Liberalization Challenges in Hungary Elitism, Progressivism, and Populism

by Korkut, Umut

• ISBN13: 9780230114593
• ISBN10: 0230114598
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2012-06-19
• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan

Summary

An examination of the problem of liberalisation in the Central and East European (CEE) states, this book explores two related research questions: why has the course of political liberalisation in the CEE states failed to construct an organic link between democratic institutions and the public? and how has the economic liberalisation narrative of the liberalising elite excluded the public? Subsequently, the book investigates the conditions under which post-accession liberalisation comes to a halt in countries once praised by the Democratisation and Europeanization literatures for their pace of reform. Particular emphasis is on the comparative aspects of research, placing Hungary in context amongst the new EU member states such as Poland, Slovenia, and Slovakia and examining trends over time.

Author Biography

Umut Korkut is a lecturer at Glasgow School for Business and Society in Glasgow Caledonian University. He received his PhD from Central European University in Budapest in 2004. The Turkish Higher Education Council awarded him "Doent" status in 2009. He has published extensively on Hungarian politics, democratic transition, liberalization, gender rights, and civil society in journals including Social Politics, Parliamentary Affairs, Economic and Industrial Democracy, Nationalities Papers, Totalitarian Movements and Political Religions, and East European Quarterly. Currently, he is working on a new project investigating the construction of gender, family, and population issues in mosque sermons in Turkey using the method of discursive institutionalism.

Table of Contents

"Korkut's careful case study of the challenges of liberalization in a transitioning democracy, in this case Hungary, illustrates exactly how and why detailed examination and attention to historical legacies and national specificity is absolutely necessary to the wider literature on democratization. His bleak and central contention—that democratization and liberalization do not necessarily cohere and may indeed undermine one another if they fail to generate mutually beneficial conditions for existence—will generate sober reflection on the part of political scientists, historians, and policymakers alike. For this reason, this is much more than a book about the Hungarian experience; it functions as an elegantly reasoned wake-up call to all concerned about how political liberalism has been democratically undermined in 21st century polities coping with economic crisis, rising inequality, ethnic tension, and nationalist populism, and how democracies in turn have been eroded by neoliberal prescriptions for economic growth and stability." - Barbara J. Falk, associate professor, Canadian Forces College