women’s Union (BWU) Julia Malinova
and with the active participation of Dimitrina Ivanova, in 1916, the Women’s Labor Department
was founded in Sofia. As it becomes clear from its name, there were mostly women who were
involved in the Department’s work. These were volunteers, active members of the Women’s Union,
who orga nized the refreshment stall at the station, sewed clothes for the refugees who settled in
Sofia and for the passing-by soldiers who would drop in at the refreshment stall. Besides, the
Department provided women from the poor Sofia neighborhoods with work on the expenses of
BWU.
2.5
Increase of juvenile criminality and organization of “Home of Humanity” educational
institution for young offenders
The increase of criminal offences committed by children who were forced to steal in order to
provide for themselves and their families caused the formation of the Association for fight against
juvenile criminality in Sofia. It started its existence in 1917 on the initiative of Gencho Handzhiev,
and had for its objective to “help the children, to arouse the society’s interest in this social handicap,
and to open educational institutions”. The Association founded “Home of Humanity” to shelter
children with criminal inclinations. After the wars, the Association continued to enlarge its activity
by opening local branches in the bigger Bulgarian towns.
2.6
Union of Charitable Associations. Charitable Union
With the advance of the military operations, there were organized many committees for raising
funds for financial support of impoverished soldiers’ families, injured and disabled people,
abandoned children, unemployed, etc. In the public space the idea of uniting those committees into
one Union which to assist BARC was being persistently commented upon. After one failed attempt
in the fall of 1914, the Union eventually came into being in the summer of 1915, when, on the
initiative of the Sofia mayor Radi Radev representatives of different charitable associations in Sofia
established the new organization.
The Union’s purposes were grounded in the necessity of coordination with the Sofia Municipality
on the one hand, and with the board of trustees of BARC’s branch in Sofia, on the other. The
Union’s founders believed that in this way the public spontaneous manifestations of charity and
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empathy towards the misfortunate fate of soldiers, orphans and others war victims, would find for
sure their proper addressee.
After the Union’s establishment in the capital city, the municipality administration became more
aware of the flow of donated funds and their appropriate handling.
In June 1917, a special Charitable Union at the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Public Health was
established. Thus, the State tried to unite and coordinate the work of associations and committees
that had been brought into being during the war. This union included the following institutions:
•
Committee for supporting children of poor soldiers’ families;
•
Committee for supporting soldiers’ orphans;
•
Institute for supporting girls and women;
•
Committee “Charity Bazaar”
•
Association “Poor soldier’s family”;
•
Association “ Endeavor”;
•
Committee for supporting impoverished Jews harmed by the war;
•
Association of the disabled soldiers /war invalids;
•
Committee at the Sofia Municipality for providing soldiers with gifts;
•
Association for supporting impoverished Armenians.
The Charitable Union was intended as a centralized organ which to coordinate the activity of its
members, to collect and control the incomings and to partake in their distribution. The Union joined
the Union of Charitable Associations, which had been established earlier at the Sofia Municipality.
2.7
Social legislation during the wars
In 1941, Prof. Iliya Yanulov published an article, which is still considered the most profound and
significant study of social legislation in Bulgaria of the war period (1912 – 1918). According to his
analysis, one could hardly say that the governments carried out some special temporary measures in
the social spheres during the Balkan War (1912-1913). The reason, as he saw it, was that
everybody was convinced that the military actions would not take long. At this time there still did
not exist state mechanisms for supporting soldiers’ families. Only the private charity sector was a
factor in this matter.
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At the beginning of World War I, special economic and social legislation for the time of war was
already taking shape. A special law was adopted in 1915, which obliged the municipalities’
administration to organized activities for supporting soldiers’ families. Till the end of the war, by
virtue of this law more than 166 000 families were granted financial support. This initiative was
made possible due to the incomings from the state budget and from the private charitable initiatives
that had been collected in the “Soldiers’ Families” Fund.
As the health-sanitary conditions in the country during the war were getting worse (mostly due to
the epidemics of typhus and influenza), the ruling elite’s priority was to concentrate on working out
the type of legislation that would favor public heath. In 1914, six bills tackling labor and health
issues were introduced in the Parliament. In 1918, the Law of workmen’s sick-and accident-benefits
was adopted.
2.7.1 Hygiene Councils
Hygiene councils were a special form of handling the sanitary problems in different populated
areas. The idea behind their establishment was to prevent the epidemics from spreading among the
population in the time of war when the medical workforce was highly inadequate – the bigger part
of the 700 medical practitioners in the country in 1917 were at the front. A special Law of national
hygiene councils in the time of war (adopted in 1916 and remained in power till 1921) regulated
their work. Around year 1917, 98% of the populated areas organized their own hygiene councils.
Usually it was the mayor, some teachers and priests who entered those councils.
2.7.2 Labor legislation
At the beginning of 20th century, law-builders, political parties and governments focused on
expanding the circle of those groups of people who were socially secured. In this connection, at the
beginning of 1908, the first Law of retirement funds was adopted, and in 1915 – the second one
(which upheld the main articles of the first law) was adopted. Now the employees could get
individual insurance. The laws introduced age limit or an old-age pension (20 years of service and
50 years of age). In contrast to civil servants, hired workers in Bulgaria, however could not find
support in the Constitution in cases of accident, old age or death. Until the amendments did not
come into force in 1911, even the word “labor” was missing in the Constitution!
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In 1918 – the last war year, the Parliament discussed and later adopted the common Law of social
insurance. It implemented for the first time the principle of compulsoriness in the insurance
practice. The Law, however, was limited within the risks of accident and illness; it did not provide
for cases of permanent disability, old age, death and unemployment.
In the war period the governments made (not very successful) attempts to provide legal protection
for salaries, reserving the right of job positions which were taken by mobilized workers and
employees; to guarantee dwelling rental; to provide pensions for the war-victims, and to carry out
other measures for securing the normal living conditions of soldiers’ families and of the population
in general.
Some improvement was made also in the legislation for labor protection – the Law of hygiene and
labor safety from 1917, and the Law of workmen’s insurances of 1918.
Third and forth period (1918 – 1934; 1934 – 1944)
1.
Social and political frames of the period (1918-1944)
The historical events related to the wars (1912–1918) traumatized the Bulgarian society. In political
aspect, the period between the two World Wars was characterized by the government of the
Bulgarian People's Agrarian Union (1920 – 1923), its overthrowing and the establishment of a
rightist government (1923 – 1925), the temporary liberalization period interrupted by an economical
crisis (1926 – 1931), and the “authoritarian” regime of 1934. After 1934, the political opposition
was no more a stern corrective factor of the ruling authority.
The central political debates that were of the greatest interest to the active part of society tackled the
social problem and the national problem.
In the 1920’s and 1930’s, the agricultural social problems were a priority in the social discussions,
as well as in the strategies of the ruling circles in Bulgaria. One particular issue was brought in the
limelight – the one dealing with the living conditions of the peasants, raising the level of their
educational and “cultural” standing, and the professionalizing of agricultural labor. In the 1930’s,
the “third-sector” organizations penetrated also into the agricultural area.
