Hungary is a parliamentary republic of Eastern Europe, born in 1918 from the ashes of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The Trianon Treaty, signed in 1920 by the victorious countries of the First World War, outlined the current borders, reducing the surface of the country from 288,000 to 93,000 square kilometers and the population from 12.6 million to 7.6 million. The question of Hungarian minorities in Central and Eastern Europe – in Romania, the Czech Republic and Slovakia – is still a source of regional tensions and a subject of internal political debate. Having definitively lost, with the dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, its political and cultural centrality in Europe, Hungary participated in the Second World War as a secondary actor. Initially engaged alongside Nazi Germany with the aim of recovering the territories lost in 1920, Hungary was subsequently occupied by the Germans and finally liberated by the Soviet Red Army. The Soviet influence materialized in the victory of the Communist Party (1947) and in the opening of a phase of reforms of a statist matrix, of Soviet inspiration. The authoritarian aspect of pro-Soviet politics soon prevailed over the populist rhetoric of international communism, irreversibly undermining the broad consensus obtained in the immediate postwar period. In the autumn of 1956, a large part of Hungarian civil society rose up against the regime and the country sanctioned its international neutrality, announcing the exit from the Warsaw Pact. The USSR sent troops to Hungary to suppress popular uprisings. leadership politics attentive to the demands put forward by civil society and ready to interpret the political and economic opportunities offered by the Western world. From the 1960s onwards, Prime Minister János Kádár embarked on a slow but inexorable process of reforms that allowed Hungary one of the most dynamic economic development in Comecon. The salient aspects of this political path were the granting of new rights to workers, the gradual opening to the Western market, internal economic decentralization and, above all, an active foreign policy. In 1973, Hungary had access to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) – which later became the World Trade Organization (WTO) – and, in 1982, to the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank. For Hungary 2009, please check hyperrestaurant.com.
With the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact and the Comecon (1991), Hungary started a new political phase of democratization based on a regular alternation of government. Furthermore, the dissolution of the USSR and the end of bipolarism allowed Hungary to deepen economic cooperation and political dialogue with Western European partners and the United States, while consolidating relations with other satellite countries. of the Soviet Union. The Visegrád Pact, a platform for dialogue and cooperation between Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Hungary, is the clearest example of this. Also born with a view to favoring the joint entry of its members into the European Union (Eu) – which happened, for Hungary, in 2004 – the Visegrád Group today constitutes an important forum for the coordination of the Community policies of these countries. It is no coincidence that Hungary – which is not part of the eurozone, but which signed the Schengen Convention – during the rotating presidency of the EU, held in the first half of 2011, gave ample space to regional issues.
On the domestic political front, the government is led by Viktor Orbán, leader of the center-right Fidesz-Hungarian Civic Union (Fidesz-Magyar Polgári Szövetség) party. Since taking office in 2010, the government of Orbán (former premier from 1998 to 2002) has passed a series of laws restricting the freedom of the media, as well as political and civil liberties. For this reason, Hungary has been subject to formal recalls from the EU, which intensified after some constitutional amendments were introduced in March 2013. These concerned in particular: the downsizing of the powers of the Constitutional Court, which will no longer be able to raise substantive objections and which will no longer be able to annul a law approved with two thirds of the parliament; new restrictions for political parties in relation to conducting the election campaign through the national media; granting state grants to students only if they commit to work in Hungary after graduation; the introduction of fines and prison sentences for the homeless; a redefinition of the concept of family which excludes unmarried couples, those without children and those made up of people of the same sex. The turning point in a more authoritarian sense was also preceded by the definitive nationalization of Magyar Nemzety Bank (Mnb), the country’s central bank. The political elections of April 6, 2014 have decreed The turning point in a more authoritarian sense was also preceded by the definitive nationalization of Magyar Nemzety Bank (Mnb), the country’s central bank. The political elections of April 6, 2014 have decreed The turning point in a more authoritarian sense was also preceded by the definitive nationalization of Magyar Nemzety Bank (Mnb), the country’s central bank. The political elections of April 6, 2014 have decreed a new success for the ruling party Fidesz, which obtained 44% of the votes (-8.2% compared to 2010). The ultra-nationalist, anti-Semitic and anti-Roma party of extreme right Jobbik is growing, which with 20% of the votes has become the third political force behind the center-left coalition Unity.
