ABSTRACT

This chapter discusses the duality in Bulgaria’s policy of doing business with Western Europe and particularly the European Economic Community (EEC) as a balancing act between socialist internationalism and economic internationalisation. While the economic benefits of cooperation with the EEC member states were indispensable for the Bulgarian industry, diplomatic recognition of the EEC was off limits for Bulgarian diplomacy. Tackling the increasing complicated relations with the Common Market from the 1960s up until the early 1980s, the chapter analyses not only Bulgaria’s strategy towards the EEC in foreign affairs and foreign trade but also the actors who forged and implemented this strategy in the state apparatus along with their capacities to act outside of direct party oversight. Though being modified over time, this strategy relied on a twofold approach: bargaining for exemptions bilaterally with the EEC members, thereby ignoring the supranational authority of the Commission, and taking part in multilateral negotiations at the UNCTAD and the GATT. Within their fora, the Bulgarian foreign services also took advantage, with more or less success, of different options for building coalitions – with the global South under the umbrella of the UNCTAD and with non-European capitalist countries under the GATT.