This thesis examines democratic innovations in Hungary, a country governed by Fidesz, an illiberal and populist party since 2010. Democratic innovations aim to engage citizens in the political decision-making process. The thesis analyses and compares two democratic innovations: the National Consultation, first organised by Fidesz in 2005, and the Citizens’ Assembly, first organised by the liberal opposition in Budapest in 2020. The aim of this thesis is to examine how the quality of democratic innovations is influenced by their organizers and the increasingly authoritarian political context of Hungary. Previous research has analysed both innovations in depth but has not systematically compared the two processes. This thesis primarily uses official reports on both innovations, supplemented by secondary data from semi-structured elite interviews conducted with Hungarian politicians in 2020. The study's results indicate that the quality of the democratic innovations analysed is influenced by the ideology and broader political goals of the organisers, institutionalisation, and the dynamics of the illiberal state apparatus. It is noteworthy that the National Consultation lost its democratic and deliberative character after Fidesz came to power in 2010. Although the quality of the Citizens' Assembly organized by the opposition parties was affected to a lower extent by the seemingly unfavourable political context, the National Consultation and the politics of Fidesz have also negatively affected other practices of the opposition.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:uu-527782 |
| Date | January 2024 |
| Creators | Herta, Eduárd |
| Publisher | Uppsala universitet, Statsvetenskapliga institutionen |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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