The Hungarian Radical Right and Its Transformation: from MIEP to Mi Hazánk

Attila Gökhun Dayıoğlu

doi:10.36484/liberal.1586918

EN TR

The Hungarian Radical Right and Its Transformation: from MIEP to Mi Hazánk

Abstract

This article examines the evolution of Hungary’s radical right through three key parties: The Hungarian Justice and Life Party (MIEP), Jobbik and the Our Homeland Movement (Mi Hazánk). Founded in the early-1990s, MIEP’s extreme nationalist and anti-establishment rhetoric declined as it failed to adapt to the new system, creating space for Jobbik’s rise in the 2000s, with its aggressive nationalist appeal targeting young, disaffected voters. In the mid-2010s, Jobbik’s strategic shift toward moderation alienated its core supporters, leading to the formation of Mi Hazánk in 2018 by former members seeking to reclaim hardline nationalism and social conservatism. Through a comparative analysis of these parties’ ideological trajectories, the article highlights the adaptability and persistent appeal of radical right ideologies in Hungary. Findings suggest that internal party dynamics and shifting voter alignments are central to the resilience of radical right movements in post-communist Europe, shaping Hungary’s political landscape.

Keywords

radical right , hungary , political transformation , ideological shift , party evolution

Macar Radikal Sağı ve Dönüşümü: MIEP’ten Mi Hazánk’a

Öz

Bu makale Macaristan’ın radikal sağının evrimini üç temel parti üzerinden incelemektedir: Macar Adalet ve Yaşam Partisi (MIEP), Jobbik ve Vatanımız Hareketi (Mi Hazánk). 1990’ların başında kurulan MIEP’in aşırı milliyetçi ve düzen karşıtı söylemi, yeni sisteme uyum sağlayamadığı için gerilemiş ve 2000’lerde genç, hoşnutsuz seçmenleri hedef alan agresif milliyetçi cazibesiyle Jobbik’in yükselişi için alan yaratmıştır. Jobbik’in 2010’ların ortasında ılımlılığa doğru stratejik kayması çekirdek destekçilerini yabancılaştırmış ve 2018’de sert milliyetçiliği ve sosyal muhafazakarlığı geri kazanmak isteyen eski üyeler tarafından Mi Hazánk’ın kurulmasına yol açmıştır. Bu partilerin ideolojik yörüngelerinin karşılaştırmalı bir analizi yoluyla makale, Macaristan’daki radikal sağ ideolojilerin uyarlanabilirliğini ve kalıcı çekiciliğini vurgulamaktadır. Bulgular, parti içi dinamiklerin ve değişen seçmen hizalanmalarının, komünizm sonrası Avrupa’da radikal sağ hareketlerin dayanıklılığının merkezinde yer aldığını ve Macaristan’ın siyasi manzarasını şekillendirdiğini göstermektedir.

Anahtar Kelimeler

radikal sağ , macaristan , siyasi dönüşüm , ideolojik değişim , parti evrimi

Kaynakça

Aras, İ. and Sağıroğlu, A. (2018). Avrupa aşırı sağında göçmen karşıtlığı: Fransa ve Macaristan örnekleri. Mukaddime, 9(1), 59-77.
Bernath, G, Miklosi, G. and Mudde, C. (2005). Hungary. Cas Mudde (Ed.). in Racist extremism in Central and Eastern Europe (p.74-93). London: Routledge.
Biro-Nagy, A. and Boros, T. (2016). Jobbik going mainstream: Strategy shift of the far-right in Hungary. Jerome Jamin (Ed.). in L’Extrême droite en Europe (p.243-264). Bruylant.
Bobek, B. (2017). Ideology of the Hungarian far right on the example of Jobbik, the movement for a better Hungary. Studia nad Bezpieczenstwem, 2(9), 201-213.
Böcskei, B. and Molnar, C. (2019). The radical right in government? Jobbik’s pledges in Hungary’s legislation (2010-2014). East European Politics, 35(1), 1-20.
Bozóki, A. (2014). Liberalisation challenges in Hungary: elitism, progressivism and populism. New York: Macmillan.
Bozóki, A. (2016). Mainstreaming the far-right cultural politics in Hungary. Revue d’Études Comparatives Est-Ouest, 47(4), 87-116.
Bradford, S. and Cullen, F. (2021). Populist myths and ethno-nationalist fears in Hungary. M. Devries, J. Bessant and R. Watts (Ed.). in Rise of the far right: technologies of recruitment and mobilization (p.41-62). London: The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing.
Buda, P. and Gabor, G. (2007). Metafora es küldetestudat a jobboldal politikai antimodernizmusa. Ele es Irodalom, 51.
Buzogany, A. (2017). Illiberal democracy in Hungary: authoritarian diffusion or domestic causation? Democratisation, 24(7), 1307-1325.

