Petia Kostadinova

Democratic Performance in Post-Communist Bulgaria: Election Pledges and Levels of Fulfillment, 1997-2005

This study examines the nature of election promises made by political parties in Bulgaria during the 1997 and 2001 elections, and evaluates the factors that determine pledge fulfilment. The seven parties that took part in these elections made 792 pledges and fulfilled an average of 60% of them. A combination of institutional characteristics, i.e. size of the party, the nature of the pledges, as well as the agreement between pledges made by different parties, explains the probability of fulfilment. Election promises related to European Union accession are also more likely to be fulfilled than other types of pledges.

Communicating policy change: Media framing of economic news in post-communist Bulgaria

This study analyzes the role of media type, political institutions and type of news on the use of episodic, thematic, economic consequences, human interest and conflict frames when reporting economic news during seven elections in Bulgaria for the period 1990–2009. Analyzing 543 news stories from six newspapers, the authors find that thematic and economic consequences framing are determined both by the type of economic policy that is reported and by the type of newspaper that is publishing the story. The frequency of human interest framing is also affected by the kind of economic news that is the focus of the news story as well as partially by the broader political environment; such framing is also used more frequently in stories reporting highly contentious economic issues.

Identifying Antecedents of the Strategic Game Frame: A Longitudinal Analysis

Although election news framing is a burgeoning area of research, empirical studies of what factors influence frame building remain rare, especially in non-Western countries. This study investigates the use of the strategic game frame and the relationship between that frame and system-level and organizational-level factors. The analysis focuses on the coverage of campaign news in six elite Bulgarian newspapers between 1990 and 2009. Results show that the type of electoral system, number of parties in government, and newspaper specialization are significant predictors of game frame use. The results are discussed in relation to framing research in Western Europe and the United States.

Party pledges in the news Which election promises do the media report

Focusing on Bulgaria, and covering the 1990–2009 period, this article analyses what factors predict if print media will report election promises made by political parties. The study utilizes two original datasets. One consists of 3083 pledges made by 15 parties ahead of seven elections. The second dataset includes news stories published by six newspapers during each election campaign. The analysis reveals that pledges made by the main political opponents during each election are more likely to be published than those by smaller parties. Pledges related to economic policy are also more likely to be discussed in the news than other types of pledges, although the opposite is true regarding promises related specifically to the country’s economic transition. Finally, in their reporting of pledges, print media do not reflect the salient ideological priorities of political parties.

Media in the New Democracies of Post-Communist Eastern Europe

Growing up in Bulgaria during the “transition” years, as a then fifteen-year old, I spent the summer of 1990 queuing up at the neighborhood newsstand waiting for the daily delivery of freshly printed newspapers. Shortages of goods, including food and gasoline, caused long lines in front of many stores, but the crowd waiting at the kiosk was eager to read about the latest political developments, and especially popular were the newspapers published by the newly established opposition parties. While there was no scarcity of political news via television and radio, there was always something special about the print media, much of which, including entertainment weeklies, were such a novelty. Twenty or so years later, I spent another summer among newspapers, in the archives of the National Library in Sofia, poring through the pages and—with no digitization of archives—collecting photographs of news articles published before each of the national legislative elections since 1990. Much has changed in the media environment since then, yet the study of media in post-communist societies and especially its relations to voters, parties, and politics in general is still in its infancy.

Improving the Transparency and Accountability of EU Institutions: The Impact of the Office of the European Ombudsman

This research focuses on the inquiries into alleged maladministration by EU institutions completed by the Office of the European Ombudsman (EO) during the period 1996–2012, seeking to highlight the ways in which the Ombudsman advances democracy in the European Union (EU). The article analyses the content of an original dataset consisting of 515 critical remarks and 113 follow-up inquiries issued by the EO. The study shows that concerns about transparency and accountability dominate citizens’ complaints to the Ombudsman. Further, the analysis concludes that, when EU institutions were subject to critical remarks, in the majority of instances they adopted the EOs recommendation to increase the transparency and/or accountability of their practices. The EOs impact is observable both during the inquiry process and after it issues critical remarks. The article links these conclusions to a broader discussion of the democratic dilemmas in the EU.

Capturing the legislative priorities of transnational Europarties and the European Commission: A pledge approach:

This article presents a new dataset of pledges made by Europarties during the 2004 and 2009 European Parliament elections, as well as pre-legislative priorities of the European Commission following these elections. The data cover two legislative cycles in the period 2004–2013. The article discusses the rationale behind the development of this dataset, the coding, and the measurement of the variables, and it highlights the applicability of these data.