The Changing

Facets of
Hungarian
Nationalism

BY G Y O R G Y C S E P E L I

AND ANTAL ORKENY

Historical Perseverance of National Sentiment

I H E early historical development of the Hungarian people

unfortunately cannot be documented accurately: evidence is
controversial. Linguistic research has suggested that Hungarian ethnicity can be traced back to about 3500 B.G., when the
Ugric branch separated from the mainstream Finno-Ugric
peoples. Three thousand years later, the nomadic ethnic
Hungarians came into contact with Turk peoples. There are
some records which suggest the possibility of a pohtical alliance
between Hungarians and the Turks, and this is the reason why
at the time the Hungarians were called Turks. The Latin term
Hunganis and its other Indo-European versions {Ungar,
Venger) originated from the common ethnic name Onogur,
which meant "ten tribes" in Bulgarian Turkish. The Hungarians refer to themselves as Magyar, which is the name of their
original Ugric tribe. On the basis of this controversial linguistic
data, some theorists stress the possibility that there was a
merge between early Htingarians and Turks. In 895, Magyar
tribes were pushed by mass population movements to the
Carpathian Basin where in 1000 they founded the Hungarian
Kingdom. The Slavs, Avars, Pechenegs, Cumans, and Jazygians, who were already living in the Carpathian Basin,
inextricably mixed with the Hungarians.
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At the time of llie fotiiidation of the Hungarian state

approximately two hundred thousand ethnic Hungarians lived
in the Carpathian Basin; this number rose to 4.5-5 million
people by the end of the fifteenth century. As a result of
foreign occupation and constant warfare, this number fell to
2.5 million by the end of the seventeenth century. Ethnic
Hungarians constituted a minority, with German, Slovak.
Romanian, Serbian, Croatian, Ruthenian. and Gypsy groups
rounding out the poptilation because of immigration. In 1920,
historical Hungary ceased to exist, and in the new reduced
territory of the Hungarian state, ethnic Hungarians made up
90 percent of the population and 3 million Hungatians lived in
the neighboring countries. According to the last census,
Hungary currently has approximately 10 million inhabitants.
There is a tendency toward a decrease in population: the
average Hungarian population has fallen by approximately
400,000 between 1980 and 1994.
The Hungarian Kingdom was fotinded by Stephen I, who
was recognized by the Pope. Before going into more detail,
three major historica! circumstances must be mentioned. First,
as we have stated, the ethnic and linguistic composition of
Hungarians was sharply diffet ent than neighboring Slavic and
German people. At that time, however, this difference was of
little importance, because medieval feudal society was not built
upon ethnic principle. Members of the nobility were considered full members of the ruling class regardless of their
mother tongue. On the other hand, serfs were first and
foremost subjects of the rtiling cla.ss, and their mother tongue
was not considered to be politically significant.
Second, the choice of Catholicism was a conscious political
decision resulting in a separation from Eastern European Byzantine influence and the fixing of Hungary's position as the
border zone of Central Europe. Catholic identification had important consequences because Christian orthodoxy, which prevailed in Eastern Europe, did not allow much room for organic,
slow, gradual development of Western structures and values such

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249

as individual liberty, dignity, separation of church and state, patterns of social organizations emerging from the lower levels of
society. Third, the development of feudalism caught up quickly
with Western Europe but was halted by the Turkish occupation
between the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
Throughout the middle ages, the Hungarian Kingdom
endured as one of the most stable polities in Europe. This
idyllic development was severely interrupted by the invasion of
the Ottoman Turks. As a consequence of the constant warfare
between Hungarians and Ottoman Turks, population growth
was stunted and the network of medieval settlements with their
urbanized bourgeois inhabitants perished. The 150 years of
Turkish rule fundamentally changed the ethnic composition of
Hungary. As a result of demographic losses including
deportation, the number of ethnic Hungarians in existence at
the end of the Turkish period was substantially diminished.
Simultaneously, there was a marked migration of Slovaks from
the north, Rumanians from the east, and South-Slavs from the
south.
At the end of the seventeenth century, Hungary was
liberated from the Turks by the Austrian Empire and became
one of the countries ruled by the Hapsburg dynasty.
Hungary's position in the Hapsburg Empire was one of
harmony and conflict. The Hungarian nobility were able to
maintain their privileges and institutions from the middle ages.
Foreign military and financial matters, however, were decided
in Vienna, and the authority of the Hungarian Diet was
limited. Meanwhile, new settlers arrived primarily from
Germany and settled mostly in western Hungary. Due to their
.skill and expertise, many of the German settlers were later to
form the core of the urban bourgeoisie. German immigration
was followed by the movement of Jews, Greeks, and
Armenians, who became entrepreneurs and merchants, bankers, and also part of the urban society. The Enlightenment and
the international political turmoil peaking with the Napoleonic
wars affected Hungarian ideological and political life. The

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emerging idea of nationalism centered around nationjil

sovereignty and complete separation from Austria. The defeat
of the war of independence of 1848-1849, however, proved
not to be fatal, and the desire of Independent Hungary finally
had to be reconciled in a compromise between Vienna and
Budapest in 1867.' Consequently, Hungary enjoyed unpara:leled freedom in internal affairs but was constrained in the
affairs of finance, defense, and foreign policy. Even if the
independence of Hungary remained limited, her enhanced
political status within the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy resulted in rapid modernization and economic development.
This growth, however, ended with the defeat of the
Monarchy in the First World War. The empire collapsed, and
Hungary became one of the newly established independent
national states in Central Europe. According to the terms of
the Trianon Peace Treaty, which established the binders of th?
independent Hungarian state, Hungary, as it existed within
the Monarchy, lost two thirds of its territory and one third of
the Hungarian ethnic population. Hungarians living in and
out of the new independent state found it more than difficult
to cope with the new situation. The treaty of Trianon was i
peace accord imposed on Hungary by the will of the victorious
powers. The Entente rewarded their allies who gradualK
developed into mortal enemies of the Austro-Hungariaii
Monarchy and Hungary. In the territory that was historiciil
Hungary, there was a substantial number of non-Hungariau
minorities; with the peace accord, each of these natioui I
minorities found their place in one of the successor states:
Slovaks and Ruthens went to Czechoslovakia, Romanians went
to Romania, Croats and Serbs became part of Yugoslavia, and
(iermans on the western border merged with Austria. Because
there was no just way to draw borders between Htiugary and
tlie successor states, the individual non-Hungarian national
groups, having seceded from Austro-Hungary, took territories
where many Hungarians (3.3 million) lived and still live today.
In frustration, the Hungarian political elite allied with fascist

