Owen Jones - Hungary’s chilling plight could foreshadow Europe’s future
Rather than being
repelled, a new generation is being attracted to right-wing extremism
Hungary’s democracy is
in mortal danger – and whether it survives will help determine the future of
our embattled continent. This weekend the main opposition newspaper – think of it as a Hungarian Guardian – was
closed down by its owners after six decades of existence. Its digital
archive vanished from the internet; its workers were shut out of their offices
and left unable to access emails.
Publicly, it is
presented as a commercial decision: in Hungary’s increasingly repressive
society, there is widespread private cynicism about such a claim. Here was a
newspaper that dared to challenge the government – whether on policy,
corruption, or its onslaught against democracy.
Authoritarian
rightwing populism is sweeping the western world: Hungary is an acute example.
We all know history turned a corner after the 2008 financial crisis: we are
beginning to see how sharp that turn was. From the Scottish independence
movement to Podemos in Spain, from Donald Trump to France’s National Front and
Hungary’s far right, from the rise of Bernie Sanders and Jeremy Corbyn to
Greece’s Syriza: a painful struggle for the west’s future has only just begun.
Hungary’s prime minister, Viktor Orbán – whose rightwing party swept to victory
in 2010 – recognises this. His chief lesson from 2008 is that “liberal
democratic states can’t remain globally competitive”. He has committed his
government to building an “illiberal democracy” – and he is remaining true to his word.
Others have harsher
descriptions. Hungarian dissident Gáspar Miklós Tamás accuses the government of “pissing on the liberal status quo”
in favour of “post-fascism”. Hungarian-British poet
George Szirtes knows all about repression. His mother was a photographer, his
father a senior ministry official, and they fled after the Soviet Union crushed
Hungary’s revolution in 1956. “Hungarian democracy is imperilled,” he told me.
“We’re moving towards a Putinesque situation.” As Human Right Watch’s Lydia
Gall puts it: “What we’ve seen in the last six years is essentially a continued
undermining or deterioration of the rule of law and human rights protection.”
In 2010 and 2011,
Hungary adopted a series of laws which were damned by Amnesty International as “a threat to the right to
freedom of expression”. Hungary’s media outlets had to register with a national
authority. The Klubrádió station – a persistent critic of the government –
became one of its victims. At the end of 2011, the authority decided not to
grant Klubrádió a licence to broadcast, forcing it into a protracted battle – though the station did eventually win.
This authoritarian
government has repeatedly amended the constitution: one change embedded
discrimination against LGBT people by defining the family as a unit “based on the marriage of a man
and a woman, or a linear blood relationship, or guardianship. Indeed, earlier
this year Hungary blocked an EU-wide agreementto prevent discrimination against LGBT
people. Other amendments have attacked judicial independence and
religious freedoms.
Key public institutions, such as the office of the
prosecutor general and the constitutional court, have been de facto taken over
by the ruling party. “These are institutions that should be independent checks
and balances on the government,” says Gall. There is a growing atmosphere of
intolerance in the country, with those who dissent being denounced as traitors
and accomplices of terrorism. Worse still, one of the main opposition parties
is Jobbik, an antisemitic neo-fascist party with a paramilitary
wing.
Hungary’s role in
Europe’s refugee crisis has been appalling, prompting Luxembourg’s foreign
minister to propose the country’s expulsion for treating refugees “worse
than wild animals”. Last year, the country declared a state of crisis and built a fence with the intention of
driving refugees back into Serbia. People who have already fled violence are reportedly being chased by dogs and beaten.
And what has the EU
done? Hungary is, after all, dependent on economic assistance from the union.
Article 7 of the EU constitution exists to sanction member states in violation
of its norms, including the suspension of voting rights. The European
commission has made it progressively harder to invoke, and last year the
European parliament threw out a proposal to invoke Article 7 – or even to
activate a warning mechanism.
When Hungary’s
government imposed the mass early retirement of veteran judges in favour of
more pliant replacements, the EU did take action – but only on the grounds
of age discrimination. Hungary was fined and forced to pay financial
compensation to those sacked – but it still achieved its goal. A recent government-initiated referendum to oppose EU plans to settle refugees failed
because of insufficient turnout, but it stirred up inflammatory xenophobic and
racist rhetoric.
Hungary’s plight has
disturbing echoes of Europe’s past: but, horrifyingly, it could foreshadow our
future too. Rather than being repelled, a new generation – including the
university-educated – are increasingly attracted to rightwing extremism. Poland too is in
the grip of an authoritarian right which chips away at the country’s hard-won
democracy. With no meaningful consequences, such governments feel increasingly
emboldened. In Austria, the far right moves ever closer to power; in France, it
grows stronger; in Sweden and other countries too.
The cure to such
movements is a left that offers an inspiring alternative relevant to the
insecurities and ambitions of the post-2008 world. We don’t have that yet. But
that’s no excuse for inaction. And we in Britain cannot smugly condemn Hungary, of course: since
the Brexit vote, xenophobic nationalism has marched defiantly. Our prime
minister condemns her political opponents as having disdain for patriotism;
this week, both the Daily Mail and the Daily Express printed chilling
front pages calling for “unpatriotic Bremoaners” to be damned for a “plot to
subvert the will of the British people”, and demanding “EU exit whingers” be
silenced. It is increasingly
common in modern Europe for political opponents to be portrayed as unpatriotic
fifth columnists. The history of our continent tells us where this can lead.
Hungary is perhaps the most extreme, undiluted form of what Europe is
becoming. It is a warning we should heed.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/oct/13/hungary-future-europe-far-right-viktor-orban
See also:Hitler's
annihilation of the Romanis (the Gypsies of Europe)
"We are Europe's misery" - plight of the Romany people in France
"We are Europe's misery" - plight of the Romany people in France
