Internationalization of Bulgarian Tourism Business

This research aims to trace the internalization process of the tourism business over the last decades in our country. Several foreign economic factors have reasoned it by virtue of the open character of our national economy, the course of the transition economy reforms, and the peculiarities of the Bulgarian economy EU integration. The relation (internationalization of business - the internationalization of the national economy) is studied in different directions and methodologies, but in the present study, an adapted version of the method developed by Alan Rugman is applied. The primary approach is based on comparing the degree of internationalization in the national economy and the degree of internationalization of a specific type of business. The degree of internationalization is measured with the help of variables and a system of indicators, which are directed respectively to the business environment of the Bulgarian economy and the specifics of the Bulgarian tourism business. As analysis findings of the processes of internationalization in the context of tourism, it is concluded that these processes play an essential role in determining the position of Bulgarian tourism in its inevitable competitive opposition to other tourist destinations and their business. The limitation has been identified in two periods of research on the degree of internationalization of business - the first covers seven years before Bulgaria's accession to the EU, and the second period - is almost ten years after the signing of the membership agreement. The practical implication of the study is that the increasing degree of internationalization of the tourism business in our country complements the overall result of the internationalization of the Bulgarian economy. This is especially clear in the second observed period of the study, which is expected to achieve a general synergy effect for the economy as a whole. The originality of the research consists in the adaptation and approbation of a known methodology for studying the internationalization processes to the specifics of the tourism business and a given economy, such as the Bulgarian one, for two separate periods.