16
The social turmoil which followed the wars led to the marginalization of massive groups of people.
The acceptance of hundreds of thousands of landless refugees, as well as the economy’s
modernization, which brought along social distress, put the acute problem of social protection on
the agenda.
2.
Social problems and “social care”
The “social care” term came into use in the early 1920- ies, but it was not until the 1930’s that it
became a central issue of discussions. This term embraced the ideas and the concrete projects about
the establishment of social institutions (communal, society, and state) for permanent and stable
support of those society’s members who, for some reason, were not able to provide for themselves.
The social debate focused on the following main social groups which needed help and care:
orphans, abandoned children, handicapped people, old sick people with no relatives, and poor
families. Due to the activities of the traditional charitable centers – religious institutions, charitable
organizations and communes - this particula r social sphere came into prominence.
The economical problems the war had brought along, the reparations provided by the peace treaty,
the huge number of refugees fled from the taken-away territories, the fate of the disabled people, the
widows and the orphans, as well as the consequences of the social crisis – juvenile criminality, the
epidemic nature of the social diseases, malnutrition, the high percentage of infant mortality – all
those were problems the state was not able to handle despite the general appeal for intervention. A
big part of the following legislative initiatives and public activities were due to the actions taken by
civic organizations, which brought certain issues into the public eye, made some political figures
involved in their committees and boards of trustees and by doing so, contributed to the
establishment of specialized institutions, normative documentation, financial concessions, and
other, and also managed to set up a public social network.
As a result of those public feelings, the old unions and organizations spread out, and many new
charitable, social, health and mutual benefit societies popped up. During the first decade after the
wars, the specialized aid organizations for people in a situation of social distress – blind, deaf,
widows, orphans, disabled soldiers, pensioners, juvenile offenders, refugees continued to grow and
expand their activity.
17
After World War I, most of the charitable organizations in Bulgaria joined together in order to form
a Supreme charitable committee, whose function was to coordinate the efforts, distribute the funds
and outline the new directions to their activities.
Like most of the defeated countries, Bulgaria also took on the Italian-German road – a decision
much opposed to by the leftist forces, which were much inspired by the Soviet model. The
antagonism between the two ideologies would sometimes lead to terrorism and radical political
disagreement, which reached their highest during World War II. In the 1930’s, the political and
public space were subjected to rightist forces alien to the idea of political pluralism. As regards the
social work in this period, we should mention an interesting practice carried out by the Bulgarian
Communist Party from the time after 1925, when the party was an outlaw. It is during this period
when the party leadership actively cooperated with the International organization for revolutionary
assistance, mostly known as “Assisting Organization”. From the mid 1920- ies to the mid 1940- ies,
through the Assisting Organization many children of communist leaders (who were either
emigrants, or imprisoned) were sent to the Soviet Union for upbringing and education.
During World War II the social-care institutions went through an organizational crisis due to poor
financial circumstances and the fact that almost all the institutions moved house from the capital
city to the province because of the air-raid danger. Besides, many more people appeared to need
social help – bombardment victims and those affected by the Law of Nation’s Protection, most of
them penniless and Jewish exiles.
3.
Bulgarian Women’s Union
The women’s unions which had joined the Women’s Union continued to expand their charitable
and educational activities. In the early 1940’s, Bulgarian Women’s Union (BWU) had 160 memberassociations all over the country. At that time those member associations provided for 37 day
children’s houses, 7 orphanages, 37 soup kitchens for students and poor people, 3 maternity homes,
2 day nurseries, 9 health counseling stations, about 40 vocational schools for girls; and 25 of the
associations supervised committees for support of poverty-stricken young mothers. The associations
run 25 courses in maternity and housekeeping. Some of those women’s associations were in charge
of five-six initiatives at the same time: day nurseries, children’s homes, vocational schools, etc.
Others, on the other hand, would confine themselves within one certain initiative only, but they
18
would still try to develop all its potentials. (The Awareness Sofia Association, for instance,
provided for eight children’s homes in the outskirts of the city of Sofia).
The Union summoned conferences at regular basis. In the course of these conferences, the
associations which worked in the social and educational sphere were given guideline according to
the new social, educational and civil laws and also according to the then modern international
standards.
3.1
Higher Social School for Women
The founders of the School in 1923 were Dimitrana Ivanova and Rayna Petkova, who had
graduated from the School for Social Work of Alice Salomon in Berlin in 1931. Due to the courses
organized by the Higher Social School at the Bulgarian Women’s Union social work turned into a
professional occupation (intended mainly for women), and terms such as “social worker” came into
use, and through social consulting service they were institutionalized within the civil practice
sphere. Although highly inadequate at that time, the job positions in different communes and other
institutions were taken by students of the Higher Social School for Women. The definition of the
profession was viewed in a twofold way. It was viewed as practice that had a lot in common with
other professional areas such as social medicine, pedagogic, legal practice.
3.2
Committee for Young Girl’s Protection
The idea about the foundation of this committee dates back to the fall of 1931, when the Bulgarian
Women’s Union sought the assistance of the Police Department asking for a special section to be
established, which to see to it that the young girls who landed up in jail not become “a complete
moral failure”. In most of the cases (according of the analysis done by one of the founders – Rayna
Petkova) most of those girls were ex maid-servants who had become prostitutes. When trying to
bring solid arguments in favor of one such institution, the Union pointed out that the measures in
respect to those girls had to be preventive and not repressive. One way of carrying into effect those
intentions was to open a special home where such girls would find accommodation and be provided
with opportunities for medical treatment and finding a proper work.
The official opening of the Committee was in the beginning of 1932. Along with the Police
Department and the Social Care Department at the Sofia Municipality, the counseling stations all
over the country too started to gradually support the work of the Committee.
19
4.
Helping the refugees and the “war victims”
Almost in every big town in the period between the wars, various charitable initiatives aiming at
assisting the war victims got under way. A special role was appointed to the women’s charitable
organizations. According to the statistics, 122 204 orphans, 45 394 widows and 12 688 disabled
soldiers were given help. Free soup kitchens were opened; homeless people and refugees were
provided with shelter. The central political power also took measures in order to solve the problems
of those people who were in some way affected by the wars. It was made possible through the War
Victims Law adopted in 1925.
In the 1930’s, the number of the charitable organizations for refugees grew bigger. After the wars,
more than 200 000 refugees from Thrace and Macedonia came to the country. The catastrophic
earthquake in the town of Chirpan from 1928 made thousands of people homeless. Bulgarian Red
Cross was an organization which actively helped the earthquake victims by winning other national
Red Cross associations for the noble cause. The problems the refugees were experiencing were both
a reason and a major goal of the initial activity of the Committee at the American Near-East
Foundation, which was known in its very beginning as Committee for Helping Refugees.
5.
Social care for children – Union for Child Protection in Bulgaria
The long- lasted war changed the childhood concept. Poverty and need forced many families to
reply on their own children’s labor. The war produced new groups of impoverished children:
thousands of orphans, homeless, wounded or crippled children, children who had fled from their
homes, children without parental control – in most case these were children of working mothers.