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251

Italy and Nazi Germany in an attempt to revise the

consequences of the Trianon Treaty. The alliance was
successful in the short run in so far as Hungary managed to
regain Southern Slovakia in 1938. Ruthenia in 1939. Northern
Transylvania in 1940, and Vojvodina, including a small strip of
Slovenia, in 1941. With the defeat of the Axis Powers in 1945,
Hungary was forced to give up these territories.
Although the country was controlled by a council set up of
the allied powers, free parliamentary elections were held in
1945 and 1947, and there was hope for a true pluralistic
political system supplemented by a market economy. In the
internationalist spirit of state socialism, imposed on Eastern
and Central Etirope by the Soviet Union, Hungarian vicissitudes were suppressed, and the issue of Trianon was subjected
to official repression. This, of course, did not do away with
hostile public attitudes toward the peace treaties (Trianon,
1920; Paris, 1947) or the general feeling of national
frustration.
The development of the Hungarian state and its institutions
can be characterized by a dualistic division of power between
the imperial government in Vienna and local Hungarian
interest represented first by the nobility and later by the
gentry. This duahsm lasted in various forms until 1918.
Territorial losses, the slow down of economic progress, and the
establishment of the full-fledged system of national public
administration strengthened the power of the state over the
society. This statist heritage proved to be extremely useftil
from the point of view of the establishment of state socialist
institutions after 1948 which purposefully focused in one
center the economic, political, ideological, and cultural
decisions.
Hungarian culture generally has followed the patterns of
Western European traditions. Due to deficiencies in social,
economic, and political development, the politics of culture
had an overwhelming impact on the formation of a national
identity. The role of culture (including not only the uniqueness

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of the Hungarian language, but also the folk customs, way ol'
life, character, moral, arts, and so on) generally has played a
major role in the formation of national distinctiveness in all
Eastern European nations, but most especially in the case oi'
Hungary. This unique cultural character gave rise to feeling*
of Ioneline.ss rather than pride because Hungarians were
obsessed with the possibility of extinction and absorption b)
the surrounding Slavic population.
The linguistic uniqueness of Hungarians was a basis foT
their feelings of loneliness, despair, anxiety, and guilt. These
negative emotions were balanced by sudden explosions oi
heroism and irrational hope of survival. The Hungarian
Anthem characteristically consists of traits of the Hungarian
self-image, which can be compared in a way to the
self-representation of the Jews tormented by self-criticism
and perceived abandonment by God. This romantic selfimage has gradually been teplaced by an alternative
self-portrayal which emphasizes urban, pragmatic, and
bourgeois elements. This portrayal has been expressed
especially by humor, also considered a part of the Hungarian
national character.
The dominance of the politics of national culture resulted in
insufficient institutions of democracy and made illtisionar)
political reform aimed at democratization. Until 1920 there
was no universal suffrage. Between the two world wars,
general elections were not secret, and the authoritarian system,
which was disguised by the facade of parliamentary democracy, did not give political representation to the poor peasantry
or the urban proletariat. Moreover, anti-Jewish legislation
enacted between 1938 and 1944 legally excluded hundreds of
thousands of Jews from obtaining Hungarian citizenship, thue
transforming them into non-persons. This legislative process
led to the persecution, deportation, and mass killing of six
hundred thousand Hungarian Jews.
Political repression and totalitarian state-socialist control
over the society provoked mass protest and led to a revolution

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253

in the fall of 1956. One of the major demands of the

revolution was the restoration of national sovereignty and the
re-evaluation of the significance of national identity. The
failure of the 1956 revolution further deepened the national
isolation. The state socialist system, however, after 1956
showed much more fiexibility and sensitivity to the needs of its
citizens, in contrast to other Eastern European countries,
resulting in the development of "gtdyds communism." With the
collapse of the state socialist system in Fastern Europe,
Hungarians felt they would be the first to take the lead among
former state communist countries in the transition to market
economy and democracy.
In contrast to national development in Western Europe,
the desire for national utiity in Hungary lacked firm
economic, social, political, and institutional foundations.
Here, the concept of the nation came before the establishment of the proper political institutions, and the emerging
national ideology conseqtiently took the form of cultural
poUtics. The national idea referred to elements of ethnocentric heritage, such as descent, cultural values, and norms.
This type of national ideology demonstrated an overwhelming concern for political fictions and imagined national
narratives (for example, the myth of the Holy Crown of Saint
Stephen; fetishization of the territory of historical Hungary
which lacked international recognition; importance of the
mother tongue, literature, theater, and national symbols).
The politics of cultural nationalism, however, cannot be
viewed solely as a romantic or literary redeeming of
nationhood. Especially in the beginning of its development,
the concern for the values of modernization served as a
powerful catalyst for the patriots, urging them to realize the
dream of a full-fledged national state. This urge, however,
was in contradiction to a similar motivation to realize the
nation state on behalf of neighboring national groups. The
result was a permanent confiict which has survived the fall of
state socialism.

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The Paradoxical Influence of State Socialism on
National Development

One cotild hardly find more conspictious proof of the

validity of the thesis concerning the inherent conflict between
intent and outcome in political action than the emergence of
nationalism in Eastern Europe following the collapse of the
"second world" which had been established under the banner
of "socialist internationalism." While the founding fathers of
socialism cotild never really cope with the embarrassing facts of
empirical reality of the perpetuation of nationalism in society,
tliey were eager to set up ideological defense mechanisms to
ignore contradictory evidence, claiming that the subjects of
historical reality were not mature enough to catch up with the
historical truth of the class strtiggle and the ongoing progress
toward human emancipation. Followers of the founding
fathers who succeeded in realizing some of the dreams of the
founders were keen on providing powerful techniques of
education in the spirit of internationalism.
Paradoxically, these techniques were based on organizational
forms of establishing nations as political units in the
international community. The way the "socialist world" created
its system of interconnections between the units within its
realm copied the pattern of the nation state which historically
had evolved as the major means of promoting internal poHtical
coherence and creating collective self-presentation in order to
be perceived as homogeneous by other states.
The battle against nationalism at first appeared successful in
the socialist world. There was the overwhelming power of the
socialist state over its subjects, who practically could not resist
the economic and political centralization which left no room
for any kind of collective organization outside of the official
frameworks. Spontaneity was by no means welcome in state
socialism, and it is no wonder that not only religiotis, regional,
and ethnic identities, but even generation and gender
identifications were discouraged. Subjects were reduced to

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255

social roles, permitted to act within the rigid organizational

patterns of party hierarchy, political "transmission belts," such
as trade unions, youth organizations, professional guilds,
branches of bureaucratic state administration, and commanding posts of various ranks in the economy. Churches were kept
under strict control, and rehgious identity was considered a
mild form of mental deviance.
It would be misleading, however, to belie\e that these overt
and covert means of political, ideological, and economic
repression by themselves would have been strong enough to
crush basic structures of civic society, pervert ideals of political
democracy, and annihilate human dignity. The backwardness
of the social grounds upon which the Infrastructtn^e of state
socialism arose promoted the success of "building socialism"
and contributed to the impression of complete transformation
of identities, values, and social roles compared to those
prevailing in the "free world." Furthermore, over decades it
seemed that state socialism could be conceived of as a remedy
for the backwardness, and as an ideology it therefore attracted
many intellectuals and poHtical entrepreneurs in some countries of the Third World, which had chosen to stop
colonization.
The battle for cultural nationalism in Eastern Europe was
doomed because it had never developed into a political
doctrine enabling communities imagining themselves as nations to establish internationally recognized independent states
which had control over their economic resources and made
themselves legitimate by granting equality to their citizens.
Joseph Rothschild evaluates positively that following the Great
War, as a result of the Versailles Treaties, new nation states
emerged in Eastern Europe. However, he cannot refute the
argument that the existence of newly established nation states
between Germany and the Soviet Union was too limited to set
it firmly in the social experience, and sooner or later these
nascent nation states would fall as the Red Army invaded this
area in 1944-45 (Rothschild, 1989). Moreover, the small

