The Perpetual Interim

Bulgaria’s chief prosecutor has been exercising power without a valid mandate since 2023, even after the Supreme Court explicitly declared his authority expired. What looks like a technical impasse reveals a subtler form of constitutional erosion: power entrenching itself through interim arrangements, procedural improvisation, and cultivated legal uncertainty. The Bulgarian case shows how institutional capture can advance quietly, without open defiance, constitutional rupture, or triggering the EU’s usual rule-of-law alarms.