Bulgarians' dissappointment with the public authorities have increased significantly and disapproval prevails about the way democracy is developing in this country, according to a nationally representative survey. It was done among 1,500 Bulgarians as part of the European Values Study 2008 and the results were announced Sunday by the research team of the academic consortium for the project, including the Bulgarian Sociology Association, the St. Kliment Ohridski University of Sofia, the Institute of Sociology with the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences and the Association for Social Studies.

More than half of Bulgarians (54 per cent) said they have no confidence in the political parties. The like figure was 26 per cent in 1999. 51.3 per cent have no confidence in Parliament and 47.1 per cent in the government. Confidence in police has slumped dramatically and 24.4 per cent have no confidence (against 13 per cent in 1999). The attitude of no-confidence in the education system is shared by 16 per cent (against 6.9 per cent in 1999).

The only institutions who are seeing an increase in public confidence are the Church and the European Commission.

In another negative trend identified by the research team, confidence is also on the decline in inter-personal relations. 82.3 per cent of the respondents said that other people are not to be trusted (up from 73.1 per cent in 1999) and 40 per cent believe that most people would lie to them.

Mistrust among people and in the institutions create a feeling of insecurity and tension which threatens the normal functioning of civil society in Bulgaria, commented sociology professor Georgi Dimitrov. He said that Bulgaria is caught in a spiral in which citizens' weak participation in political life makes public institutions corrupt and thus citizens are even more strongly put off by politics.

In a positive trend, the survey found that Bulgarians have a growing appreciation of personal freedom and the principles of market economy. Twice as many prefer personal freedom to social equality (57.6 per cent against 33.2 per cent).

Also, an increasing number of people (46.5 per cent) are proud to be Bulgarians.

Nearly 30 per cent feel fine about having foreigners work in Bulgaria as long as there are job vacancies and 17.3 per cent don't mind if everybody who wanted came to Bulgaria. Nearly 45 per cent believe in having a tight limit on the number of foreigners coming to Bulgaria. The share of those who want a ban on foreigners coming to Bulgaria has shrunk to 8.3 per cent this year from 15.7 per cent in 1999. Intolerance to other races have decreased to 20.9 per cent from 28.1 per cent.

The family remains at a high level of importance: 86 per cent say it is "very important" and 13.5 per cenet describe it as "fairly important". Bulgarians also emerge as tolerant to cohabitation without marriage: 60 per cent of the respondents accept the idea.

The share of Bulgarians who describe themselves as "very happy" has doubled to 15.9 per cent and 44.2 per cent define themselves as "fairly happy". 6.4 per cent are not at all happy (down from 12.7 per cent in 1999).

Bulgaria is among 44 nations participating in the European Values Study. The latest edition of the survey was held between April 21 and June 15.