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Eastern European states emerging from the ruins of thi^

Habsburg, Romanov, and Ottoman Empires during their
short-lived tenure proved to be too weak to resist th'^
temptation of defining the nation in terms of "Gemeinschaft.'
They were mote than ready to assume the racial vet-sion of the
national idiom. The cultural definition of the nation left them
ideologically and psychologically defenseless against the Soviet
invasion, which was backed not only militarily, but also
politically by the Yalta Agreement. Moreover, this invasion was
supported morally by the anti-fascist ideological discourse of
liberation.
In light of the historical defeat of cultural nationaUsm, which
could not prove its incongruence with fascism, and the
repression any spontaneotis collective self-identification manifestations, including nalional identity, it is truly surprising to
witness the reemergence of nationalism in Eastern Europe and
in the successor states of the Soviet Union (Hockenos, 1993).
The question we must ask is w'hether we should approacli
and treat this symptom as a return, a haunting ghost from the
pre-socialist past, or, as other interpretations would have it, as
the unintended consequence of the practice of "buildin;^
socialism." We would certainly like to argue for the second
option, at least in the case of Htingary. While there is no doubt
that throughout the region from the Elbe to the Volga facts in
the historical records are rampant since 1989 demonstratin;^
the reemergence of national hatred and the obsession with
ethnic purity. It is also easy to point to political parties and
programs which hardly differ from their predecessors wh.j
acted sixty years ago and ended up at the gallows as war
criminals. We would like to argue that cultural nationalism is in
retreat in the post-socialist political landscape. We are
witnessing the emergence of political nationalism aimed at
building up Gesellschaft-iype political commtiuities based on
constitution, civil society, market economy, and citizenshij;.
Controversies tormenting the post-socialist nation states steri
from the ideological and psychological dilemmas of politic..1

HUNGARIAN NATIONALISM

257

nationalism and have nothing to do with tribalism, obsession

with ethnic purity, and other devices of the politics of national
culture and psychology.
Is this statement congruent with our knowledge of the war
in former Yugoslavia? Before answering this question, we
would like to remind the reader of the paradoxical relationship
between the practice of state socialism and political nationalism. The thesis is that while state socialism was successful in
crushing cultural nationalism, it had the opposite effect on the
development of political nationalisin. Investigations of the
relationship between state socialism and nationalism have
generally failed to reveal this dual tendency. In some
countries, the political elite was permissive toward nationalism,
while in other countries there were elites who have resisted
and have not deviated from the internationalist route imposed
by the Soviet Empire. Romania falls almost naturally in the
first category, while Hungary is conceived of as an ideal typical
example of the second category. There is ample evidence in
the literature dealing with the poHtical and ideological
developments in the individual state socialist countries which
existed between 1948 and 1989 that the way political ehtes
related to the ideology of nationalism can be represented by a
scale ranging from official discouragement to outspoken
encouragement. Nationalism, however, had never been a force
which could have had serious impact on the fate of the
"socialist world," and it was an effect rather than a cause in the
link of internal and external events leading to the collapse of
the socialist world.
Why then has it become so apparent in the aftermath of the
collapse of state-socialism? Following the disappearance of the
Soviet Union and its dominance over the sateUite states,
nationalism in its political manifestation became seemingly
important because all certainties, apart from the boundaries
between the individual national and federal states, disappeared. The basic need for the maintenance or the earlier
establishment of these boundaries had by no means been

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dictated by practical necessities stemming from the administrative tasks of the Empire, which was heavily centralized and
bureaucratized. Just like the fortuitous colonial empires of
Western Europe, it was necessary to divide and name the units
within the Soviet Empire in order to administer. The classic
colonizers, however, were keen on creating borders which did
not correspond to previous views concerning the traditional
boundaries between clusters of the colonized subjects. In
contrast, Lenin and, to a lesser degree, Stalin were more
concerned with the presence of political and cultural vernaculars and drawing internal borders within the Empire, especially
in Eastern Europe, which followed the paths of history.
According to Stalin's enunciation, the peoples of the Empire
had to live in administrative units which were socialisl in
content but national in form. Despite the ideological and
political homogenization of the Empire, the realization of this
principle had far reaching consequences.
These consequences were most significant in Eastern
Europe, where the "national form" of the individual administrative units had to be taken more seriously than in the core of
the Empire. While it was a commonplace to blame the Yalta
Agreement for the Sovietization of Eastern Europe, in fact,
this agreement made it possible for the small Eastern
European countries to access the requisites of nationhood in
political terms. To be sure, Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia
could not achieve this status; nevertheless, their incorporation
in the Soviet Union had never been recognized by the Western
powers, and within the Soviet Union they preserved their
"national form."
It took forty years for the Eastern European countries to
gain possession of the requisites of national existence, which
for the first time in their history was not just imagination or
demand, but sociological reality. Any nation can be created in
the cultural sense by poets, teachers, linguists, or ethnographers. It is not up to them to care about the government, the
army, mail service, railways, currency, the capital city,

HUNGARIAN NATIONALISM

259

buildings for bodies of public administration, embassies

representing international recognition, police, foreign service.
Any group can be culturally defined as a nation if it owns a
repertory of national songs, customs, a belief in national
character, and literary and historical narratives promoting the
"awakening" of the nation. It would be an exaggeration to say
that all nations of the "socialist Commonwealth" had been
awakened by men of letters and lacked all political requisites,
or many of them, in the pre-socialist past.
Nevertheless, their tinhappy coexistence during the decades
of the Soviet repression certainly held one novelty of
paramount importance. For the first time in history, these
states experienced fixed borders^ which were not only
guaranteed by the international community, but had assumed
a kind of sanctity. While the founding fathers of socialism, led
by idealism, predicted the withering away of the state, their
sticcessors had a less Utopian demand. They emphasized the
significance of state boundaries and understood that the great
plan of "building socialism" is more realistic if it starts first in
one country and later extends to the entire "socialist camp."
Experience and paranoia equally explain why socialist politicians were so concerned with the border between the
"imperiahsts" and the peace camp. Between 1961 and 1989,
the Berlin Wall dramatically illustrated the socialist politicians'
anxiety about the frontier of the two worlds. But borders
between the brother socialist countries were also much
revered; Big Brother himself was extremely obsessed by the
impenetrability of the Soviet state borders to which, unusual in
an atheist system, the official documents referred as "holy."
The importance attributed to the borders was so great that in
1975 the Soviet Bloc signed the Helsinki Agreement, which
renewed the commitment of the international community not
to change state borders by force in Europe. Gratification on
the Soviet's part was by no means symbolic because there was
no serious threat to change the Ftnopean borders. The
Western countries, including the Federal Republic of Ger-

