#842: Lessons From Hungary’s Election

How did Peter Magyar win over Viktor Orbán in Hungary? Just some reflections.

The Hungarian elections have been a while ago. We know that Viktor Orbán was finally defeated by a former party colleague of his from Fidesz, Peter Magyar. Why did this happen?

Well, Hungary has turned into a country in which the leading party gave itself so much more power that it became really difficult to dethrone it. Viktor Orbán came to power originally — was elected — because Gyurcsány, at a famous speech, admitted that his previous government hadn’t done anything right, had lied to people, no successes. This is why people were angry. This is why they went for Orbán. This is why they supported him for so long.

Also, in a lot of the post-communist countries there is a dedication to democracy, but there is also a deep skepticism of the European Union becoming too strong — because what these countries want is no return to some Soviet Union-style system. They want to stay independent. They want to stay democratic, and they do have a sense of national identity that maybe isn’t there anymore for some countries in the more western part of Europe.

But whatever that may be, there have been several attempts to defeat Orbán at the ballot box. All the previous attempts failed because the opposition was divided. They were divided because of their different ideas, their different approaches — as opposition typically is, and that’s a good thing. But if you say you’re so much against what is happening now, then you need to embrace compromise. Then you can’t say: well, I’m against this, they’re against this, but my position of being against is so much stronger than theirs, and they deliver a completely different outlook on society to you. This is why previous attempts failed.

What was different now? First of all, the winning candidate comes from a similar ideological position as Viktor Orbán — just hopefully without the corruption, the pro-Russia orientation, and the illiberal democracy ideology. It seems to be that this is for now the case.

Magyar could win. Maybe his name also helped, because “Magyar” means Hungarian. He could probably win already a little bit because of the problems that people have had with Viktor Orbán — but that never is enough on its own.

He could win because he was able to put all the opposition energy into one. He was able to win through moderation, not through extremism — by unifying all the different streams of the opposition, who admitted that they were willing to make a compromise, to mollify their more radical ideas. This is what’s needed if you’re saying you want to win an election over someone that you really think needs to be ousted from power.

You need strong moderation, strong ability to compromise, strong ability to bring the other side to you. You don’t need doubling down on your most extreme ideas. You don’t need factionalism. All of that can emerge later again. But you need a sense that those who voted for the ones you want to take out of office — that those people are welcome with you as well. That some of those ideas will be re-evaluated, and whatever is good will stay, whatever is not good will be discarded.

That’s what you need. And that’s how Hungary was able to defeat Viktor Orbán. Take from that as you wish.