The question of society’s duty towards the war victims was raised, and child care became a social
problem of first priority. First, it was the pediatricians, the teachers and the active members of
various charitable organizations who saw children as a collective image/subject that needed
protection. Both the professionals who were dealing with children and the social charitable
organizations directed their efforts to the establishment of such a network through which the
contemporary views about child embraced by other countries to get recognition in Bulgaria.
The establishment of the International Movement for Child Protection, the elaboration of the
Geneva Declaration and the recognition of the international standards of treatment if children gave
new impulses to the social efforts in Bulgaria.
20
The foundation of the Union for Child Protection was assisted by the Red Cross Society. In 1924,
International Union for Child Protection made a request to Bulgarian red Cross Society to send two
representatives to the Forth International Congress if Children Protection in Vienna and Budapest.
After the congress, the Bulgarian delegates Prof. Stefan Vatev and Dr. Kirov called together the
representatives of all the institutions related to children issues to discuss the “conditions of the
official and private care for children and to found a permanent Union of Child Protection in
Bulgaria on the basis of the recognition of the Geneva Declaration of the Children’s Rights and
having the status of a branch of the International Union.” Prof. Stefan Vatev was elected a first
chairperson of the new founded union. To support the first initiatives of the Union Frederica
Freund, an International Union representative, arrived in Bulgaria and stayed in the country for
more than four years.
Through the direct assistance of the International Union new institutions were founded in Sofia,
such as the “Save the children” hospice for wandering and homeless chidren and children forced to
begging.
In 1926, a child health exhibition was organized and by the end of the year, new branches of the
Union opened in nine towns (Lovech, Kjustendil, Varna, Shumen, Russe, Razgrad, Plovdiv, Pleven
and Samokov). In many of the towns the branches profited from the potential of the already existing
women associations.
Two events made a desisive contribution to the enlargement and the development of the Union for
Child Protection as a coordinating center of care and charity for children in Bulgaria: the
foundation of the institution of so cold female teachers advisers at the beginning of 1927 and the
launch of the “Our Child” periodical in the year 1928.
Organizing training courses for teachers advisers was a wide-spread practice carried out by the
Bulgarian Child Protection Union that had the task to prepare female teachers for education and
social work in the villages. The Union had chosen the village female teacher as its main ally. The
tasks of the teachers advisers were the following: to investigate the socio-economic and health
conditions of the families and children; to raise the health culture of mothers and children; to
organize soup kitchens for pupils; to organize local societies for child protection by coordinating the
effords of educated peasants, teachers, priests, minicipal employees.
The Bulgarian Union for Child Protection developed a large organizational network with more than
3 000 regional associations and its ideology, based on the Geneva Declaration of Children’s Rights,
to a great extent became part of the new childhood norms. More than 100 000 people took part in
the local organizations for child protection.
21
Village establishments of the branches of Bulgarian Child Protection Union and the number
of included children - 1938
Type of establishment
Number of establishments
Kindergartens
Day houses/nurseries
Orphanages
Hostels
Soup kitchens
Child playgrounds
Summer collonies
Summer camps
Heath-counseling stations
Total:
1
6
2
48
3042
342
32
2
449
3924
Number of children
10
157
47
1036
179 258
25 755
1504
140
127 570
355 477
Town eestablishments of the Bulgarian Child Protection Union - 1938
Type of establishment
Number of establishments
Distribution centers
Kindergartens
Day houses/nurseries
Orphanages
Protection homes
Homes for handicapand retarded children
Homes for juvenile offenders
Educational homes
Homes for deaf-and-dumb children
Homes for blind children
Hostels
Soup kitchens
Child playgrounds
Summer colonies
Summer camps
Maternity hospitals
Health-counseling stations
Total:
1
7
60
15
1
1
2
1
3
1
15
287
118
130
25
3
104
787
Number of children
22
344
3065
704
35
80
111
26
17
89
704
34 899
23 291
3 145
1975
191
94 619
174 247
22
The Union for Child Protection was one of the organizations which succeeded in creating its
operating structures not only in the cities, but also in hundreds of villages during the 1920’s and the
1930’s.
Union’s representatives actively participated in the Balkan congresses for child protection in Athens
in 1936 and in Belgrade in 1938.
The state social care tried to cover all target groups but was focused mainly on children, especially
on the largest group consisting of peasant children. The state social care never became the core
formation executing child care activities in Bulgaria. Professional experts started to play an
increasingly important role in the charitable organizations for children care. They voiced the
problems of different groups of children (homeless, abandoned …) and addressed the social
sensibility toward them. Many modern centralized charitable organization (first of all Red Cross
and Bulgarian Women’s Union) but also International Foundations like Near-East Relief urged the
state authorities to support child care. Child protection was often articulated in nationalistic rhetoric
and became an important part of modern national identity.
6.
Care for the elderly people
The initiatives aiming at assisting the lonesome elderly people were limited to local undertakings
for a long time before this issue to become a central topic of the public debate during the 1930’s.
This debate was gradually chiseling the belief that it was society’s duty to itself to provide social
care for those in need.
The Christian Orthodox fraternities started opening homes for elderly people (hospices). It was
mainly after World War I when such charitable associations started to appear at the parish churches
in many towns and villages. The establishment of those institutions was closely related to the social
work of the Bulgarian Orthodox church, which had entered a highly active period after the wars.
In the 1930- ies, hospices for elderly people opened all over the country. Some separate cases of
impoverished old people could become the motive of one such hospice to open in a certain town or
village. Another motive was that sometimes benefactors would donate or leave by testament certain
amounts. Thus, the hospices for elderly people, established primarily by church institutions, would
contribute to the formation of the social care network for sick old people.
One additional opportunity for the further development of this social care network was provided by
the Law of Social support from 1934. It regulated the activity of social charity and introduced the
more systematic financing of the appearing homes for elderly people.
23
7.
Social activity of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church (BOC)
The charitable Christian Orthodox “fraternities” were the ones to carry out to an utmost degree the
social activities of the church. The first parish Orthodox fraternity was founded in 1905. In 1922,
the Holy Synod of BOC called upon all the parish churches to found parish fraternities, which to
busy themselves with educational and active charitable activity. Many hopes were trusted into the
female members of those fraternities and their partaking into the charitable activities. In order to
persuade them to work more heartily for the church’s social cause, the “Christian Woman”
magazine made its start in 1923. A year earlier, the “White Cross” Women’s Monastic Fraternity
together with a school was founded; the fraternity had for its objective to work with women for the
propagation of charity ideas among them. With its numerous charitable initiatives in the 1920’s the
church became the source of new impulses for social work and social care in the country.
Some religious and monastery boards of trustees provided for soup kitchen for pupils, homes for
elderly people and orphanages. The Sofia bis hopric, for example, in the person of Bishop Stefan,
who most actively participated in all the large-scale charitable activities at that time, raised funds
for orphanages, which around the year 1928 totaled up to 800 000 Bulgarian levas.
8.
