The Bulgarian Communist Party from Blagoev to Zhivkov: Histories of Ruling Communist Parties

Since the days of Dimitur Blagoev, a member of the first Marxist group in Russia and a founder of Bulgarian communism, the Bulgarian Communist Party (BCP) was closely identified with its Russian counterpart. In the waning days of the Soviet Bloc, the best-known fact about Bulgaria was that it modeled itself closely on the USSR and was allegedly linked to KGB terrorist activities.

Those similarities were more than superficial. Nonetheless, their extent and effect were inevitably colored by Bu...