#02 Social Policy Aspects of Bulgaria's EU Accession - Noncheva, Teodora (Centăr za izsledvane na demokracijata, 1999)
The social policy of the European Union aims to reduce the most substantial differences in the national schemes and programs, to facilitate the free movement of workers, to create prerequisites for employment growth and improvement of the working conditions, to raise the level of qualification and to promote the retraining and the reintegration of people who lost their job because of structural economic changes or for other reasons with social implications. Ensuring of the national social security systems' conformity with the criteria for membership in the European Union is of substantial importance for the entire process of democratisation and integration in Europe. At the same time these systems determine the internal potential of the applicant countries for accession. That is where the actuality of the questions, put in this study stems from: What is the scope of the field of action of the economic and social criteria for integration in the social sphere? To what extent does the Bulgarian system for social protection correspond to the European models and values? What are the perspectives for development of the social reform in the light of the strategy for accession to the European Union? These questions do not have a simple answer, but nevertheless the analysis of the social problems of the integration is the main challenge at the current stage of the social reform