Social welfare and public health
8.1
Society initiatives
The low living standard at the very end of the 19th century and during the first decade of the 20th
century, the intensive process of urbanization and the underdeveloped public care sector were the
main reasons for the strikingly bad hygienic and medical situation in Bulgaria at that time. In the
period between the wars, many institutions engaged themselves in the sphere of public health.
8.2
Bulgarian Association of Red Cross (BARC)
After the wars, the Red Cross Association enlarged its network in the sphere of public health and
social aid. In this period, BARC grew into one big and well-organized institution. Since 1923
together with the Union for Child Protection in Bulgaria (UCPB) it had organized courses for
teachers-advisors. Each year about 100 female teachers successfully finished the courses.
24
Red Cross made an enormous contribution to the development of the health and prevention
infrastructure in the country. One of the central initiatives in this direction was the establishment
and the further development of the network comprising of health-counseling stations (since 1924) –
again due to the joint efforts of UCPB and BARC.
In cases of urgency – which was the case with the earthquake in Southern Bulgaria in 1928 – BARC
set up nation-wide relief funds.
About year 1935, the association had 589 branches with 32 300 members.
In 1921, BARC founded its own filial – Youth Red Cross. Soon it had its representatives in
almost every school and village in the country.
8.3
Delegation of the Russian Red Cross in Bulgaria
Under the patronage of Bulgarian Association of Red Cross (BARC), the delegation of the Russian
Red Cross had been working in Bulgaria since 1920. It was formed with the purpose of helping
those needy Russian emigrants who had sought refuge in Bulgaria after the revolution in Russia in
1918. The delegation’s leader during almost the whole period was Leontii Feldmahn – this very
Feldman who would later stand at the head of the American Near-East Foundation in Bulgaria.
Beside the Russian Red Cross hospital in Sofia, the association involved itself also in a couple of
other initiatives – till the end of the 1930’s three pupils dormitories opened in Sofia (boys’, girls’,
and children’s) for orphans and children of poor Russian emigrants from the province who had
come to study in the capital city. The association provided also for a summer colony for about 50
children, and saw to it that twice as many children would spend the summer in other summer
resorts. The delegation financed the education of the children of impoverished Russian emigrants at
four educational institutions on the territory of the country. In the 1930’s, one orphanage for about
25 children and one dormitory for young unemployed managed to function due to the funds of the
Russian Red Cross. For those aged Russian emigrants who had lost all their relatives the Delegation
of the Russian Red Cross opened a hospice in the village of Shipka with the capacity to provide
shelter for about 150 people.
All the projects and institutions of the Russian Red Cross were supported by means of the Russian
Red Cross itself and by subsidies coming from the Fund for Public support (after 1934), the
American Association for helping Russian refugees, and the Supreme Commissariat at the Peoples’
Society.
25
*
*
*
Among all the associations and organizations dealing with health care there was one particular
association that is worth mentioning – Association for fight against tuberculosis (founded in 1907)
and its branches in the country. As the disease was rated among the most dangerous diseases
because of its wide ranging and lethal character, they had been trying to restrict its dissemination
since the very beginning of the 20th c. Because of the consequences the disease had brought along,
public attention was put on the alert. Through the financial support of BARC, UCPB, the Ministry
of Internal Affairs and Public Health, private sponsors and international relief funds, the
Associations managed to create a huge network consisting of branches (more than 200 in the early
1940’s), sanatoriums and children’s summer camps.
The Abstinence (from alcohol) Movement gained popularity in the period between the wars. Many
central unions popped up (Bulgarian Abstention Federation, Bulgarian Abstention Union), as well
as regional branches, pupils’ associations, and professional abstention organizations (Bulgarian
Medical Abstention Union).
8.4
State policy of public health
The Bulgarian Agricultural People’s Union, which came into power in 1920 made an attempt to
radically reform health work. In its health-care policy, the Union focused on preventive medicine,
and dealt with such medico-social problems as prostitution, alcoholism, and melioration of towns
and villages.
In 1924, the government of Alexander Tsankov initiated the obligatory insurance practice for all the
workers and employees in cases of illness, accident, disability, maternity, and old age (the Social
Security Law). The “Social Security” Fund was created. With the means coming from this fund
many health institutions, workmen’s dwellings etc. were built. The government adopted Law of
providing people with work and insuring them against unemployment (1925). The Public Health
Law of 1929 added to the expansion of the sanitary-preventive activity and regulated the fight
against the socially-significant diseases. This law lessened state’s expenditure on health care by
shifting the main financial burden to the communes.
The tendency towards decentralization of medical work continued till 1934; this tendency led to a
certain lack of coordination and narrowing down the activity range of the health care organs. It was
not until 1935 that, through the Decree-Law obliging the doctors to carry out their service and
26
health practice in villages, some kind of coordination among health care services had been
achieved. Since 1937-1938 there had been going on a large-scale building of health centers in the
smaller towns and some village communes (within the framework of the “Modern village” social
program).
9.
The Law of Social Support from 1934 – centralization and organization of social care
The bill- under-discussion from 1933 aroused lively debates in the Parliament – the Parliament
members were much concerned with the balance between the private charitable initiative and state
control. Those of them who stood up for the individual and group initiative called attention to the
danger of bur?aucratization of public aid and its being paralyzed by public administration. Union of
Child Protection in Bulgaria (UCPB), for example, declared their stand on the restriction of private
initiative in charity.
The bill adopted in March 1934 never came into effect because of the power take-over on 19 May,
1934. At the end of 1934, a new Law of social support came into force; it favored the ideas of the
new ruling elite for bigger centralization. Besides, the law introduced a united system for social
support, which comprised all the charitable organizations and was coordinated by the state. Thus,
after 1934, the interaction between State’s social policy and actions on the one hand, and private
charity, on the other hand, was finally brought into proper parameters of correlation. In unison with
the tendency towards a stronger centralization, all the initiatives dealing with social support were
better synchronized. The charity and social support in the country were coordinated through an
annual state plan for public aid, and it was the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Public health that
exercised supreme control. Supreme Council of Social Support was established, members of which
were representatives of state institutions – Ministry of Internal Affairs and Pub lic Health, Ministry
of Finances, of the church, the mayor himself, as well as representatives of some public
organizations dealing with charity – UCPB, Association for fight against tuberculosis, Bulgarian
Association Red Cross (BARC), and the Union for helping invalids and all those who are in need of
being socially supported. As stated in the law, all the associations for helping children up to 18
years of age had to become members of UCPS, and those dealing with elderly people had to join the
“Social support” Union.
Beside coordinating the activity of charitable organizations and introducing new organizational
standards and bureaucratic procedures, the law also launched a new mechanism for state financing
27
and public aid. A Social support Fund was founded; it supplied its finances from the obligatory civil
payments.
The new law gave rise to many critical comments, the main reason being the excessive
centralization and state control, which restricted private initiative. What is more, the law provided
with the opportunity for all the social support trends to expand their activities; it differentiated child
care and old people care, and formulated the obligations the local authority had to assume in this
sphere.
10.
