Етническите сблъсъци в българското виртуално пространство - един невъзможен сценарий
Ethnic conflicts in the Bulgarian virtual space: An infeasible scenario

Summary/Abstract: This article deals with the problems of ethnicity-based confl icts in the Bulgarian society and their refl ections and recurrences in the virtual space. By putting the local issues at hand in a broader context and referring to studies and researches carried out in other countries, the author aims to distinguish the margins of cyber-activism in Bulgarian virtual space and to make an approach of mapping the ethnical structure of this space. The main actors, which are of interest for this study, are far-right activists, Bulgarian Turkish and Roma population. Analyzing the supposed tension between “nationalists” and “minorities” in virtual space, the author comes to a conclusion that ethnicity-based struggles appear to be a phenomenon of very limited signifi cance in the local web. However the article emphasizes on other major problems, which are closely related to this impossibility of the virtual space to become a fi eld for ethnicity-based struggle. On the one hand we observe the continuing tendency of Roma and Turkish population to be largely excluded from the web, based on material and educational factors. On the other hand the far-right activists demonstrate low levels of trust in the independent character of virtual space as a media. Both of these issues are of vital importance for anyone who is interested in analyzing the structure of Bulgarian virtual space and its limitations, corresponding to social problems exceeding its margins.

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