Information Outlook, Vol. 5, No. 12, December 2001
Making the Transition: Bulgaria Libraries Struggle in a Post Communist World
by Sherrie Kline Smith
Sherrie Kline Smith (klinesmiths@usa.net) is a consumer health information specialist and free-lance writer. She is a member of SLA's Heart of America Chapter and a member of the Medical Library Association. She has lived in seven foreign countries and traveled extensively throughout the world.
Journey to Eastern Europe for a Look at a Special Library
Like most Eastern European countries, Bulgaria has struggled
to find its way in the years since the fall of communism. The country's libraries have not been exempt from this transition, with much of the financial support they enjoyed under the old system drying up. Sherrie Kline Smith takes a look at how one library in Bulgaria is handling this problem and what it is doing to fill the shelves.
I paid the driver and climbed out of the taxi. "Was this the right place?," I asked myself. In front of the long two-story building was a Cyrillic sign that would have read "Central Technical Library" in English. Though the sign had more than three words, the last onelibraryreassured me that I was at the right place.
I entered the front door and found myself in a small vestibule with two large living plants on either side of double doors leading into the library. The large fern on the right looked so healthy and green that I stopped to admire and feel it to see if it was real.
I then entered the lobby area, which was barren with empty shelves and display cases. A woman sat in front of several rows of these shelves and behind a low, long counter. I wondered if the "emptiness" resulted from the summer hiatus that took place here in Sofia when many went to the Black Sea. I greeted her and asked for Valentina Slavcheva, the director of the library, with whom I had an appointment.
She picked up the phone, spoke into it, and, not a minute later, a tall woman with blond, shoulder-length hair came from the far opposite side of the lobby area and shook my hand. "Hello! I'm so glad to meet you!" Slavcheva said.
She led me back to her office. It was very large with a bank of windows across the full width of the room. On the windowsill sat 10 or more plantsat least three six-foot ficus plants, one five-to-six-foot plant I didn't recognize, and several other plants decorated the room. I was struck by how extraordinarily healthy they looked.
I first heard of Slavcheva from a colleague. When I came to Bulgaria in June, I wrote my colleagues and asked if they knew of any librarians in the country. I soon received a message from Alexandra Dimitrov, a professor at the library school of the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee. She wrote that the previous summer she had met Slavcheva at a conference in the Crimea. "She speaks English, and is a warm, wonderful woman." With the e-mail and phone numbers sent by Dimitrov, I contacted Slavcheva and made arrangements to visit her library and get acquainted.
"I do not speak English so good," Slavcheva explained, "so I have asked my colleague to join us to help with the language." At that moment another lady entered the room. "This is Lyudmila Velkova. She works in our acquisitions department." With preliminary introductions over and refreshments served, I asked them to tell me about the library.
Inside the Library
The Central Technical Library (CTL), established in 1964, is one of four main divisions of the National Center for Information and Documentation (NACID). Formerly called the Central Institute for Scientific and Technical Information, NACID was established in 1961. The name changed to the National Center for Information and Documentation in 1993. Engineers and economists with a good command of foreign languages (English, German, French, Russian, etc.) comprise most of the staff at NACID.
The other three divisions include General Administration, Information Products and Services (IPS), and Automation of Information Processes (AIP). The IPS staff processes and submits information about the present state and trends in the world of science and economy; prepares branch analyses; carries out marketing surveys of Bulgarian industries; provides Internet services, online information services with in-house databases, and telecommunication access to leading host centers; and maintains close contact with companies within the country and abroad. The AIP is responsible for information technologies, the hardware and software, and it maintains NACID's web page.
"I know this is a special library functioning primarily to support the center, but can others use it?," I asked.
"Yes, anyone over sixteen years old can come to the library after obtaining an ID card," Slavcheva said. "We have 4,000 registered users who make 15,000 visits yearly to search the 4,950,000 items in our collection. We have books, conference proceedings, product catalogs, translations, microfiche, CD-ROMs, and periodicals. These are organized or cataloged with the Universal Decimal Classification scheme. In 1984, we automated the catalog using ISIS, the UNESCO designed software. To find items in the collection prior to 1984, though, users must search the card catalog. Just recently, the automated catalog was also made available via the organization's web site and five public workstations provide Internet access."