Sofia Municipality – public care organization
Till the mid 1920’s, in the capital city with its 250 000 inhabitants, there was no special service for
providing the poverty-stricken citizens with assistance. Some attempts for institutionalization of
social care had been made during the wars and under the administration of the mayor Vladimir
Vazov (1926 – 1932). The Social Care Office at the Sofia Community was founded. The
Municipality administration sent experts to study the experience in the sphere of social work of the
fellow communities in Vienna and Prague (and to study more specifically the establishing pattern
the so-called Masarikov homes in Prague).
Some female social consultants were involved in the public aid initiatives of the Sofia Municipality
(12 of those consultants were appointed to position around year 1939). The first social consultants
were nurses, but later it was the graduates from the Higher Social School for Women who were
being appointed social consultants.
At the end of 1939 the public aid service helped about 15 000 households (of the total 60 000 on the
whole Sofia territory).
11.
Jewish charity
The history if public aid within the Jewish community in Sofia illustrates in the best possible way
the tendencies characteristic for the development of this kind of social care in the country as a
whole.
As the capital city was modernized at the beginning of the century, city poverty was marginalized.
The Jews were pushed into one of the far off neighborhoods (Yuchbunar), where the bigger part of
the 20 000 Jewish citizens lived.
28
The Jewish community started their own system of institutions operating in the sphere of charity
and social care.
11.1 The Jewish charitable association “Kupat tsedaka i Bikur holim” (Fund for charity and
visiting of sick people – Sofia)
The first project of the Association after the wars was the foundation in May 1920 of Jewish Local
Hygiene Council which to compensate for the inability of the Sofia Municipality to handle the
problems related to the living and hygienic conditions in the Jewish neighborhoods. In the 1920’s
and 30’s, the Association organized “social inquiries” among the Jewish families. At the end of
1939, the Fund for charity and visiting of sick people (FCVS) had collected enough data for about
1080 families from such inquiries.
In the mid 1920’s, the association opened an ambulatory for impoverished sick people (not only
Jewish) with its own health-counseling station. In addition, it collaborates with the Jewish
association for fight against tuberculosis “Beruit/Health” (established in 1925) by maintaining a
shared anti- tuberculosis dispensary.
The Associations, together with the Jewish community in Sofia, was the founder of a new center
which to coordinate the activity of all the Jewish charitable associations in Sofia. At the end of
1929, the Headquarters of the Jewish charitable associations was already functioning. According
to the statues, all the already existing associations on the Sofia territory became members of the
Headquarters. The executive power of the Headquarters was concent rated in the hands of two
people from FCVS, representatives of the “Tsaritsa Eleonora” Jewish orphanage, the free Jewish
soup kitchens for pupils, a couple of women’s charitable associations, the Jewish Council at the
Sofia Municipality.
In the 1930’s, the Association further expanded some of its activities: in 1933, one more counseling
station was founded – for mentally-defective children and for juvenile offenders; maintained a
Jewish orphanage; in 1937 – ? soup kitchen for workmen and poor Jews (supported by the Sofia
Municipality).
In the 1920’s – 1940’s, more than 19 Jewish religious and women’s associations in Sofia, and many
more in other towns with large Jewish communities, were involved in public aid practices. In the
period between the wars, there were two more representative Jewish institutions that were resolute
to help resolving the social problems in the community – Central consistory of the Jews in Bulgaria
and Jewish community in Sofia. The social aspect of their activities cover the organization of free
professional courses for young men and women of the Jewish community; providing impoverished
29
Jews, above all pupils, with help; supporting various charitable initiatives such as organizing
summer colonies for pupils, soup kitchens, free medical help, etc.
The Law of Protection of the Nation and its supplementary laws put an end to the activity of almost
all Jewish associations around year 1942. The reason was that the law provided for the dissolution
of all Jewish and international organizations with headquarters on the territory of states considered
anti- fascist allies.
12.
Ideas and practices in the sphere of social care after 1934
In 1934, all child protection organizations were centralized under the leadership of the Bulgarian
Child Protection Union and all charitable organization for adults – under the leadership of Union for
Social Support. The state started to introduce standards and common bureaucratic rules of social
work, especially for resident ial care. A magazine for state social support was issued – the “Social
support” magazin?. Another magazin? was started by the Central Union for social support.
The international organizations now influenced in a rather tangible way the social care organization
– those international models and standards covered social care for children, mothers-workers,
destitute peasants, consumptive patients, etc.
In the 1930- ies, the eugenic views started to make their way also in field of social work. Already in
the early 1920-ies, the “Eugenics” association was founded in Sofia. With the intensification of
Bulgaria’s relations with the countries of the Triple Alliance, the ideas of racial hygiene gained
popularity among certain social circles.
In the 1930- ies, after the legal regulation of the charitable image of such places of social care, they
became an important symbol of modernization. Images of social homes appeared also on stamps in
order to finance social activities. Homes, soup kitchens, night shelters etc. started to be
photographed. A lot of photographs, pictures and maps of local and national social care activities
were published in order to create some kind of symbols of social solidarity.
Inspite of the centralization local initiatives survived and even increased because the state was
interested in preserving the voluntary nonpaid work of the charitable activists and supported the
traditions of charity. Inspite of the state finance support of the local charitable organisations, their
main budget was based on the local financing: rents of real estates, interests, personal donations,
proceeds.
30
Throughout the 1930- ies and in the course of finding the balance between state and public
initiatives, of making attempts to professionalize and expand the charitable activities, of
strengthening both the control over and the will to give aid through providing care, of reconciling
the public relief’s bur?aucratization and genuine charity, state institutions, medias and societies
succeeded in discovering new forms of collaboration. Through those new forms the participants
could freely express their different ideas, inspired by humane, religious, modern or nationalistic,
socio-controlling and eugenic views. Keeping pluralism intact meant rivalry, but it also called for
coordination among separate institutions.
The law tried to balance between the State and the associations, and to assist for the formation of
partnership between them. However, the centralization effect gave rise to fears of excessive
“nationalization” of the social activities. Although the necessity of a state and communal
organization was out of any doubt, two were the main opinions to dominate the discussions: the first
one emphasized on the pluralistic principle in the social work initiatives, and on the right of various
institutions to perform charitable actions; the other one regarded the work of the public charity as
“supplementary” and “in aid” of the state itself.
Fifth period: 1944 – 1950
1
Social care after 9th of September 1944: bureaucratic continuity - social discontinuity
1.1
Political, economic and social changes in 1944 – 1948
The period of 1944 – 1948 was very dynamic in all aspects and the social changes were quite
conflicting. On 9th of September 1944 the Government of the Fatherland Front dominated by
Communist Party took the power with the support of the Soviet Army. The allies of the Communist
party were the left wings of the Agrarian, Social Democrat and Radical parties and left military
men. The new Government took repressive measures against the former Government which
included representatives of the parties of the political center and the right trying to democratize the
country after the series of pro German oriented Governments (1940 – 1944). Nevertheless of the
repressions against the former authorities political pluralism was preserved in the first years, there
were multiparty Parliamentary elections and political opposition until 1947.
