that it functions as an after-the-fact approving body rather than as a legislature. The development and initiation of new legislation, therefore, is handled outside of the actual legislature, primarily by the State Council and the Council of Ministers.

At its first session after general elections the National Assembly elects the State Council, but it would be highly unlikely if not impossible for the assembly to refuse to elect the complete slate of nominees that has been preselected by the party hierarchy. The election of the State Council, therefore, as is the case with various party elections, is a unanimous vote of approval rather than a true election. The State Council is the true center of the government. When it was created by the 1971 Constitution, Zhivkov chose to relinquish his governmental post as chairman of the Council of Ministers (the country's premier) and assume the position of president of the State Council, leaving no doubt about where real governmental power lay. The State Council, in effect, is a collective executive body that, because the National Assembly meets so infrequently, also becomes a major initiator of legislation.

The Council of Ministers, also elected by the National Assembly in the same manner as the State Council, functions as the administrative arm of the government. Here again, party influence is pervasive. In 1973 the chairman of the council (premier) and four deputy chairmen were concurrently members of the party Politburo, the minister of internal affairs was a candidate member of the Politburo, and most other ministers were members of the Central Committee.

Matters of state—such as defense, foreign affairs, education, and welfare—usually associated with the central government of any country are handled by individual ministries and are overseen by the Council of Ministers. In addition to such affairs of state, however, various ministries, as well as the council itself, are charged with administering the country's entire economy, as is the case in other communist-ruled states. In mid-1973 eleven ministries out of a total of twenty-two dealt exclusively with economic matters. In addition, the State Planning Committee, the chairman of which holds ministerial rank, is of great importance in the overall economic structure.

The economic ministries control virtually every aspect of the country's economy. The goals of nationalization of all industry and collectivization of agriculture were achieved early in the communist era, and the efforts of the party-government ever since have been toward increased efficiency. In Bulgaria the quest for greater production has led to ever greater centralization of control. In the early 1970s this quest has brought about the reorganization of industry wherein industrial enterprises have been grouped into huge trusts at the same time that collective and state farms have been similarly grouped into so-called agroindustrial complexes.

The consolidation of agriculture into extremely large complexes, begun in 1970, was intended to raise productivity through concentration of effort, specialization of production, and increased control by the central government. The reorganization is a long-range program that is expected to be completed by 1980, at which time authorities predict that farm incomes will have risen to equal industrial incomes and, because agricultural enterprises will be run just like factories, the social differences between peasants and workers will have been eliminated. By 1973 results of the reorganization that had already occurred were mixed, and it was still too early to assess the long-range value of the agroindustrial complexes.

In the industrial sector the consolidation of various enterprises into trusts was undertaken in the early 1970s for the same reasons that the agroindustrial complexes were formed, that is, greater efficiency through concentration, specialization, and increased control. Bulgarian industrial growth since World War II had been remarkable, considering particularly the inadequate base of skilled labor and natural resources in a country that had been predominantly agricultural. Bulgaria's need for raw materials, machinery, and technological assistance during its long period of industrialization and the Soviet Union's willingness to supply them accounted in large measure for the extremely close economic ties between the two countries. Because the growth rate had begun to slow toward the end of the 1960s, the BKP decided to try a massive reorganization of the economic structure as a remedy for the situation.

In addition to the political and economic systems of the country, the social system has been a major concern of the party and government ever since the BKP took power. Social restructuring has resulted in a system wherein the party elite occupies the highest level. This group is small and represents the apex of the social pyramid. The next level down, which is much broader, includes lesser party functionaries, professionals, administrators and managers, technicians, and all white-collar workers. The next level is made up of blue-collar industrial workers, who constitute the largest group in the society. At the bottom of the structure are the peasants. There are, of course, gradations of power, privilege, and prestige within all of the social groupings. The society has been very mobile since World War II with rapid upward mobility based mainly on the expanding economy, industrialization, and modernization. Toward the end of the 1960s, as the economic growth rate slowed, so also did the social mobility, and there was evidence that social groups were stabilizing.

Education has been the key to upward mobility and, since coming to power, the Communists have given preference in educational opportunity to formerly underprivileged groups. At the beginning of the 1970s, however, the percentage of students of worker and peasant origin enrolled in institutions of higher learning was far below the percentage of workers and peasants in the population. Students from the lower income groups have not competed favorably against those from more advantaged backgrounds and, although upward mobility is not blocked, it has been becoming more difficult. Membership in the BKP remains important for persons desiring to move upward in the social structure.

For the leadership the importance of education lies in the fact that it is the best means for orienting the people in the official ideology as well as for training the professionals, technicians, and skilled workers needed to run the country. The ideological indoctrination is pervasive throughout the entire school system, but the concurrent goal of meeting the needs of the economy has suffered because the system of higher education has not expanded rapidly enough to absorb most secondary school graduates who are desirous and capable of pursuing higher studies. Many educational reforms have been enacted over the years, but they have been cautious and limited and have not attacked the major problem of providing much greater funding for higher education.

In the cultural sphere the party and government have promoted pride in the ancient Bulgarian heritage but have regulated art, music, and literature in order to bring about conformity with the Soviet-developed doctrine of Socialist Realism. Throughout the communist era there have been periods of freeze and thaw in the controls imposed on artists and intellectuals, but the periods of greatest restriction in later years have not equaled the severity of the Stalinist times. In the 1960s and early 1970s control has been exercised primarily through publishers, art galleries, theaters, and other outlets. Artists and intellectuals know that their work must pass through state-owned outlets if it is to be seen or heard; therefore, they exercise self-censorship to ensure acceptability. Other means of control are the