Lecture #4 - Hungary and Poland

Illiberalism

A government that has enough democracy to be sent out by voters at the polls, that operates without political prisoners and where there’s free speech. Despite this, the government is still authoritarian, in nature.

Hungary and Poland

Country prototype of illiberalism.

2015 - 2016 Migration Crisis

• First case of The Visegrad Four uniting against Brussels

• Millions of people wanted to enter HUngary from Iraq, Afghanistan and Kosovo to reach Germany

• Viktor Orban put up a razor fence to keep migrants out — called fascist and intolerant (eventually other EU countries adopted his very same stance)

• Poland, Hungary, Czechia and Slovakia joined together to refuse migrant quotas

Jaroslaw Kaczynski

• Head of Poland’s Law and Justice (PiS) party

• In power from 2015 to 2023

  • Modelled his form of government openly off Orban

Project 2010

Orban’s plan to consolidate authority, built over a period of eight years where he was out of power.

New constitution, new election laws, lowering judicial retirement age

Primary components of Project 2010

Welfare policies

The way that illiberal governments in Poland and Hungary have remained popular is through their _______ _______. Ex. family bonuses, lifetime income-tax exemption for mothers of several children. Designed to reach working families, not necessarily marginalized (poor, Roma) ones.

Typical Western Explanations for Why Poland and Hungary are Illiberal

• An ungrateful East — a backward culture awakened after communism

• A relapse toward Russia and old intolerance (ie. anti-semitism)

• The idea that the West has “mastered” its past and is now in a position to teach the East how to be democratic

Eastern Europeanism

• A racism against people from post-Communist Europe, strengthened after 1989

• Far milder than racisms of colonial origin

• Tropes: gangsters, oligarchs, sex workers, trafficking, corruption, state failure, poverty

Illiberalism is found all over the world, hate is imported.

Why Eastern Europeanist explanations of illiberalism fail.

Neoliberalism

• Why illiberalism started in Central Europe. Western-dominated capital invaded the region after communism, taking over previously state-owned companies and introducing new ones from the West. Due to the lack of existing capital, the area was even more affected be _____ and the corresponding illiberal reaction.

• When Western capital moved into Central Europe, it became a labor-providing area, and people were hurt and belittled by Othering, leading to illiberalism.

Racial Capitalism

Some groups are given the advantage in the accumulation of capital, and others are relegated to work. Capitalism presents itself as supporting individual competition, but it divides people, and the division is unequal. Labor is outsourced to low-wage (racialized) areas, and profit flows back to the (non-racialized) core. The explanation is that the cultural character of people in the periphery places them in that exploitative situation.

White (White but Not Quite)

Means having white priveliege (being providers of labor and not of capital).