11 April 2014
The reaction of the Financial Times to Viktor Orbán’s decisive victory in last week’s Hungarian election was something to behold. An editorial steeped in invective set the tone; a leading commentator produced a hatchet job on the victors (no pun intended) and the FT’s resident journalist in Budapest found that the OSCE monitors had sullied the election victory with an observation that the rules gave an advantage to the incumbent.
Now the question I frequently ask myself is why? What is it about Hungary that so enrages the paragons of virtue at the Financial Times?
Lets look at some of the charges against Hungary. The FT believes that a super-majority is unhealthy for democracy yet they offer no explanation as to why this is so. Surely somewhere in the rulebook of democratic governance it says that the majority win the right to form the government. Clever people will argue it is how that majority is used that is an indication of the health of a democracy and this is so. So let’s look at some examples.
Lets take the new constitution for example. The FT and other liberal bodies, including the EU, were quick to denounce it and indeed some were able to criticise it even before it was published and translated. What a wonderful feat of prescience. Yet little real thought was given to the conditions under which revision was required – namely that the previous constitution was a prop of the former communist regime. Furthermore, how much of it actually needed to be redrafted? Practically nothing, as the drafters of the constitution were clever enough to base their draft on the practices and precedents set in other EU state constitutions.
Similarly, based on this communist legacy, there was a fair argument that senior judges of a certain age should be replaced but even this was decried by liberal elites. The FT gave a guest column space to a Princeton academic who has made a cottage industry out of such criticism but the impact of such interventions have been non-existent. Indeed, some Hungarian citizens might wonder why these same judges who supported the former regime, used the Communist Party for personal advancement and who presided over a legal system that incarcerated and pronounced death sentences on people should not be exempt from justice.
Take another question, the issue of minorities in Hungary? On the evidence before us, there is no systematic abuse of minorities, although there are socio-economic challenges facing the Roma population. And before anyone claims that Hungary treats the Roma badly, just remember that it was France and their then President Sarkozy that was upbraided by Vivian Reding in the European Union for France’s inhumane policy to Roma minorities, not Viktor Orbán.
Indeed, if we wish to look at minorities, then let us examine the role of the Liberal Party minority in Hungary, this elite which sat in a number of coalitions with the Socialist in government and which introduced policies which practically no-one in Hungary voted for in return for propping up their coalition partners and attaining the trappings of power. Who gave the Liberals the right to experiment in Hungary with neo-liberal economic policies, the failure of which led to economic dysfunction, the growth of rampant corruption and greed, the involvement of the IMF and generated a social reaction, which, if we are being honest, has killed liberalism in Hungary. Perhaps the fact that the Liberals were routed in the 2010 election, receiving no seats in parliament jaundiced the view of the FT. However, they have fared no better last week – receiving one manipulated seat for entering an opposition alliance but otherwise winning nothing and being incapable of competing in the European Elections in May. Does this not resonate with the FT even if it’s hard to digest?
Another charge raised time and again against Viktor Orbán is his unorthodox economic policies. The FT is apoplectic when banks, mortgage lenders and utility companies are singled out for special attention – especially being the subject of special taxation or legal challenge. Likewise, the FT finds flat rate tax an anathema. In short, the FT is a slave to the current neo-liberal theory of economics.
However, when seen by the Hungarian voter, such orthodoxy has never profited them. There is at the top of society, a wealthy and bohemian elite but under that stratum, there are just too many poor or fiscally challenged citizens who struggle to make ends meet. So when banks or mortgage lender or utility companies are forced to repatriate some profit, the voter is grateful, whether this is against so-called ‘European norms and value’ or not. Furthermore, unorthodox or not, Hungary’s economic policies have made inroads into debt reduction, helping the low paid, supporting families and yes, attracting inward investment. Hungary is no Ireland, Cyprus or Greece.
The FT is also negligent when it comes to appreciating Hungary’s recent history. How easy the paper sits with those who used to govern by ‘super-minority’! Perhaps if the paper made more effort to understand that Hungary is more than simply Budapest and that political, economic, social and cultural preferences are not that of a Luxembourg or Germany it might be able to give a more balanced account of Hungarian affairs.
The FT, in this latest outpouring of scorn and bile, has made a statement on Hungarians, which is wrong, sad and undeserved. It believes that Hungary is a dictatorship and revanchist. According to the FT, the EU should intervene in Hungary’s internal affairs. Does the FT not understand that such comments, when juxtaposed with articles on Russia’s annexation of Crimea and interference in Ukraine, suggest at best confusion and at worst double standards? Why, asks the average Hungarian, did the FT not question the theft of an election in 2006 by a former prime minister who claimed that he lied day and night and stole the election? Where was the EU? Was that not an assault on European values and norms? Was that also confusion or double standards – either way it suggests a lack of credibility on the part of the FT.
How wide off the mark can a quality newspaper be? With headlines that could grace any UK tabloid newspaper, are subscribers or investors being well served? Hungary, quite definitely, is not a liberal country in the way the FT prefers politics. Hungarians foster and support traditional or conservative views on society ranging from the role of religion and the family and marriage. Yes, there are challenges, not only economic but also political in terms of the rise of an extreme right wing party, Jobbik. What is patently unfair, however, is that the rise in extremism in Hungary is accentuated, as similar advances in France, or the Netherlands or Belgium are somewhat glossed over or ignored.
It would be fatuous to deny that the FT has no agenda in Hungary – it clearly does. That agenda is to support the status quo in terms of liberal-democratic politics and global economics, including the respect of the laws, which underpin the system. Within this agenda, the EU is afforded a status of critical importance.
The problem of last week’s election, however, is that the Hungarian voter cocked a snoop at the liberal elites and with it the FT. Yes indeed, it was a bitter pill to swallow!