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10. Obshto Delo Before setting up Obshto Delo as an independent platform, Sakŭzov had officially requested the publication of a biweekly supplement to Rabotnicheski Vestnik in order to discuss theoretical issues. His request was turned down. While the debate, triggered by the appearance of Obshto Delo, focused initially on the clearly technical issue, that is, the legal status of the publication—the 5th Party Congress had prohibited the publication of any independent political journal apart from the officially endorsed party organs—, it was soon transformed into a debate of substance. The polemic lasted three years—from 1900 to1903—and its protracted character forced the party intellectuals not only to take sides, but to define with greater precision their visions of what social democracy stood for. Although Obshto Delo started appearing in September 1900 as a “magazine on literary and social life,” its contents were programmatically political. It covered a variety of issues from the peasants’ movement to the women’s question, from political theory to book reviews, as well as topics of political, social and legal interest, but its core consisted of the first-page editorials written in a serial, consecutive manner by J. Sakŭzov. In these accumulative articles, he advanced one coherent argument that had the form of a political commentary on current events, scrutinizing the social and political problems of the country and proposing a plan of action to be followed. At its heart the Sakŭzov critique consisted of exposing the democratic deficit of the Bulgarian political system, emphasizing the necessity to solidify constitutional rule and the reestablishment of the popular political practice of self-government. In his introductory article, “Polozhenieto ” (The situation),134 he underlined the violation of the constitutional principles of “freedom and legality” as the political system in Bulgaria was sliding progressively into a condition of “force and lawlessness .” The rights of the Bulgarian people had become a game in the hands of rotating regimes, and the fruits of their labor benefited only the governing elite. Whereas civic freedoms and rights were guaranteed on paper, no authority could safeguard their fulfillment, as the state 225 10. Obshto Delo mechanism (police, army, etc.) was at the service of the ruling elite and was utilized against the population. It was imperative to find and mobilize the social forces that could bring about social change in Bulgaria. These social forces existed; they lacked organization, however. In the first place, there was the young movement of the peasants, “born only recently from the simple peasant masses, who are becoming conscious of their discriminated position and subordination in political and economic terms.” They formed a potential social force, demanding “modesty and frugality in our social institutions, equal distribution of the costs of the state, the democratization of the army and education, the enforced responsibility of the civil servants, etc.” Second came the artisans and craftsmen, who had an equal interest in removing a rapacious regime, indifferent to the interests of the productive strata. Efforts in a similar direction came from the commercial and industrial environment as well. They also had an interest in a more financially balanced state, a greater equilibrium between revenues and expenses, the regulation of credit, etc. Last, but not least, was the ascending workers’ movement, gathering its adherents from the ruined craftsmen, the peasants, petty merchants, joined by a non-negligible number of intellectuals, petty civil servants, teachers and the youth. These social forces of physical and intellectual labor necessitated a prosperous country , where the free working population would dispose of its own labor freely. Sakŭzov concluded with what became known as his thesis of the “collaboration of the productive strata”: Who can deny that by organizing and coordinating their separate efforts they could form a broad class, inspired by civic ideas, whose first concern would be to put an end to the personal regime and direct the state towards a productive-capitalistic, rather than a looting-rapacious policy? … Is there something today or in the nearest future that could stop them— after they have gained greater consciousness and enlightenment—from putting their efforts, in the beginning each one separately, and in the given occasion jointly, in order to lay the foundations for a real civic life? … Hence, what can we counterpoise to the ruling Force and Lawlessness? Today the separate vital interests of the productive strata and tomorrow their joined efforts in order for the people to proclaim a long-lasting situation of Freedom and Legality. Having identified the social actors...

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