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many, harshly refused the idea of changing any state borders

in Europe. While the Western attittide toward state borders
had increasingly reflected less and less importance, the Soviets
failed to reflect this development. In exchange for Western
recognition, the borders between the European states created
in 1945 favored Soviet interests. The Soviet Union and its
satellites recognized a set of human rights which were
considered by the Western powers to be of paramount
importance. The Soviets thought that they had struck a good
deal, but in actuality they simply got what they already had.
The fruits in the "third basket" of the Agreement contained a
lethal dose of ideological poison, causing the death of socialist
"rights" and bringing to life ideals and \alues of liberal
democracy which finally won over "socialist democracy."
The Soviets were misled by their fetishizatioti of the state
and state borders (Oschlies, 1992). Western attitudes toward
nation states had changed by 1975. The borders between the
Western FAiropean countries gradually lost their importance,
replaced by institutions of the European economic, cultural,
and political integration which transgressed the competence of
the individual nation-states.
The "holiness" attributed to the state borders survived the
collapse of state socialism. Having lost the "socialist content,"
the "national form" became the major substance in the
countries in transition from state socialism to democracy,
which assumed the character of "state-nationalism." This
symptom was due to the logic of European national
development. By the turn of the century in Western Etiiope,
political nationalism replaced ctiltural nationalism and resulted
in the formation of well-established nation states.
Soviet obsession with state borders reflected a time lag in
keeping up with the West. Stalin's disciples failed to take notice
of emerging new tendencies and rigorously followed their
master's teaching on nationalism, which was developed in the
age of political nationalism. Communist politicians put their
signature on the Helsinki Agreement believing that they had

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261

outwitted their Western counterparts by falsely identifying

them as representatives of independent nation states. In fact,
they were outwitted on two levels.
As we have already mentioned, on the ideological le\el they
failed to understand the significance of human rights. On the
political level, their fetishistic concern with the state acted
against their intent within their owti ranks and engendered
fetishization of the inner borders in the Empire. In the
aftermath of the collapse of the Empire, a set of full-fledged
nation states emerged in Central and Eastern Europe. For the
first time in history, each of these nations possessed all the
requisites considered essential for national independence by
traditional nationalistic thought. National existence of the
post-Soviet nations, in the political sense, resulted from the
previous Soviet system of bureaucratic administration, which
enabled the formation of bureaucratic and cultural elites in the
individual units of administration, thtis creating corresponding
institutions and giving impetus to the fetishization of the
national state. By the end of twentieth century, the nations of
Eastern Europe had only caught up to late nineteenth-century
Western Europe. Yugoslavia, in its former condition, however,
lacked fetishization of its inner borders.

Conflicts of Citizenship and Nationality

The issues of peaceful or tense coexistence between minority

and majority groups in Eastern European societies and the
revival of nationalism, chauvinism, anti-Semitism, and discrimination against Gypsies have returned as a dimension of public
affairs. These insidious problems slowly poison public life by
affecting the way people relate, cohabitate, and communicate
with each other. Little heed was paid to these issues while the
euphoria over the death of socialism lasted, but the various
symptoms have multiplied since then, on the political scene
and among the general public. Nationalist overtones were

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increasingly audible in the Hungarian assessment of tht

Romanian national uprising. The Hungarian ptime minister ir
1990 stated that he felt he was the spiritual prime minister o]"
all 15 million Hungarians in the region. The Slovak language
has been declared the language of the state in Slovakia, whicl
sets limits on the use of the Hungarian and Ukiainiai
languages. Doubt was cast in the very first days of Lithuaniar
independence on the future citizenship of the country's Polish
and Russian minorities. The Romanian national assembK
declared Romania a uniform nation-state. And the gravesi
conflict of all: the bloody civil strife in Yugoslavia. Tht
adjective national has become ubiquitous in the post-socialisi
countries, attaching itself to everything from the future middk
classes to medicine and education. Each country's ruling;
political groups, and the emerging national ideologies, art
assessing the regit^n's conflicts exclusively from their owr
national point of view and using that assessment as their
guideline for political action.
In the ct)uise of the transition from state socialism to markei
economy and pluralist society much has been learned. Tht
Czech Lands have taken the lead in the transition process anc
are now being considered as a possible member of the EU
Hungarian voters in 1994 explicitly rejected cultural national
ism and the ideological crusade which was imposed on them b\
militant followers of the ruling parties between 1990 and 1994
Lithuanians got rid of their nationalist leaders as well
Moreover, the double victory of leftist political forces in Polauc
can also be interpreted as a sign of the peoples' disappoint
ment with the nationalist and Christian rhettmc representec
first and foremost by the defeated president. Lech Walesa
Ihe conflict in the territory of former Yugoslavia will end
However, the peace will more likely depenei on external
pressure than indigenous forces stemming frtim civil society.
Thomas Marshall (1950), in his analysis of the modern statu:;
of citizenship, distinguishes three areas which grew along with
the development of bourgeois society:

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263

1. The eighteenth century saw the appearance of human and

cix'ic rights (freedom of speech, conscience, and worship; equality
before the law; respect for the dignity of man and protection of
the individual; freedom to acquire and own property).
2. These were followed in the nineteenth century by political
rights (universal and equal franchise; secret voting; popular
representation; self-government; freedom of assembly and
association; the right of participation in political life and the
exercise of power).
3. The twentieth century added social rights (from the basic
rights that allow the development of a welfare society to the full
range of rights guaranteeing social security and including the
right to an acceptable life according to a social standard; the
rights to a livelihood through work; health and knowledge; the
equality of women; and protection of children, the old. the ill
and the disabled).
This extension and expansion of the status of citizenship
came about by a long process of struggle. The values of social
eqtiality and justice were essential to the legitimacy of the
modern bourgeois societies of Western Europe and North
America. Marx, of course, criticized these societies precisely
for their inequalities and injustices, pointing out that the
market economy and the property relations deriving from it
lead inevitably to social inequalities and an unjust distribution
of goods. He saw bourgeois democracy merely as a device used
by the ruling class for hoodwinking society, an ideology and
practice intended to disguise the true nature of its rule. The
truth is. however, that the successive accretions to the status of
citizenship allowed the inequalities to steadily even out; far
from impeding the operation of the market economy, they
positively assisted it, creating a dynamic class organization
based on eqtial opportunity and ensuring continuous reproduction of participatory, pluralist democracy.
The fact that the desire to do something about the
inequalities arising out of the market economy, the way of life,
and the consumption becomes internalized in the members of
societies based on the modern concept of citizenship is far
from significant. Much more important is the fact that the

264

SOCIAL RESEARCH

tiiodern theory and practice of citizenship produces a universal

standard. This standard serves as a yardstick that goes beyond
evening out or harmonizing the particularities in the hierarchy
of class to tackle the particular inequalities arising out of
ethnic, national, religiotis, and even gender diffeiences.
It follows from the comprehensive interpretation of citizenship that membership in and access to a nation will be assured
to each individual comprising the state so long as no
constraints are placed on the special interests of individuals
arising out of socio-cultural differences. That is the key to
understanding how the heterogeneous groups, denominations,
ethnic minorities, blacks and whites in the United States can
call themselves first and foremost American citizens. It also
explains why in eighteenth-centtiry France, which was shot
through with national, ethnic, and religious differences, the
criterion for citizenship created by the revolutionary constitution was not to be born French, but to belong to the French
republic, with the legal status that conferred. The expansion of
citizenship plays a decisive role in lessening the distance
between nation-states and effectively integrating peoples,
ethnic groups, and minorities.
The comprehensive interpretation of citizenship provides
the principle for the mtilticultural integration in present-day
Western Europe. The intention is not to do away with culttiral
differences and multiplicity, but to provide a unified,
integrated framework for a heterogeneous world. For any
present-day discussion of the fuiure united Western Europe to
center on this unity born of multiplicity, rather than on vague
generalities, the assumption must be that only a universal
approach to citizenship and a demand for such an approach
can provide the kind of unity in which linguistic, cultural,
historical, ethnic, and religious differences and diversities can
live together. Then the frontiers can become spiritual ones, the
labor and money markets can combine, and a new European
culture can be envisaged. Then the Tower of Babel may not
topple after all.
.

