“Populist Assault on Democracy" is the headline of a special chapter on Hungary and Poland in Freedom House’s “Nations in Transit 2017" report published on Tuesday. The title of the full report is “The False Promise of Populism", and although FH is not concerned only about the political turn of events in Hungary, the country does have the lowest ranking in the Central European region and in the entire European Union.
Hungary now has the lowest ranking in the Central European region. Poland’s score reached its lowest point in the survey. “In these countries, populist leaders have attacked constitutional courts, undermined checks and balances, and have turned public media into propaganda arms," Freedom House said in the report.
Hungary’s democracy scores dropped the most over the last decade. The country is no longer considered part of the region in a narrower sense; its score is below the scores of Southeast European countries.
Hungary’s decline is spectacular not only in regional, but also in global terms. It is among the countries that show the greatest democracy score erosion of the past ten years. As regards countries regarded overall free only Nauru is on the list, i.e. Hungary has uniquely declined in the ranking as a stable democracy. (Let’s be clear that Freedom House had reclassified Hungary as a ‘semi-consolidated democracy’ from its previous status of ‘consolidated democracy’ already in its 2015 report. Semi-consolidated democracies are electoral democracies that meet relatively high standards for the selection of national leaders but exhibit weaknesses in their defense of political rights and civil liberties.)
Hungary is also high on the list of countries that slipped the most compared to their 2016 score.
The above two charts are from FH’s annual report published in early 2017, but the regional map published now shows it ever so clearly how Hungary’s trend of the last decade stands out. Although none of the countries made serious progress, a decline such as Hungary’s is nowhere to be seen.
Hungary’s democracy score declines
Score changes:
National Democratic Governance rating declined to 4.25 from 4.00 due to the continued centralization of power and the total domination of the political system and economy by the governing parties, as well as the deployment of illiberal rhetoric.
Electoral Process rating declined to 3.00 from 2.75 due to the manipulation of the refugee quota referendum and the Sunday shop closure scandal, when security guards blocked an opposition politician from filing a referendum initiative on the controversial shopping ban.
Civil Society rating declined to 2.75 from 2.50 due to an increasingly hostile political atmosphere, and allegations of surveillance and outsourced physical violence against watchdog NGOs and other civil society representatives.
Independent Media rating declined to 4.25 from 3.75 due to the strong political intervention in the Hungarian media market, several acquisitions financed with the help of state-controlled banks, and the controversial circumstances leading to the shutdown of the newspaper Népszabadság, Hungary’s leading critical daily.
Corruption rating declined to 4.50 from 4.00 due to large-scale and unpunished corruption involving not just government-friendly oligarchs but also high-ranking politicians and officials.
As a result, Hungary’s Democracy Score declined from 3.29 to 3.54.
The Roots of Populism’s Revival in Europe
The populist tide has been rising in Central Europe since 2010, when Viktor Orbán led the Fidesz party back to power in Hungary and then eviscerated the country’s checks and balances, changing the constitution and electoral code to ensure his party’s dominance while ignoring the EU’s reprimands
, Freedom House said in the report.
What is this populism?
At its core, it pits a mystically unified “nation against corrupt “elites and external enemies, and claims for a charismatic leader the power to voice the will of the nation. It is therefore fundamentally illiberal, rejecting diversity of identity and of opinion within society and discarding basic principles of modern constitutional thinking: that democracy requires constraints on the will of the majority and checks on the decisions of the executive. It feeds on the gap between what mainstream political leaders promise and what they deliver, which is why the utopian vision and quotidian results of the EU have nourished its growth. The anti-elitist, anti-immigration, and protectionist platforms of the Brexit and Trump campaigns drew on the same set of frustrations. (Source: Freedom House ‘Nations in Transit 2017’ report)
FH recalled that Orbán hailed Trump’s victory as the end of “liberal non-democracy" and “the return to real democracy."
FH said Orbán and his ruling Fidesz party have “entrenched themselves ever more firmly in power each year since 2010, increasingly stoking bigotry and hatred through a self-serving anti-immigration campaign. Having spent its first years rewriting the constitution, taking over the courts, and warping the electoral system, the government has now snuffed out most of the critical media and built an efficient machine of state capture and grand corruption.
“With the 2018 elections nearing, Fidesz is turning its attention to civil society, threatening to “sweep out" organizations backed by foreign funding."
Nations in Transit 2017 measures progress and setbacks for democratization in 29 countries from Central Europe to Central Asia.
In consultation with country report authors, a panel of academic advisers, and a group of regional expert reviewers, Freedom House provides numerical ratings for each country on seven indicators:
Electoral Process. Examines national executive and legislative elections, electoral processes, the development of multiparty systems, and popular participation in the political process.
Civil Society. Assesses the growth of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), their organizational capacity and financial sustainability, and the legal and political environment in which they function; the development of free trade unions; and interest group participation in the policy process.
Independent Media. Addresses the current state of press freedom, including libel laws, harassment of journalists, and editorial independence; the emergence of a financially viable private press; and internet access for private citizens.
Local Democratic Governance. Considers the decentralization of power; the responsibilities, election, and capacity of local governmental bodies; and the transparency and accountability of local authorities.
Judicial Framework and Independence. Highlights constitutional reform, human rights protections, criminal code reform, judicial independence, the status of ethnic minority rights, guarantees of equality before the law, treatment of suspects and prisoners, and compliance with judicial decisions.
Corruption. Focuses on public perceptions of corruption, the business interests of top policymakers, laws on financial disclosure and conflict of interest, and the efficacy of anticorruption mechanisms.
These category scores are straight-averaged to create a country’s “Democracy Score" on a scale of 1 to 7, with 1 being the most democratic, and 7 the least.
Charting is displayed using TradingView's technology, a platform, where you can build advanced charts,
spot upcoming trends in the stock screener, and find inspiration in multiple trading ideas