31
The political debate (especially after the division of the Fatherland Front in 1945 when some of the
Fatherland Parties went in opposition) was dominated by the severe political confrontation which
influenced the social policy debate as well. In the economic sphere private property was preserved
to December 1947 with the exception of the confiscated enterprises of the ones sentenced by the so
called People’s Court (1944/1945), private land property was preserved to the 1950- ies.
Nevertheless the social structure in general remained the same the main tendencies of change
emerged. In 1947 plan economy started with the appropriation of the first Two - Year’s National
Economic Plan; the Directives of the First Five-Years Plan were accepted by the end of 1948. In
1947 the opposition was defeated, many opposition leaders were arrested and persecuted, and
political pluralism was abolished. The Fifth Congress of the Communist Party held in December
1948 marked the final victory of the socialist system of Soviet type in Bulgaria.
2.
Social policy
2.1
Ministry of Social Policy ruled by Social Democrats
Taking the power in September 1944 the Fatherland Front immediately founded Ministry of Social
Policy following the social-political priorities of the new Government.
It was based on several former institutions - Office of Social Care to the Ministry of Internal Affairs
and Public Health, Institute of Social Insurance, Labour Department to the Ministry of Trade,
Industry and Labour, Office of National Pensions. In 1947 the Ministry of Social Policy was
renamed to Ministry of Labour and Social care. A new Department “Relaxation and Culture”
opened to the Ministry to guide the spending of the free time of the citizens.
In the first year the Ministry was chaired by the old social democrat leader Grigor Cheshmedzhiev.
After his death and the division of the Fatherland Front when most of the social democrats went in
opposition the management was taken by Ivana Popova and later by Zdravko Mitovski, who was in
charge of it for years. The two of them were representatives of this part of the Social Democrat
Party who remained in Fatherland Coalition and joined the Communist party in 1948 when the
Fatherland Front was dismissed. Some social democrats who had been working in the social
sphere for more then tree decades remained in the new Ministry providing minimum personal
continuity in the social work.
From the very beginning of the Fatherland Front Government big part of social policy was assumed
by other Ministries. The Law of Health Protection of Motherhood and Childhood (1946) provided
32
for free medical health of pregnant women, children under the age of 15 and for bigger food coupon
portions for them. Two tendencies - the enlargement of the social policy on one side and the
strengthening of the social control on the other side marked the first years of the establishment of
the new Government.
2.2
The parliamentary debates about social policy
Debates about social policy in the period of 1945-1947 were quite different from the debates in the
1930-ies when the advocates of pluralism in social support – state, municipality, church, women,
citizen and private initiatives - dominated in the National Assembly.
The deputies of the 26th National Assembly (1945-1946) relied mainly on the state. State social care
was a central concern of the ruling parties of the Fatherland Front. The oppositional parties, most of
them of the left political space, admited NGO charity and social work but only as secondary one in
the cases when the state could not provide for. To some extend faith in the state was shared by the
opposition as well.
Nevertheless of the extreme confrontation in the 26th Ordinarily National Assembly and the 8th
Great National Assembly the debates were not focused on the relation state/ civic or state/church
initiatives. The Fatherland Front and the opposition shared close attitudes to labour (perceived
mainly as manual labour and basic source of material goods); to women equality; support of young
families; housing and health policy; social control over leisure and even to the need of straitening
the social control over the “non working elements” through imposed labour (The Law of Idlers and
Vagabonds, 1946).
Labour as primary life necessity and basic characteristic of the new man assumed new conception
of leisure. The conception of the labour was influenced by the conception of the harmoniously
developed personality. Free time was accepted as “measure of the public wealth only when it is
spend in a socially useful manner for mastering moral, physical and intellectual qualities of each
member of the society”. Since the main task of the state was to form new harmoniously developed
personality spending of the free time could not be left to personal preferences. It should be
organized and spend in collective activities. A special Department “Cultural relaxation” was
founded in 1944 to the Ministry of Social Policy to plan free time activities. This way labour and
free time turned out to be managed by one and the same Government institution.
33
The political confrontation in the sphere of social policy was related to other topics: the increased
budget and staff of the Ministry (which was not considered as a result of the reduction of the
volunteer labour in the social work). The other topic which provoked sharp criticism was the
expending budget for supporting a new group of relatives and friends of “freedom fighters“ which
were promoted under special social protection.
After the dismission of the Bulgarian Women’s Union which was substituted by the Bulgarian
National Women’s Union dominated by the communist party the problems of women disappeared
from the social policy debates nevertheless of the considerable number of women in the Parliament.
Equal legal rights of men and women were considered to guarantee gender equality. Feminism was
rejected as ideology supporting bourgeois social order. In such way the hidden forms of gender
discrimination were denied any public expression. The High Social School for Women founded by
Bulgarian Women’s Union in 1932 was dismissed. For some time the minister Georgy Popov
insisted on reopening of the School and planed a law-draft but his intention was never fulfilled and
the professionalisation of the social work was suspended for a long time.
2.3
The change of the structures and organizations
The new Government dismissed the Social Support Union which was established in the 1930- ies.
The Union for Child Protection continued to exist for several more years but after 1944 most of its
activities were taken by the new Pioneer Organization “Septemvrijche”. It started to organize
children summer camps and to occupy free time of children. ‘Septemvrijche” turned into a basic
tool of socialist ideology instruction. Bulgarian Red Cross continued its activities but under the full
control of the state. Its basic activities were directed to the organization of blood donation actions,
courses and competitions of “Be Ready for Sanitary Defense” movement which followed a Soviet
model.
East Orthodox Church was removed from charity. The Church tried to support the families of the
repressed of the new Government and to establish orphanage s and homes for elderly people but the
Church activities were restricted by the new authorities and religious attitudes to charity and
compassion were criticized and ridiculed in the official press. The authorities convinced part of the
priests to form a circle around the “People’s Shepherd” newspaper which announced that the role of
the Church is out of the social sphere.
34
Exarch Stefan was send to exile and by the end of 1940- ies the Church was totally excluded from
the social work. The resistance of the Church to the persecution of Bulgarian Jews during the
Second World War and to the anti-Jewish legislation (the Law of the Defense of the Nation); the
Church contribution to saving Bulgarian Jews from deportation to Nazi camps were silenced and
totally neglected.
The Government supported fully the Relief Organization which was a successor of the International
Relief Organization of Revolutionaries. It supported the families and the children of the persecuted
communists and other revolutionaries in the 1920- ies and 1930-ies, after 1944 the organization took
part in the support of the families of the freedom fighters and organized institutions of child care as
well.
Until the 1950- ies UNICEF was still functioning in Bulgaria supported by the municipality and
schools authorities and the structures of the Union for Child Protection.
2.4
Conclusion
The established state of affairs in social support kept functioning for several years. The new
tendency of nationalizaction of social care and work got dominance by the end of the 1940- ies and
the beginning of the 1950- ies. In the process of nationalization several fields of conflict between the
state authorities and the established participants in the social care (local branches of Social Support,
Women and Christian Unions, private donors and their hairs) appeared. The Ministry used different
motives – political, ideological and economical - in the debates. With the nationalization of all
social care institutions they were included in a centralized state network which made possible the
destiny of the social institutions - their closing, removing, and specialization, to be decided on
central level without the opinion of the local communities to be considered.