HUNGARIAN NATIONALISM

265

Brian Turner, who expands Marshall's classic model to

include the right to meaningful work and the right of cultural
communication in the status of citizenship, arrives at a global
criterion which can provide the foundation for political
democracy, individual liberty, and civilizing progress in the
broadest sense. Being a citizen in this sense no longer amounts
simply to a national identity. It offers the chance of forming
part of a modern civilization that transcends frontiers and
continents. The status of citizenship, in our interpretation,
then comes to constitute more than a basic state organization, a
complex of rights, duties, and guarantees, and a key to the
relationship between nations; it develops into a way of life,
providing scope for a modem, civilized life and governing
people's relations and contacts with each other regardless of
what language they speak, what religion they believe in, or
where they live.
All this may seem worlds apart from the relations between
the nation-states of Eastern Europe and the fate of the region's
national minorities, but in our view this is far from the case.
The development of nation-states marked a political climax
for nations as factors in the modern history of Europe,
culminating in the replacement of a feudal, dynastic concept of
the state with one embracing popular sovereignty, independent statehood, territorial integrity, and modern international
law. Regardless of whether the nation-state produced by this
development process grew out of an earlier feudal state, or
whether statehood was artificially constructed and then gave
rise to the nation itself as a political entity, the formation of the
nation-state framework necessarily entailed, as Csaba Gombar
points out, "members of state-forming nations often living also
as minorities in other nations, either because they were
dispersed historically in the first place, or because international
confiicts gave rise to historically impermanent border adjustments" (Gombar, 1980, p. 113). So, the formation of national
minorities is a general feature of Etuopean development. But
it must also be noted that there are regional differences in

266

SOCIAL RESEARCH

Europe in the gravity of the political and social problems

represented by the destiny of the national minorities and in the
degree to which they are politically and socially integrated.
The Western nation-state derives its political legitimacy from
the sovereign individual, who is first a member of the political
community defined by the constitution of the state; becatise of
that, he becomes a member of other communities defined in
psychological, ideological, cultural, or world-view terms,
irrespective of whether these other commtniities coincide with
tbe group of citizens of the state concerned.
The nation-states of Central and Eastern Europe in the
post-communist period appear at first sight to have reached
the Western condition. The gap between Eastern and Western
Europe in terms of political rights seems to be narrowing. But
the disquieting symptoms shown here prove that things are not
so simple. The layers of citizenship that Marshall describes
developed in Western Europe over centuries before maturing
into the concept we know today. It would be a mistake, of
course, to idealize the final product of this development. The
position of national and religiotis minorities in some Western
European countries is disquieting as well.
Although democratic slogans provided an accompaniment
to the fall of state socialism in all Central and Eastern
European countries, the democratization of political power as
such could hardly resolve the problem of the asymmetrical
relationship between the state and its citizens. Economic
change has been far slower than political change dtiring the
post-socialist transition. All post-socialist countries bear the
signs of stout resistance by the old redistribtiti\e economic
system and its bureaucracy, and this resistance is strongly
inclined to draw on nationalism for ideological support.
Another factor at least as important is the absence of a
bourgeois stratum in society. Since a modern class society
failed to develop, Eastern Europe never acquired the frames of
reference in which citizenship status could be perceived as an
integrating force capable of combating social and cultural

HUNGARIAN NATIONALISM

267

of the pre\alence of racism in Hungary. A representative

survey of Hungarian teenagers in 1992 (Gsepeli, Keri, and
Stumpf, 1994) indicated that while 71 percent of the
respondents expressed a willingness to accept refugees of
Hungarian origin, the willingness to accept refugees from Asia
was much less conspicuous: only 12 percent of the respondents
agreed that Asian immigrants should be allowed to enter
Hungary. Xenophobia might be the underlying factor which
resulted in the general tendency to avoid taking part in
demonstrations for minority rights. According to the results of
a study among fourteen year old Hungarian students and
Hungarian adults, latent patterns of xenophobia and racism
were revealed (see Table 1). Respondents of both samples were
addressed by a question which targeted their attitudes toward
strangers of different ethnic and racial origin. They had to
select possible informal partners among members of the
following groups: Gypsies, Arabs, Romanians, Chinese, Russians, Jews, ethnic Hungarians coming from Romania,
Slovakians, and Germans.
Avoidance and refusal characterized the negative choices of
TABLE

I. Negative sociometric preference for members of

various ethnic groups among Hungarian adults and
children

Gypsy
Arab
Romanian
Chinese
Russian
Jew

Ethnic Hungarian from Romania

Slovakian
German
No refusal
Number of respondents

Adult sample

Teenager sample

74

30
25
23
15
14

58
26
40
21
35
28
8
31
11
26

N = 1000

N - 4248

52
51
48
40

268

SOCIAL RESEARCH

latter have to prove only I year residence. The substantially

revised Hungarian constitution proclaimed Hungary as a
republic rtiled by law. The constitution guarantees separation
of powers, protects human rights, and established for the first
time in Hungarian history the Constittitional Cotirt, which has
the power to atiiiihilate any law proved to be anticonstitutional.

Xenophobia and Racism

Hungarians are having to deal increasingly with minorities

within their own state. Hungarian Jews are among these
minorities who had the most tragic fate. They were highly
assimilated into society prior to World War II, constituting one
of the major forces of modernization. This role, however, was
perceived with suspicion and distrust by the non-Jewish middle
class because of competition, xenophobia, and economic
frustration on behalf of the peasantry and urban proletarians.
Following the German occtipation of Hungary in March 1944,
600,000 Jews were executed or deported. Hungarian society
has never been able to recover from this trauma and shadows
of the Holocaust still haunt large numbers of citizens of Jewish
origin (approximately 100,000) living in Hungary.
The Gypsies form another important minority in Hungary,
but while Jews were typically perceived as belonging to the
elite, Gypsies have generally been perceived as constituting the
lowest level of society. There were two representative
investigations of the Gypsy population in Hungary. In 1971,
their number was approximately 320,000. According to the
study carried out in 1993-1994, their number had reached
500,000. Within this period, the total population of the
country had decreased from 10,322,000 to 10,278,000. These
numbers mean that while the country's population decreased,
the gypsy population increased, and there are estimates
indicating ftirther increase in the gypsy population. Poor.

