Center for Liberal Strategies (CLS): ‘The Future through the Culture of the Past: Bulgarian Economic and Social History’ Seminar presents:

Images of Bulgaria in British Commercial Discourses Before 1914

lecture by Mika Suonpaa (University of Hull, UK)

The overall aim of the paper is to examine British commerce-related representations of Bulgaria between the mid-nineteenth century and 1914. Conceptually, the paper investigates the extent and the ways in which commercial decision-making was affected by cultural attitudes and perceptions, and whether cross-cultural commercial contacts produced generalising or stereotypical views. A distinction is made between the attitudes of British businessmen and diplomats which often differed quite significantly. The intention is not to explain economic phenomena purely from a cultural perspective, but rather to bring cross-cultural commercial relations more closely into the realm of the field of Balkan studies that examines British images of the region.
The first part of the paper examines portrayals of Bulgaria as a country in which considerable investment and trading opportunities existed, and how these perceptions led to the founding of numerous ‘Anglo-Bulgarian’ companies – examples of which will be taken from banking, construction and manufacturing industries. This section will also explore reasons for British companies’ business failures in Bulgaria in a wider Balkan context, and it ends with a discussion of factors that contributed to successes of British enterprise in Bulgaria, which included local knowledge and the ability to attract Bulgarian investors.
The second part will deal with concerns that were expressed by established British exporters, investors and other firms who had or attempted to extend their operations into Bulgaria. Problems occurred especially when British companies were involved in competitions for public contracts and concessions and whenever legislations that were designed to protect Bulgarian industries were introduced from the 1890s onwards. These difficulties did not however lead to generalisations or expressions of stereotypical derogatory ‘balkanist’ views because British businessmen were mostly concerned with concrete financial and economic aspects. British businesses reacted to commercial difficulties by appealing to diplomats for support, but often without success. Diplomatic assistance was often refused on statutory grounds or as a result of negative attitudes to prospects for success even if diplomatic support was given. Furthermore, it seemed that British diplomats hesitated to give assistance if promoters had foreign connections or if they were Jewish. To an extent, diplomatic hesitation in the case of Bulgaria and the Slavic Balkans more generally went against the broad outlines of commercial policy which from the 1880s onwards was more inclined towards supporting British commercial interests abroad than denying it because of the growing competition from continental European and American enterprises, especially in the manufacturing sector.
The third part continues to concentrate further on the diplomatic responses to commercial difficulties. Diplomats’ views were often much more critical than those of British businessmen, and they, unlike the businessmen, often argued, for example, that xenophobic sentiments in Bulgaria drove away foreign businesses, and thus, British investors and exporters should not commit to commercial arrangements in the country. Diplomats were also much more likely to fall into generalising ‘balkanist’ categorising than the businessmen, and often argued, for example, that Bulgarians and other Balkan Slavs were unreliable business partners because they came from peasant backgrounds. These sentiments illustrated that British diplomats were very much influenced by their aristocratic prejudices against the peasantry and that their views were also seemingly affected by the lack of hands-on commercial experience. Thus, in addition to financial and economic factors, negative perceptions or indeed positive ones, certainly had an effect on the types of advice that British diplomats gave which meant that prejudices and (pre)conceptions were likely also to have an effect on commercial policy-making. In contrast, there was no evidence that commercial difficulties or negative preconceptions had any power in changing or having any significant effects on the decision-making processes of British businessmen. However, at times, cultural conceptions also informed the thinking of businessmen, for example, about the types of products that were likely to succeed in Bulgaria.

Contacts: Mika Suonpaa (University of Hull, UK ) - m.suonpaa@hull.ac.uk

The seminar is led by Roumen Avramov (Center for Liberal Strategies) and Martin Ivanov (Institute of History, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences).

March 19 (Wednesday) 2008, 5.30 p.m.
Pesha Nikolova hall
In English, no interpretation provided.
Free entrance

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