Materials cannot be checked out. Newest books, proceedings, and other items are shelved in a special reading room with free access. Another part of the collection that receives heavy use is kept in a special room and monitored by a librarian to limit loss of the valuable resources. After five or six years, the librarians remove older items to storage areas. Clerks can still retrieve these items if a user has a need for them. A sample of topics researched includes economics, telecommunications, software and hardware, power engineering, electronics, chemical technologies, protection of the environment, biotechnology, and medical equipment.
Employees of NACID, engineers, professors, scientists, and students who use the library will often request items the library doesn't own. The ILL department then goes into action, contacting libraries in Russia; the British Library; a library in Hanover, Germany; the Library of Physics in Vienna; and the National Library in Macedonia. The ILL department receives few requests from libraries in other countries, except for scientific materials in Bulgarian.
The CTL staff numbers 29. Eleven of these people have a library degree and five, who have taken university courses in librarianship, are specialists in other areas. (Velkova's degree is philosophy.) Engineers work in the library because of their technical expertise.
The National Patent Library shares the building with the Central Technical Library. The patent library used to be part of the CTL, but in 1994 it was separated and moved under the direction of the National Patent Office. It remains in the building, providing convenient access for library patrons.
"It was and still is a state organization, currently under the direction and funding of the Ministry of Economy. But, we do not know what will happen now with the new government," Slavcheva said.
Political Transition
Just that week the newly elected National Movement Simeon II (NMSII) party had been approved by Parliament. Leading the party was Simeon Saxe-Coburg, boy/king exiled with his family from Bulgaria following World War II. After spending almost 50 years in Spain, the 64-year old returned to Bulgaria as prime minister. Whether it was his promise to improve the lives of Bulgarians within 800 days or his royal status that caught the fancy of Bulgarian voters, his party won a stunning victory by an overwhelming majority.
Talk of the government was a natural lead into my question about how things were going in what is referred to here as the "transition period"communism to democracythat began in 1990. Slavcheva and Velkova looked at each other for a moment, and then words began spilling forth.
"Our funds have been cut drastically," Slavcheva said. "There is no money. The collection has really suffered setbacks. Before 1990, we received 10,000 periodical titles a year. This year we only have 105, plus 150 subscriptions via exchange with other institutions. One of our most valuable subscriptions, Scientific Citations Index, had to be dropped. We used to buy about 6,000 books each year, and this past year we only purchased 435."
The CTL is not alone in its struggle to survive in the transition period. Many of the Bulgarian librarians I've met tell of drastically reduced revenues that limit purchasing new materials, let alone supplying reasonable salaries, refurbishing rundown facilities, and providing continued training in information management in the age of the Internet.
I contacted Snezhana Ianeva, the Information Resource Center Director at the United States Embassy in Sofia, to help me understand the state of Bulgarian libraries. Ianeva also serves as the International Relations Officer for the Union of Librarians and Information Services Officers.
"The principal piece of legislation on libraries in Bulgaria for many years before 1990 (even until 1996) was Decree No. 2 of the Council of Ministers of January 20, 1970," Ianeva said. "The decree established the Unified Library System, and in addition to the subordination of libraries to their institutions, called for coordinated activities in areas like acquisitions and library management. The Ministry of Culture, through its Department on Libraries, was the governing institution for the system. A number of libraries were mandated specific responsibilities concerning the centralized activities. For example, the National Library and its then established Methodological Department became the coordination center for library management. It also organized a number of qualification courses for librarians and technicians. Sofia University Library coordinated all university libraries; the Medical Library of the Medical Academy in Sofia correlated all medical libraries in the country, etc. The decree also established several coordinating bodies, like the Council of Directors (for managerial decisions) and Council of Acquisitions (to take care of coordinated acquisitions). Under the regulations of the decree, libraries used their funds for salaries and collection development, but some money, especially the so-called "hard currency" (US dollars), was given to designated libraries for the acquisition of western books and periodicals.
"In the beginning of 1990, everybody wanted to be independent in reaction to the previous regime. University libraries became more independent and many special libraries were closed. This practically ruined the centralized system, although the decree was formally in force until 1996. In 1995, on the initiative of the Ministry of Culture, a working group of specialists was established to draft a new law on libraries. It is to be based on the legislative experience in countries with developed library systems and is aimed at preserving the traditionally good Bulgarian libraries and their activities while giving more specific definitions to a number of principles underlying the work of libraries in the country and allowing them to take advantage of opportunities for individual development. While waiting for a new law, the Ministry of Culture passed several pieces of legislation concerning some types of libraries, none of them resulting in a better status for Bulgarian libraries and none of them satisfying the library community."