HUNGARIAN NATIONALISM

269

uneducated, socially deprived Gypsies have been victims of

political, cultural, and economic discrimination. They became
especially affected by the negative effects of economic
transition from planned economy to market economy. While
in state socialism they were employed in semi-skilled industrial
jobs, with the disappearance of huge state-owned industrial
plants, they were the first to lose jobs and were forced into
ghettos. Negative attitudes toward gypsies are reinforced by
their minotity status stemming from cultural distiiutiveness
and the percei\ed high frequency of deviant beluuior among
them such as delinquency and prostitution (Havas and
Kemeny, 1995).
In addition, the population of Hungary includes Germans.
Slovaks. Serbs. Croats, Slovenians, and Romanians. Assimilation tendencies among minorities are very strong. Following
the end of the Second Word War. many Germans were forced
to leave the country due to their allegedly Nazi activity
{Volksbund Germans), and the most conscious members of the
Slovak community volunteered in the nationality exchange
program with Czechoslovakia. As a result, 200,000 Germans,
100,000 Slovaks, 30,000 Croats, 10,0(W Serbs, 5,000 Romanians, and 4,000 Slovenians inhabit Hungary, and most of
them are scattered around the country, living in small rural
communities. These ethnic minorities are encouraged by the
Act of Minorities to form associations and institutions of local
government based on cultural autonomy. Moreover, the
Constitution has special provisions for the protection of
national and ethnic mitiority rights.
Post-communism brought Hungary to a cross-road: from
the opening of the borders to the liberalization of the state, this
country has assumed a different role in Furope. This situation
effected refugee and migration pt)licies in particular as well as
the whole society in general. During state socialism there was
constant emigration process from Hungary to the West
(although annually the total number was modest). After 1989
this process has stopped, and instead of sending reftigees.

270

SOCIAL RESEARCH

Hungarian society has become a target of population

movements from the East. Moreover, due to its geographic
location, Hungary became a transit country; migrants cross
Hungary on their way to the West. As a result, refugee camps
had to be established which provoked hostility and xenophobia
among the population. Those who decided to stay in the
country can be classified into two types: ethnic Hungarians
arriving from Transylvania, Trans-Karpatia, and Serbia, and
those who have no cultural or linguistic attachment to
Hungarian ethnicity. Interestingly enotigh, public attitudes
toward immigrants became increasingly similar and equally
negative toward both types of immigrants. Xenophobia is on
the rise in the country. The basis of this xenophobic attitude,
however, is not embedded in ethnic or national principle of
selection, but on citizenship. Xenophobia among Hungarian
citizens is motivated by frustration connected with the
perception of enhanced competition in the labor market for
jobs and the sense of discrimination in the social services.
Between 1988 and 1992, 99.2 percent (117,549 of 118,464) of
the refugees arrived from three countries: Yugoslavia,
Romania, and the former Soviet Union. In 1992 alone, 16,204
refugees arrived in Hungary, and 36 percent of these refugees
claimed they were Hungarians."*
Surveys on national auto- and hetero-stereotypes were
conducted continuously in the 1980s and 1990s. The events of
1989 and 1990 have not infiuenced the general thought, which
can be summarized as follows: (1) respondents have shown
much more activity in self-stereotyping as compared to the
willingness to produce hetero-stereotypes; (2) national autostereotypes refer more frequently to positive trades, such as
hospitality, pride of being Hungarian, and uniqueness of
national character; (S) hetero-stereotypes concerning tbe
neighboring nations are all negative except toward the
Austrians; (4) the historical tendency to evaluate Poles has
considerably declined.
Results of three recent sttidies should be mentioned in terms

HUNGARIAN NATIONALISM

271

of the prevalence of tacism in Hungary. A representative

survey of Hungarian teenagers in 1992 (Csepeh, K^ri, and
Stumpf, 1994) indicated that while 71 percent of the
respondents expressed a willingness to accept refugees of
Hungarian origin, the willingness to accept refugees from Asia
was much less conspicuous: only 12 percent of the respondents
agreed that Asian immigrants should be allowed to enter
Hungary. Xenophobia might be the underlying factor which
resulted in the general tendency to avoid taking part in
demonstrations for minority rights. According to the results of
a study among fourteen year old Hungarian students and
Hungarian adults, latent patterns of xenophobia and racism
were revealed (see Table 1). Respondents of both samples were
addressed by a question which targeted their attitudes toward
strangers of different ethnic and racial origin. They had to
select possible informal partners among members of the
following groups: Gypsies, Arabs, Romanians, Chinese, Russians. Jews, ethnic Hungarians coming from Romania,
Slovakians, and Germans.
Avoidance and refusal characterized the negative choices of
TABLE

1. Negative sociometric preference for members of

various ethnic groups among Hungarian adults and
children

Gypsy
Arab
Romanian
Chinese
Russian
Jew

Ethnic Hungarian from Romania

Slovakian
German
No refusal
Number of respondents

Adult sample

Teenager sample

74
52
51
48
40
30
25
23
15
14

58
26
40
21
35
28
8
31
11
26

N = 1000

N = 4248

272

SOCIAL RESEARCH

both groups. Adults, however, expressed more avoidance than

the teenagers. As Table 1 demonstrates, 26 percent of the
teens showed no negative preference for any ethnic or racial
groups in the list, while this tendency was much weaker among
the adults (14 percent). Gypsies were targets of refusal in both
groups (Szabo and Orkeny, 1995).

Empirical Studies of National Identity

Since 1969 in Hungary, research on national identity has

been conducted with various samples of children, youth, and
nationwide groups (Csepeli, 1989; L^zar, 1995). These
investigations demonstrate that national sentiment and affective components of national identity are pronounced. In light
of the repressive nature of the political and ideological system,
these results are hardly surprising because, generally speaking,
all aspects of social identity, such as religion, region, class, and
even gender, were repressed or channeled according to the
official patterns of identification. Forced identification with
Patriotic Front, Proletariat of the World, and Socialist
Brotherhood of Nations were not strong enough psychologically to have mass appeal. However, in light of the heavy
emphasis by authorities on internationalism, these results are
remarkable.
Investigations among the Hungarian intellectual elite in
1983 and 1989 (Csepeli, 1992) show a twofold pattern of
national identity. The Gesellschaft type centers around citizenship and the image of the nation as a political community,
while the Gemeinschaft type focuses more on descent and
mother tongue, reflecting a more traditional, cultural image of
the nation. Following the collapse of the state socialist system in
19891990, these patterns have been translated into powerful
political slogans attracting different constituencies who increasingly perceive each other with hostility, distrust, and
suspicion. The parties in power between 1990-94 were heavily

HUNGARIAN NATIONALISM

273

infltienced by the Gemeinschaft type of national idiom. They

tried to orient popular attention toward the issues of national
symbols and Hungarian national minorities abroad; generally,
they tended to perceive themselves in terms of tradition and
national continuity which they believed had been interrupted
by the international ideology of the state-socialist system for
forty-five years. The majority of voters, however, followed a
different course, and in the second free elections held in May
1994 they voted for those parties which had shown more
moderation in their claims of representing all Hungarians in
the Carpathian basin and which had shown more concern for
economic issues, such as unemployment and taxation, social
policy, anci international issues such as negotiation with
governments of the neighboring nations.
The last domestic research on Hungarian national identity
was conducted in the fall of 1994 (Vasarhelyi, 1995). These
results showed no significant change from the results of earlier
research. Only 5 percent of the national representative sample
(n 1000) expressed concern on the issue of national identity.
Interest in the definition of a "real patriot" was equally weak (4
percent). Majority opinion (59 percent) favored the statement
which stressed that "the public debate over the destiny of
Hungarians is aimed at diverting the public's attention from
discussion of more pertinent issues." People in Hungary,
however, were concerned with the possibility of getting
involved in local conflicts with at least one of the neighboring
cotuitries (Serbia was noted most frequently). Immigrants were
perceived as a threat by 5 percent. The presence of Gypsies
generated more hostility (31 percent of the respondents
considered gypsies to be a threat).
Definitions of being Hungarian did not show a dramatic
shift either. As earlier studies demonstrated, people in
post-socialist Hungary continue to define Hungarians primarily in terms of self-categorization. Conseqtiently, citizenship,
mother tongue, descent, and place of birth matter less.
According to the majority view (59 percent), the importance of