The policy of renaming, removing and restructuring of the established institutions was not limited
to the social care only but characterized also policy of the state to church, NGO-s, charity and
donation, feminism and women movement, traditional local authorities. In such a way the social
policy exceeded the immediate tasks of social work and got clear political and ideological
dimensions.
There was bureaucratic continuity as far as the immediate organization of social activities
(reception procedures, blanks and reports) was concerned but the function of social care changed
35
dramatically. For a along time the medical procedures and the reception forms elaborated in the
1930-ies for social homes were kept untouched but the underlying social relations were broken.
Without affecting considerably the bureaucratic frames of social care its institutions were
transformed in such a way that the social chain supporting the dialogue about the needs and
attitudes to poor, alone and homeless people was destroyed. The reconstruction process spanned
from 1944 to 1950 and several tendencies could be outlined:
-
Isolation of local community through ignoring civic initiative and nationalization of all NGO-s
property and donation funds
-
Substitution of free volunteer labour by state work appointments
-
Enlarging self-support in the homes for elderly people by engaging inmates in planed economic
activities
-
Interruption of local traditions and history by removing institutions most often in the village and
town outskirts and renaming of social homes
-
Avoiding the influence of the church and religion by promoting socialist ideology and
propaganda
After ignoring NGO-s, donors and church the state strengthened the bureaucratic control over the
net of social institutions and became sovereign master. The directives concerning the social
institutions reflected the radical transformation of the Bulgarian society in the second half of the
1940-ies. The changes in the social sphere remained hidden because of the bureaucratic continuity
and for a long time the social policy was in the periphery of the research of that period.
Sixth period: 1950 – 1960
1.
Economic and social changes
According to the main principle of the periodization of socialism the period of 1950 – 1960
included part of the first Five-Years-Period (1949 – 1953), the second Five-Years-Period (19531958) and the beginning of the third Five-Years-period (1958-1962). This was the period of the
most radical changes of Bulgarian society: industrialization (the main part of the national income
had to come from industry) and collectivization of agriculture (which ended in 1958). For a decade
the economic and the social profile of the country became very different.
36
For the period of 1946 (a year before the nationalization of the industrial enterprises) - 1956 the
number of workers increased by one third: from 638 249 to 970 988, the number of employees
increased about 3 times -from 191 757 to 553 213. About 572 000 according to the calculation of L.
Berov immigrated from villages to towns.
A clear disproportion in the age structure appeared –young people prevailed in the towns and
elderly people in the villages; the tendency was preserved in the next decades.
Nevertheless of the propaganda for “a leap forward in life standard” the calculations reveal that for
the period of 1937 - 1970 the real wages of workers increased between 1, 5 and 2, 5 times) and the
salaries of employees decreased. The income of employees leveled with that of workers and with a
tendency the income of workers to exceed the employee’s income.
Important dimension of the change was the mass participation of women in work sphere.
According to the Constitution of 04.12. 1947 men and women had equal rights including the right
of public work. The statute of “housewife” still existed but house work was not considered as
equivalent to public work. The official propaganda promoted the tree-fold unity of woman’s roles:
worker, social activist and mother.
The state took care to enlarge the net of children kindergartens and to provide proper legislation for
working mothers with small children. The other aspect of the social policy was the satisfaction of
the accommodation needs especially those of young families and families with children. The state
control on residence permition especially in the big towns gave possibilities for planning the
housing policy and to use it as an additional tool of recruiting workers for industrial enterprises.
The state promoted the social policy to children and young people as an emblem of the cares for the
Bulgarian people while the care for elderly people was pushed out in the periphery of social space.
The elderly people were the ones most affected by the nationalization and the collectivization; they
lost their property and suffered of other reforms as well - the exclusion of religion and religious
institutions from social life and the promotion of new official ideology, the spelling reform and
others. The value of pensions for years of service fell down so much that they leveled with old-age
pensions. In such way pensions cost was about 25-50% of the so called conventional monthly
budget (necessary for the satisfaction of the basic needs of individuals).
In the beginning of the 1950- ies pension legislation changed. The New Labour Code of 1951 and
the Insurance Funds were dismissed. The autonomy of the insurance system was rejected. New
37
state-budget insurance was introduced and lasted for 4 decades and this made possible the pension
funds to be misappropriated in the first months after the reforms of 1989.
2.
Social cares during the 1950-ies
Social life in the 1950- ies developed in the frames of the mass organizations which were
compulsory to a great extent. Such organizations were: Fatherland Front which ceaseed to be a
coalition in 1948 and became a unified organization, Trade-Unions, Dimitrov’s Communist Youth
Union. Part of the social policy of the Government was transferred to these organizations. They
organized the free time and the holidays of the “working people”; their involvement in different free
labour activities – construction, agriculture and forestation brigades and their participation in sport,
culture and tourist activities.
In the sphere of social support the postulate of radical solving of all social problems through state
guarantee of the rights of work, insurance, free medical care and pension was adopted. According to
the Decree of Social Support of 1951: “The Constitution of the People’s Republic of Bulgaria
guarantees the right of work to every citizen. The working people are secured against illness,
accidents, disability and old age; free medical care is provided for all Bulgarian people. The
victims of wars and fascism are granted special pensions as honored persons”
Social sphere was considered as automatically working system in which the need of social support
was rather an exception then a rule. In such a way the scope of the activities of the social services
was quite limited. Social care did not have a stable statute and organization and was under the
authority of different Ministries.
According to the Constitution of People’s Republic of Bulgaria of 04.12.1947 the Ministry of
Social Policy was transformed to Ministry of Work and Social Care. It was in charge of the social
support of the victims of wars and fascism, children, victims of social disasters, newly married
couples, and large families.
In 1951 the Ministry was closed and part of its functions was transferred the Trade Unions and the
Ministry of National Health and Social Care. Department of Social Care opened to the Ministry of
Health which moved back to the Ministry of Labour and Social Care in 1968.
38
For a long period social care was mainly related to medical care which caused the medicalisation of
social care and limited its function. The Ministry of People’s Health and Social Care was chaired
for many years by Doctor Petar Kolarov (1950-1962) who was a political emigrant in USSR and
contributed for the imposition of the Soviet model in Bulgaria.
3.
Social cares: classification, categorization, standardization
In 1951 the Decree of Social Support of the Presidium of the National Assembly (25.09.1951) put
an end to the pluralism in the social sphere. The interruption of the tradition was emphasized in the
preamble of the Decree with clear political implication:
“ To dismiss the laws of the past which played only a lip service to the charity of the working people
but in fact humiliated them; to introduce unity in the organization of social support including
categories of people which were out of social insurance – blind and deaf-and-dump persons,
orphans and semi-orphans, lonely old people and others; to organize the pension of disabled
people, the Presidium of the National Assembly according to the article 35, point 5 of the
Constitution of the People’s Republic of Bulgaria, and the article 5 point “b” and article 6 of the
Law of the Presidium of the National Assembly issue the following Decree of Social Support”
Labour readjustment was introduced as a basic principle of social support, and big part of the texts
were related to the rights of disabled people victims of wars and fascism which were given some
job, accommodation and traveling privileges. Begging was forbidden in all forms and the People’s
Councils were entrusted with the task to fight begging. All charity organizations and funds were
eliminated. The basic part of the immediate work was transferred to the Departments of the
People’s Councils and the Ministry kept only the methodological work.