Touring The Library
With the governing change in 1990, librarians established a non-governmental organization of librarians called the Union of Librarians and Information Services Officers (ULISO). "Before 1990 there was no way we could have had the union, so that was a major change," Ianeva said.
With 720 individual members, 65 institutional libraries, and 14 regional branches, the group is working and lobbying for better legislation for Bulgarian libraries. Unfortunately, there is no law yet. But, as Ianeva said, "We will continue to work with the new parliament on that."
Until then, Bulgarian librarians meet the challenge of moving from communism to capitalism with creative determination. Some have sister libraries in the United States. Colorado State librarian, Nancy M. Bolt, has been instrumental in establishing some of these relationships. The CTL does not have a sister organization, but would welcome such an alliance. Slavcheva, who came to the library in 1978 and became director in December 1999, approaches the reduction in financial resources with panache and hopes for better days ahead.
"Unfortunately problems and bad moments come unexpectedly, without asking us," she said. "Sometimes they pass away quickly, but sometimes they last unbearably long. But still we have to be patient and hope for better times to comeboth in the personal and global aspects. Probably the prolonged period of transition in our country has made us philosophers, but sometimes philosophy really helps to overcome emotional and financial problems."
"Would you like to see the library?" they asked.
"Of course!" I answered.
"But before we do," I commented, "I want to tell you how wonderful your plants look. Someone takes very good care of them."
"We have many, many plants in the library," Velkova said. "Almost all our employees at this time are women, and I think we have a fondness for flowers and plants."
And as we toured the different rooms, I saw what she meant.
"In July and August, a lot of people take vacation; they go to the Black Sea," Slavcheva said. "So presently, we do not have a lot of patrons in the library. Here is the periodical reading room. Right now, some of the staff is removing older issues that will be put in storage. Our shelves are going to look so bare! Going from 10,000 titles to only a couple hundred leaves big gaps in the physical space. We've discussed what to do with all the unfilled shelves.
"We thought we'd put plants there," she said, with a twinkle in her eye.
Her attempt to make light of a serious reduction in the amount of information being provided by the library called to mind something a Bulgarian doctor said to me several weeks earlier. Throughout the evening he had shared amusing anecdotes and later apologized for telling so many funny stories. "Life in Bulgaria is not easy," he said. "If we don't joke, life is very difficult."
Bulgaria ranks as one of the poorest European countries.
Since the "velvet revolution" in 1990, when the country quietly changed from communism to a free market society, the nine previous ruling parties have struggled to adapt and change and have been severely hampered by corruption.
But hope rises on the horizon. Bulgaria has applied for membership in the European Union and NATO. Both are being diligently and purposefully pursued. The European Parliament estimates that Bulgaria will be set for joining the EU by 2007. And, on Tuesday, July 24, the 800-day countdown to October 2, 2003 began. Saxe-Coburg, the new Prime Minister whom the Bulgarians nostalgically call "The King," promised to place a clock on his desk to keep track of the time and his vow to improve the life of Bulgarians in 800 days.
Perhaps all these things, along with the active involvement of the union of librarians, will improve conditions for Bulgarian information providers. Then maybe Slavcheva won't have to put plants on the empty shelves of the Central Technical Library. 
Want to Find Out More?
Web Pages
· National Center for Information and Documentation's web page, http://www.nacid.nat.bg
· Universal Decimal Classification scheme, http://www.udcc.org/about.htm
· Open Society Foundation, Sofia, Bulgaria, http://www.osf.bg/, is part of the global Soros Foundation, http://www.soros.org/
· Bulgarian Union of Librarians and Information Services Officers, http://www.nl.otel.net/uliso/
· "Bulgarian Librarians in Support of Intellectual Freedom Issues," http://www.ala.org/work/international/intlpprs/ianeva.html
· Valentina Slavcheva, vs@nacid.nat.bg
· Snejana Ianeva, shezha@pd.state.gov
· Sherrie Kline Smith, klinesmiths@usa.net
For more information on Bulgaria:
· The Sofia Echo, Bulgaria's English Language Newspaper Online, http://www.sofiaecho.com/
· Bulgaria: A Country Study, http://lcweb2.loc.gov/frd/cs/bgtoc.html
· CIA: The World Fact Book 2000 Bulgaria, http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/bu.html
· Delegation of the European Commission to Bulgaria, http://www.evropa.bg/
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