274

SOCIAL RESEARCH

mother tongue and citizenship are preceded by selfidentification, and no importance was attributed to place of
birth or descent (this pattern can be interpreted as a popular
version of the Gesellschaft idiom perpetuated by the liberal
intellectual elite). A minority (17 percent), however, maintained that descent, mother tongue, and place of birth were of
primary concern when defining Hungarian national identity.
(This pattern can be interpreted as a derivation of the
Gemeischaft idiom perpetuated by the conservative intellectual
elite.)
These two profiles are rooted in different sociological
backgrounds. Age, education, type of settlement, and socioeconomic status affect the tendency to define Hungarian
national identity in terms of liberal, Gesellschaft idiom oi
conservative, Gemeinschaft idiom. The former was supported by
those urbanized respondents who were born after 1945,
achieved higher socio-economic status, graduated from secondary school at least, and lacked the experience of social
frustration as a result of transition. Gemeinschaft orientation
was more frequent among elderly and uneducated segments of
the rural population (born before 1945 and losers of the
transition).

Mute Liberal Elite and Shunned Society

In the fall 1995, Hungary participated in a cross-national

investigation which was organized within the framework of the
International Social Survey Project (ISSP).^ Results of this
international survey are not available currently, but Hungary
can already be analyzed. A national representative sample of
1000 respondents were questioned by interviewers.
For the purpose of this article, five sets of variables seem
worthy of analysis. There were seven items concerning the
thematic composition of tiational identity. Respondents were
asked to weigh attributes, such as place of birth, citizenship.

HUNGARIAN NATIONALISM

275

place of residence, mother tongue, Christianity, approval of

democratic institutions, and national self-categorizatioti, as to
the importance of being a "trtie" Hungarian. The basic trend
does not contradict that of the previous research which we
have discussed above. Although the methods of questioning
were different (ranking versus rating), self-categorization and
mother tongue emerged in tbe ISSP research as the most
important aspects of being Hungarian. Less important were
place of residence, citizenship, and place of birth; least
important were democratic institutions and Christianity.
As a result of the cluster analyses, five groups emerged.
Table 2 shows the pattern of contribution of the seven
constittient variables to the formation of the individtial
clusters. The most numerous cluster (32 percent) contains
those respondents who were unable to select among the
variables which were offered for national identification and
instead decided to rate all of them with high values, thus
resulting in a "conformist" label. The next grotip (22 percent)
rated all variables high except for Christianity and trusting
democratic political institutions; they are labeled "liberal
nationalists" because of the high ratings giveti to cultural,
psychological, and political attributes of national identity.
The group labeled "traditional" (11 percent) gave high
ratings to mother tongue, Christianity, and self-categorization.
TABLE

2. Clusters by type of national identity (N = 1000)

(L = low, M meditmi, H high)
Bmh

1Citinsh,p

Rcs,den.e

Mol tonjiLe

Chri>.(ianity

Democracy

Scll-det'in.

Extrinsic- liberal
N = 209

.M

Traditional

N = 113
Liberal nationalist

Imrmsie liberal
N = 133

N = 219
Conformist
N = 320

276

SOCIAL RESEARCH

The first two rows of the table produce real problems oi"
interpretation as far as the "liberal" label is concerned.
Paradoxically, "conformists" and "liberal nationalists" stressed
citizenship in national identification although citizenship is
tistially lacking from the identification pattern of these twc
groups. However, the remaining attributes, such as mother
tongue, self-categorization, and trust in democratic political
institutions, refer to a kind of national identity which is rooted
in a linguistic and psychological background. One can argue
that this basis is too weak to support a coherent and conscious
Gesellschaft type of national identity. In later analyses, however,
we shall try to prove that these two groups can be considered
"spontaneous liberals" at the least. The low rating of
citizenship among respondents of these two groups can
probably be attributed to semantic connotations of the term
citizenship, which in Hungarian stresses authoritarian subject
rather than politically conscious democratic citizen. The high
rating attributed to citizenship among conformist and nationalist respondents shows that the notion of citizenship has
attained an exclusive character.
National pride was measured by six items which stressed
preference and selectivity stemming from being Hungarian.
Ninety percent of the respondents expressed pride in hearing
about the success of Hungarian athletes in international
games. Eighty-seven percent of the respondents had not seen
alternative national identification in terms of citizenship. A
majority view^ (62 percent) agreed with the classic nationalist
statement, "Right or wrong, it's my country." The opposite
state of pride is shame which is difficult to admit if one tries to
maintain a balanced attitude toward his own nation. According
to the results, only a minority (41 percent) were keen on
getting rid of the inconsistency of the national attitude. The
majority, however, was split, and only a minority (32 percent)
accepted shame as an element of national identity. Ethnocentrist statements met definitely less enthusiasm (26 percent and
25 percent).

HUNGARIAN NATIONALISM

277

Table 3 demonstrates a generally moderate tendency to

agree with the statements in the sample. On the average, 3.2
items were selected for agreement.
National pride can be sustained by various sources. Nine
possible sources of pride were listed and offered for rating as
to how they have seemed to contribute to national pride.
Ratings of Hungary's democratic system, international influence, national economic achievement, social security, and the
army showed a high correlation, generally indicating a low
level of contribution to national pride. Hungary's technical and
scholarly development, sports achievements, production of
literature and fine arts, and history also showed a high
correlation; however, in this case, it indicated a high level of
contribution to national pride.
The first five items referred to "hard" aspects of national
reality, which stressed political, social, and economic components of national existence. These components are resistant to
the national image because they can be validated empirically
and traditionally from the requisites of the rhetoric of political
nationalism. In contrast, the remaining four items reflected on
central issues of a culturally conceived national identity, such
as history, athletic achievements, literature, arts, and scholarship. These components can be considered "soft" aspects of
TABLE

3. The tendency to agree with items of national

pride (N = 1000)
36
26
30

IS
10
B

278

SOCIAL RESEARCH

national identity, leaving much room for social comparison. As

Tables 4 and 5 demonstrate, respondents tended to attribute
extremely low importance to the "hard" themes, justifying
their positive national identity, and they were much more
active in their selection of "soft" themes, rationalizing their
pride in being Hungarian.
One can ask how to interpret the contrast between the low
rating of themes forming the rhetoric of poUtical nationalism
and high rating of themes characterizing the rhetoric of
cultural nationalism. The authors argue that the presence of
this contrast can be explained by the continuity of the politics
of culture in Hungarian nation building. It remains to be seen,
however, how strong the resotirces of this historical-ideological
package are, and if there are any indications of a change
toward the formulation of national community in terms of
pohtics and liberalism.
Proneness to nationalism was measured by six items which
referred to variotis aspects of economic nationalism, antiinternationalism, cultural nationalism, and uncompromising
attitude concerning the selfish pursuit of national interest. One
of the most striking aspects of the study carried out in fall of
1995 is that Hungarians expressed an overwhelming endorsement of international agencies which, from a nationalist point
TABLE