In 1957 a new change took place – the Office “People’s Health and Social Care” was renamed to
“Social Insurance, Pensions and Social Care” by the Decree of Changing the Law of People’s
Councils ( Izvestija newspaper, 30, 12.04.1957). In the next years the social debates about social
work were suspended. The periodical press which used to provide publicity of the debates was
substituted by an internal Ministry Bulletin in which normative acts were published. The published
information was very scant because social care data were declared state secret.
Some social groups as families of convicted persons, exiles, dismissed persons were not only
deprived of any support but were stigmatized as enemies. The language of Cold war put a profound
39
imprint on the interpretation of social problems - the bourgeois charity was condemne and
phenomena as suffering, poverty, inequality, humiliation, prostitution were assigned to the capitalist
world only. In the socialist state the social care clients were euphemistically designated as “the
needy ones”. The abstract and pompous rhetoric makes very difficult the analysis of the historical
sources and the discovering of the persons related to social work for that period. Practical examples
of social work could also hardly be found.
The dismission of the Women’s Social College and the lack of any educational institutions for
professional training in social work up to the end of 1960- ies caused the deprofesionalisation of the
sphere. The vanishing of the former professional social work standards elaborated in contacts with
international institut ions and the new dominance of administrative and expert classification
influenced negatively the subjects of social care.
4.
Normative documents of the 1950-ies
On the basis of the Decree of 1951 the norms of social care were elaborated. According to the
Decree the following groups were subject of social support:
-
Invalids of the wars and the fight against fascism and their families
-
Orphans and semi-orphans, morally endangered children and adolescents, children of heavy
psychic and physical ailments
-
Blind and deaf-and-dumb persons
-
Disabled and lonely old people
-
Military men victims of professional service accidents in peace time
-
Victims of air-raids
-
Victims of the Defense of the People’s Government after 1944
The integration of disabled people to labour activities and working collectives was
considered as most suitable way for their social integration. Educational-productional enterprise
“Labour” was organized to the Ministry of People’s Health and Social Care to offer qualification
and requalificatio n of persons of diminished labour ability. Workshops of radio-techniques, fine
mechanics, metal turnery, tailoring, cabinet- making, machine knitting and shoes making, basket and
broom making were planed and establishing of Invalid’s Cooperatives was recommended.
According to the normative acts classification of institutions of social care was done: (according to
the Collection, p.123.)
40
-
Homes for Invalids of the wars and the fight against fascism and their families
-
Homes for children of heavy psychic and physical ailments
-
Homes for blind people
-
Homes for deaf-and-dumb people
-
Homes for elderly people
-
Homes for disabled people
-
Homes for persons caught in begging
-
Allocation homes
In the social homes special attention was played to the political education, they were obliged to
establish a library with science and fiction books of “progressive content”, the periodical” New
Time”, the newspapers ” Worker’s mission” (the official of Bulgarian Communist Party) and
“Fatherland Front ” had to be provided also (p.128). Organization of culture programs for
celebrating the 9th of September and the October Revolution Day; exploring the biographies of
Stalin, Lenin and Dimitrov with activists of Fatherland Front as speakers was also recommended.
The deprofessionalisation of social work in the Departments of Social Care to the People’s Councils
affected the normative documents– the only professional they required was one nurse per house.
Free accommodation was provided for the staff working in the homes situated out of towns and
villages. Most of the homes for disabled people were removed to small villages or village
surroundings. Such were the homes in Vidrare, Podgumer, Prisovo, Gorni Voden, Zemen,
Draganovo.
In 1954 a full categorization and location of the existing 36 social homes was done (Decree ?
1693, 20.12. 1954). Two homes for persons caught in begging were established – one in the village
of G. Voden for North Bulgaria and other in the village of Prisovo for South Bulgaria. They turned
into closed prison- like institutions, accessibale only for expert control. Suffering, need, ailment
became invisible for most of the citizens because they could have hardly fit into the official
ideological frames.
The basic principle of classification was the degree of labour ability in combination with the degree
of ailment. For instance “non able of work persons with psychic ailments” were allocated in the
homes of the villages of Zhaltesh (Gabrovo area) and Kovachevec (Popovsko area). Handicap
children were also strictly categorized. According to the memories of a Director of a Home for
Handicap and Retarded Children:
41
“There was a medical model of care for these children and that is way pedagogues were not
appointed. The etiquette “non eligible for education” was typical for them. There were, I do not
know on what kind of principles the categorization was based, children of middle and heavy forms
of oligophrenia, children of remains of psychic life and children without such remains. For the
staff it was very difficult to separate a child and to say –It is without any remains of psychic life.
But the most horrible division was that of lying and walking children. There were, everybody who
has visited such institutions knows, sections of lying children. What does it mean lying children? A
child put in a bed, looking at the ceiling all day long. Those kinds of children never went out of the
day-rooms. This model is fading away but still you can find it… There were subgroups in the
groups: lying, sitting, crawling, staying, and walking. In the 80-ies new vision about the work with
children appeared”.
For “work therapy and improvement of the material conditions of inmates and ill persons” farming
and workhouses opened to the homes (p. 163). The economic function played a leading role: they
were categorized according to their annual income in two main categories: of income lower or
higher then 50 000 leva. Production plans were developed and inmates consulted doctors what kind
of labour was most suitable for them. The productio n outputs had to correspond to the assortments
of the nomenclature of state commercial enterprises.
Imposed labour was an obligatory tool in the fight against child delinquency. In 1959 new Law of
Fight against Child Delinquency was adopted. The Law accounted for the lack of coordination
between state authorities and social organizations and recommended the establishment of central
and local commissions for fighting child delinquency and the setting of the work on “wide social
basis”. But in the field of prevention of child delinquency the old system was preserved with some
ideological innovations. The establishment of so called Child Pedagogical Rooms to the District,
Town and Regional Councils was also a new practice. They were led by pedagogues and were
responsible for “prevention, limitation and elimination of child delinquency”. Child pedagogical
rooms had to”contribute for the communist upbringing of juvenile offenders” as well.
42
5.
Conclusion
In the 1950- ies the centralized system of health and social policy brought to some positive results.
Some modernization tasks were fulfiled: mobilizing of the resources for diminishing child mortality
rate, fighting diseases of social effect as tuberculoses and malaria, spreading out health education
and sanitary control.
On the other side social control was reinforced, the right of work became an obligation and often
ended in imposed physical labour. Social sensitivity declined because of the lack of both places of
public debates and professional and voluntary collaborators. In such a way certain social groups
were denied social visibility which led to their social and spatial isolation.
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