On the Political Entrepreneurship in the 19th Century and its Importance on the Economic Development of Bulgarians

On the basis of the theoretical model for political entrepreneurship proposed by the author, initiatives and projects of Bulgarian public and political subjects from the beginning of the 19th century until the creation of the new Bulgarian state in 1879 are analyzed. Church-national movement is the longest and most effective political entrepreneurship, ending with the creation of a Bulgarian proto-state – the Exarchate. The manifestations of the evolutionary direction in the national liberation movement are considered, especially those in the period after the Crimean War (1853–1856) to the end of 1876 after the April Uprising. Legal political actions are a kind of political entrepreneurship, as the ultimate goal of most of them is to establish political autonomy of the Bulgarians in the diocese of the already established Bulgarian Exarchate without formal separation from the “inseparable” Ottoman Empire proclaimed in Paris in 1856. Most of the revolutionary Bulgarian initiatives from the period 1856–1876 can be characterized as “startup” projects with all the conventions in the transfer of a predominantly economic phenomenon from the 21st century to the specific environment of the 19th century. The lack or insufficiency of own funding is particularly important for the success of these endeavors and therefore their organizers resort to risky assistance from external forces, which predetermines and limits to a large extent the results even of those who achieve their political goals such as the April Uprising of 1876.