Last week, I began my leadership in action work. This summer, I am working at the Center for the Study of Democracy (CSD) in Sofia, Bulgaria. CSD is a think tank and advocacy organization that addresses pressing issues in South East Europe and the Balkans including corruption, energy transition, foreign influence, and rule of law. I am working in the economic program as a part of the BridgeGap consortium.
I have been here in Sofia since the beginning of June. In my first few weeks, I got settled in Sofia and learned to find my way around the city. I got to know many of my coworkers and completed a draft of a literature review/theoretical framework for the policy and advocacy work I will be doing for the next few months.
This past week, the primary members of the research consortium met to discuss the deliverables and prepare to begin work on the first stage of the project. Consortium partners from the United States, Romania, Italy, and Ireland. CSD also hosted several events with partners in the Bulgarian government and from other institutions to draw public attention to the issues that the BridgeGap consortium will be addressing.
I will be working on the first deliverable for the next couple of months. I will be preparing a case study on Russian evasion of EU sanctions on crude oil imports. I will also be contributing to the overall theoretical framework that provides justification for the work and preparing policy objectives to address corruption that enables sanction evasion.
While many younger Bulgarians speak some English, it is certainly not ubiquitous. As a result, I have begun learning important phrases in the language. I have a firm grasp of the Cyrillic alphabet, which has been extremely useful, but I have a lot to learn when it comes to speaking and interacting with Bulgarians. There has been a lot of Google Translate involved.