ESSHC Amsterdam 2006: National discourse as a factor legitimising a communist regime [Bulgaria 1944-1948]

National discourse as a factor legitimising a communist regime
[Bulgaria, 1944-1948]

My paper aspires to develop and elaborate the national discourse that the
Bulgarian Communist Party (henceforth BCP) used in order to legitimise its
power after the Second World War. So far literature has paid attention to
several factors underpinning the struggle of Bulgarian communists to
consolidate their power: high discipline of the Party membership and
maintenance of party structure and function during the harsh period of the
Second World War, prestige gained by the resistance movement and the
victory of the Soviet Union and the Red Army, and a series of authoritative
measures and means of violence mainly due to the presence of the Red Army,
such as terror, purges, authoritative control of key ministries, and
elimination of the opposition. Undoubtedly, all of the above factors played
a crucial role in the establishment of the communist power. However, means
of violence cannot effectively explain the popularity that the BCP and the
Fatherland Front enjoyed in the post-war period. Moreover, the communist
regimes could not rely only on means of violence: they needed means of
consent to legitimise the new regime, gain the support of the masses,
maintain the Fatherland Front united, and navigate political antagonism
with the opposition.

My paper goes beyond tactical political manoeuvres (maintenance of the
unity of the Fatherland Front, salami tactics and development of clientele
networks) focusing on the national discourse as articulated by the
communists. The in-depth analysis of this discourse relies on archival
material and primary sources. This discourse recast earlier discursive
elements from the French revolution (identification of people, nation, and
state) and from the October revolution (identification of people, state,
and the Party). As the Party was identified with the nation, challenging
the Party became synonymous with challenging the nation. The schema "if you
are not within the Fatherland Front, you are against Bulgaria" was taken
for granted.

This discourse was all-embracing and operated in a set of key policy
domains: security apparatuses (People's Army and Militia), the justice
(including the People's Courts), the economy (first and foremost concerning
the modernisation project of the BCP), the constitution and governance, and
the elimination of the opposition. Identifying the nation, the people, the
state, and the Party in all these domains, the Bulgarian communists
effectively began to articulate what we might call a totalitarian discourse
as it negated the separation of the various domains of social life. The
totalitarianism of the nation-state constituted the discourse of the BCP in
its efforts to legitimise its regime, pacify Bulgarian society, re-build
and modernise the Bulgarian state.