ABSTRACT

Unprecedented focus on corruption Bulgarian and Romanian corruption – and organised crime in the case of Bulgaria – evolved into an extraordinary problem in relation with the European Union, overshadowing other issues and threatening to impede accession. The EU’s progressively stern warnings over corruption in Bulgaria and Romania represented the pinnacle in a complex landscape of domestic and international calculation and accusation, complicity and misunderstanding. In the European Union and in the two candidate countries, politicians promised, journalists exaggerated and citizens complained.