4. Contribution of "hard" themes to national pride

(N = 1000)

20
16
10

B
0

HUNGARIAN NATIONALISM
TABLE

279

5. Contribution of "soft" themes to national pride

(N = 1000)
so
40
3fi

20
10

of view, easily might be considered as constraints on national

sovereignty. Seventy-four percent of the respondents were
willing to give up national sovereignty where global problems,
such as pollution, were concerned. Fven higher is the
proportion of those who encourage foreign language instruction in Hungarian schools (90 percent). This sober view' can be
considered an adequate symptom of adjtistment to the uniqtie
linguistic isolation of Hungarians. Globalism and internationalism seem to be leading motifs of discourse on national
existence in contemporary post-communist Hungary.
Political and ctiltural nationalism as measured by our items
(priority by administrative means given to Hungarian-made
cultural prodticts in mass communication, stubborn pursuit of
Htingarian interest in international conflicts) showed a modest
increase. Fconomic nationalism, however, showed a high
increase, reflecting strong popular resistance to foreign
economic intrusion, especially in trade and buying land (74
percent and 77 percent respectively). A main component
analysis was carried otit on items measuring economic,
p()litical. and cultural nationalism. The analysis resulted in otie
factor along which the individual items showed a high positive
correlation.
The right of ethnic and national minority groups in
Hungary was generally approved of by tbe tespondents (77

I .

280

SOCIAL RESEARCH

percent agreed with the state policy to support minorities in

defense of their own customs and traditions). This result might
refiect a general benign attitude toward minorities which
would change immediately as the minority concerned was
mentioned. As we have indicated, Gypsies are exempt from thi!
general pro-minority attitude.
Xenophobia was measured by six items which covered issues
related to the perceived assets and liabilities of exclusive and
inclusive versions of refugee policy.
As Table 6 indicates, the population is quite insensitive
toward immigrants. There is a strong tendency to disagree
with possible benefits of immigration, such as economic profit
and multiculturalism, and respondents tended to unequivocally agree with exclusionist anti-liberal ideas urging harsh
administrative procedutes (95 percent of the respondents wenr
for stricter regulation against illegal immigrants). On the
average, the sample assumed 3.6 out of 6 xenophobic attitudes.
The changing content of xenophobia which we have indicated
elsewhere was corroborated in the 1995 survey, showing;
continued readiness to exclude ethnic Hungarians from th<;
benefits of Hungarian citizenship.
In light of these results, immigrants, not surprisingly,
provoked intolerance and hostility. The majority endorsed the
policy aimed at reducing the number of immigrants coming to
Hungary (84 percent). Public opinion, however, was split over
TABLE

6. The tendency to agree with xenophobic items

(N = 1000)

20
IB

10
9

HUNGARIAN NATIONALISM

281

the issue of immigrants fleeing political persecution. Thirtyfive percent of the respondents expressed a willingness to
grant asylutn for these people, and 24 percent rejected this
proposal (40 percent hesitated).
Cross-tabulation of the national identity clusters and the
measures of national consciousness which we have discussed
above supports our hypothesis concerning the liberal character
of the first cltister. This group shows the lowest valties of
nationalist, xenophobic, and intolerant attitudes. The fifth
cluster can be seen as the opposite of the first one. The
remaining three cltisters are shifting between liberal and
anti-liberal versions of national identification.
Nevertheless, respondents on the whole cannot Ix^ characterized by a consistent ideological profile of national identification.
Multiple regression analysis has shown that membership in
cluster 1 (intrinsic liberals) significantly correlates with
education: tbe higher the level of education, the greater the
likelihood of belonging to this cluster. Clusters 2, 3, and 4, due
to their inconsistencies, did not manifest any significant
relationship to age, education, or gender. Cluster 5, however,
showed a significant relationship to age and education: elderly
and less educated people tended to belong to this anti-liberal
group.
TABLE

7. National identity clusters and measures of national

consciousness

Inirinsjc liberal
N = 133
Extrinsic liberal
N = 209
Traditional
N = n?
Liberal naiionalisi
N = 219
Conformisi
N = 3211

Pride
(mean)

Hard'
themes
(mean i

Soft'
themes
(meani

Nationalism
(faciorsfore)

Xenophobia
1 mean)

Tuierante
<nieun|

2.8

0.3

.1,1

-0.43

3.2

4.2

3.1

0,4

3.1

-0.05

3.6

4.4

3.0

0.4

2.7

-0.05

3.4

4.4

2.9

0.4

2.9

-0.19

3.5

4.4

1 7

(t ^

:? N

+ 11 Ml

45

282

SOCIAL RESEARCH

The results of the 1995 survey are snapshots which, of

course, are rooted in the historical antecedents mentioned in
the first parts of this article. A more immediate antecedent it
the transition process from state socialism to democracy. The
intellectual elite, which fought for the political and economic
change, was united in anti-state socialist programs, but there
were marked differences among them concerning the practical
means of realization. Liberals and nationalists had conflicting
political programs. In the first free election held in the spring
of 1990, nationalist rhetoric attracted the majority of the
voters, and a conservative nationalist government came into
power. Disenchantment soon followed, and it is up tc
discordant political evaluation whether it can be attributed to
social frustration stemming from the vague attempts tc
introduce market economy or ideological discontent caused by
the nationalist ideological crusade against adherents of liberal
and socialist parties, who were accused of being aliens in the
national community as defined by ethno-nationalist terms.
Empirical sociological investigations of public attitudes
between 1990 and 1994 have shown the increase of latent state
socialist nostalgia which consequently led to the victory of the
Socialist Party in the second free election held in 1994. The
defeat of nationalist rhetoric was approved by the liberal elite,
which entered into an alliance with the winning Socialist Party.
The latter entered the coalition hoping for international
recognition and legitimation by an alliance with the former,
which had an outstanding reputation stemming from its past
opposition to state socialism.
The society, however, was less concerned with the changing
fronts of the political and ideological battleground and
continued to be inconsistent and hesitant in major issues o(
nationalism, liberalism, and socialism. A slow modernization of
national identity was on the way which has been clearly
manifested in the empirical part of our article. This
modernization process has its own inconsistencies. On the one
hand, strong economic nationalism and xenophobia are the

HUNGARIAN NATIONALISM

283

major featuies of the new transition period, and, on the other

hand, a willingness to accept multiculturalism and to adjust to
the challenges of globalism emerged. Most paradoxically,
citizenship, which in the strict political sense would constitute
the center of the nation coticeived as political community, has
absorbed the ethno-nationalist connotation, which has lost its
historically encoded aggressive potential. The new Hungarian
national identity is looming on the horizon of selfcategorization which continues to be unorganized, controversial, and vague.

Notes
' The agreement was reached by the Hungarian political ruling
elite and the Viennese imperial bureaucracy, resulting in the
establishment of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy.
'^ According to our survey on national identity conducted in the fall
of 1995, 54 percent of the respt)ndents of a national representative
sample in Hinigary held the view ihal borders between countries of
Central and Eastern Europe cannot be subject to change under any
circumstances, and 46 percent thought that the borders can be
changed pro\ ided there is approval of the population concerned.
^ See Fullerton. Sik, Toth, 1995.
^ The data which will be demonstrated and interpreted in this
article came from a study supported by the Hungarian National
Science Eoiuidation.

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