Hungary no longer a democracy, Freedom House claims
A growing number of leaders in Central and Eastern Europe have dropped even the pretense that they play by the rules of democracy. They openly attack democratic institutions and are working to restrict individual freedoms, according to Nations in Transit 2020, an annual report on democratic governance in the region.
These attacks have resulted in a dramatic democratic breakdown across Central Europe, the Balkans, and Eurasia, leading to category declines for four countries in the past two years: Poland has dropped out of the group of consolidated democracies and become a semiconsolidated democracy, while Hungary, Serbia, and Montenegro have all left the category of democracies entirely and become transitional/hybrid regimes.
Hungary has experienced the largest drop ever recorded in Nations in Transit, with its Democracy Score exceeding the average decline eightfold in the past decade. In the 2020 report, with declines related to elections, local governments, and corruption, Hungary left the group of democracies.
The number of countries classified as democracies fell to 10 from 15 a decade ago while hybrids like Hungary rose to 10 from three and full-blown autocracies dropped to nine from 11.
Cover photo: Getty Images
