COURAGE

seotud kollektsioonid

Sofia Municipality is the government of the city of Sofia, the capital city of Bulgaria. It is a juridical person with its own budget. It is led by the mayor and the City Council. The city runs essential communal services. On a low level, it has 24 district councils with administrative responsibilities on the day-to-day level of municipal government.

Sofia Municipality is also an important actor in the sphere of culture. In 2012, the City Council passed the "Strategy for the Development of Culture in Sofia 2013-2013" (https://www.sofia.bg/culture-strategy). It clearly puts culture as an essential element of the city's development and well-being, and lays out a holistic approach towards its development. It aims at turning the city into an incubator or arts and a plattform for the support of the cultural activities of its citizens. Culture should help to turn Sofia into a cosmopolitan city and to underwrite its opennes for innovation. The full text of the strategy can be found here.

The city of Sofia operates important institutions preserving and presenting the cultural heritage of Sofia and its neighbourhood, such as the the Sofia Regional Historical Museum, the Sofia City Art Gallery, the gallery "Dechko Uzunov", the City Library, four theatres and numerous cultural clubs [Dom na kulturata]. The Department for Culture of the City also initiates further activities and support initiatives carried out by third parties. Altogether, these efforts help to collect, maintain and present the cultural and historical legacy of Bulgaria, including that from the communist period.

For more information on Sofia's cultural activities go to: https://www.sofia.bg/web/mayor-of-sofia/culture-department

Solidarity or Independent Self-Governing Trade Union "Solidarity" was the first autonomous trade union and mass organization in the Soviet bloc since communist takeovers in the 1940s. It came into existence in Poland as a result of workers' strikes that rocked the country in the summer of 1980. Of crucial importance was the strike in the Lenin Shipyard in Gdańsk led Lech Wałęsa which spread to other industrial centers in the Baltic region leading to the creation of the Interfactory Strike Committee. Following the August accords between strikers and the party regime in August 1980, the alliance of striking enterprises evolved into Solidarity trade union in September 1980. Other long terms origins of Solidarity include the 1970s workers' protests in the Baltic Coast, the birth of the democratic opposition and, especially, of the Committee of Workers' Defence in 1976 and the Free Trade Unions in 1978, and the mass mobilization of Polish citizens during the visit of Pope John Paul II in 1979.  An umbrella, largely decentralized organization, Solidarity united members of different political persuasions, professions, and social backgrounds. Solidarity's 'self-limiting revolution' oscillated around attempts to democratize and liberalize the communist system, expand the pockets of autonomous and civil soviety, and introduce self-governing institutions and mechanisms that could limit the party rule. At the peak of its popularity, Solidarity reached the membership of between 9 and 10 million people in the country with the population of 35 million. During the 16 months of its legal existence, Solidarity launched the wave of unprecedented social activism amidst the uneasy relationship of with the party state and under the constant threat of the Soviet military intervention. In December 1981, the authoritarian regime of General Wojciech Jaruzelski, who at that time was the party leader, head of the government and chief commander of the Polish army, imposed martial law in the country, banned Soldiarity and other independent associations, detained thousands of its members, and crashed social protests using brutal force. Solidarity continued its struggle underground organizing peaceful resistance, launching strikes, and running independent social networks and publishing. In 1989, it concluded the roundtable talks with the party regime, which led to the re-legalization of Solidarity and partly free elections in June 1989. The party's electoral defeat led to the creation of Tadeusz Mazowiecki's cabinet, the first non-communist government in Eastern Europe since communist takeovers in August 1989. Solidarity's contribution to the collapse of Communism in Eastern Europe was truly decisive. The organization split into numerous rival political factions in 1990. It continues as Poland's largest trade union.

The Association Song and Social Movements was founded in 1991 and had the goal of advance the “collecting and merging of songs and documents of the songwriter-movement and adjacent genres” that “developed in the 1960s in cooperation with the social and political movement” (excerpt from the articles of association). The core of its interest lies in collecting items for the singer- and songwriter movement in the GDR. However, it connects this historical basis also with today’s song culture and social movements. As the successor of the former Festival of Political Song (Festival des Politischen Liedes) it organises since 2000 every February the Festival Music and Politics (Musik und Politik). The non-profit organisation and its archive can be reached under PO Box 180154, 10205 Berlin.

The University was founded as a branch of Sofia University in 1975 in order to locally train teachers for primary school and kindergarten. In 1983, the branch was transformed into the separate Higher Pedagogical Institute. New programs, including mathematics, physics, Bulgarian language and literature, Bulgarian language and history were established in the following years. By 1990, the Institute had five faculties running ten study programs. After 1990, and especially with the Law on Academic Autonomy, the Institute continued to expand its scope. Paid education was introduced as well, alongside study places funded by the government.

In July 1995, the Bulgarian parliament decided to transform the Higher Pedagogical Institute into Neofit Rilski South-West University  -  Blagoevgrad. In 1997, the College of Machine Building and Electrotechnics in Blagoevgrad was affiliated as a Technical College as part of the South-West University.

Today, the university offers training in 71 Bachelor's, 100 Master's and 74 specialized PhD programs. It has the around 14,000 students in the following faculties: Law and History, Natural Science and Mathematics, Economics, Public Health, Health Care and Sport, Pedagogy, Philology, Philosophy, Arts and Engineering.

The KGB (Komitet gosudarstvennoi bezopastnosti/Committee for State Security), the Soviet secret service, was established in Soviet Lithuania in 1954, but the origins of the Soviet security service go back to post-Second World War times: the NKVD (Narodnyi komisariat vnutrenih del/People's Commissariat for Interior Affairs), and later, in 1953-1954, the MGB (Ministerstvo gosudarstvennoi bezopastnosti/State Security Ministry). The main task of the security service at that time was to fight the anti-Soviet armed resistance that lasted in Lithuania for more than eight years (1944-1953).
On 1 April 1954 was established the KGB on the bases of MGB. KGB was under the jurisdiction of the Council of Ministers. Methods of activities and operiational work continued chekist traditions introducing more flexible forms applaying to the local situation. While old staff of the MGB, mostly Russians, were employed in KGB as well, more Lithuanians after graduation of high education were invited to KGB in 50's and 60's. This "Lithuanization" of KGB was rational step surveiling society especially in fighting with more sophisticated forms of cultural opposition. So called "line two" operated by the KGB 2nd division and "line five" operated by the 5th department were most involved in activity against cultural opposition. The Second line meant keeping and control of state secrets and it was concentrated in industrial factories, construction, science and transport organization. The Fifth line was directly concentrated on counter-ideological work and acted mostly in high schools and culture institutions.