Carter, E. (2018). Right-wing extremism/radicalism: reconstructing the concept. Journal of Political Ideologies, 23(2), 157-182.
Csomor, G. (2015). Right-wing extremism in Hungary. Budapest Institute for Policy Analysis.
Cwejman, A. (2013). Failure after success: a study of extreme right party failure in Eastern Europe (MA diss.). University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg.
Dayıoğlu, A. G. (2023). Macaristan’da radikal sağ: popülist radikal sağ politikaların ana akımlaşması. İstanbul: Tasam Yayınları.
Dohnanyi, K., Gelencser, A. and Hegedüs, D. (2015). Hungary in media, 2010-2014: critical reflections on coverage in the press and media; final report of the working group on Hungary. Berlin: Forschungsinstitut der Deutschen Gesellschaft für Auswartige Politik.
Fazekas, R. and Korkut, U. (2023). Mainstreaming, gender and communication: Hungary country report. De-Radicalisation in Europe and Beyond.
Finchelstein, F. and Bosoer, F. (2013, 18 December). Is fascism returning to Europe? https://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/19/opinion/is-fascism-returning-to-europe.html.
Gera, M. (2023). Here, the Hungarian people will decide how to raise our children: populist rhetoric and social categorization in Viktor Orbán’s anti-LGBTQ campaign in Hungary. New Perspectives, 31(2), 104-129.
Goldstein, A. (2021). Right-wing opposition to the mainstream radical right: the cases of Hungary and Poland. Journal of Contemporary Central and Eastern Europe, 29(1), 23-40.
Gyollai, D. (2021). Trends of radicalisation: Hungary/3.2 research report. DeRadicalisation in Europe and Beyond.
Havlik, V. and Hlousek, V. (2024). Where have all the ‘exiters’ gone? Contextualising the concept of hard euroscepticism. Journal of Common Market Studies, 1-18.
Jakli, L. (2024). East-Central Europe: the young and the far-right. Journal of Democracy, 35(2), 65-79.
Jost, J. and Kende, A. (2020). Setting the record straight: system justification and rigidity of the right in contemporary Hungarian politics. International Journal of Psychology, 55, 96-115.
Juhasz, A. (2016, 06 July). Hungary: migration trends and political dynamics. https://www.politicalcapital.hu/hirek.php?article_read=1&article_id=2210/.
Kafkadesk. (2019, 28 March). Hungary’s unwavering opposition to migrants and refugees. https://kafkadesk.org/2019/03/28/hungary-unwavering-opposition-to-migrants-and-refugees-in-figures/.
Kallis, A. (2019). Islamophobia and radical right in Europe: nostalgia or alternative utopia. I. Zempi and I. Awan (Ed.). in Routledge international handbook of islamophobia. New York: Routledge.
Karacsony, G. and Rona, D. (2011). The secret of Jobbik: reasons behind the rise of the Hungarian radical right. Journal of East European and Asian Studies, 2(1), 61-92.
Kiss, B. and Zahoran, C. (2007). Hungarian domestic policy in foreign policy. International Issues & Slovak Foreign Policy Affairs, 16(2), 46-64.
Kondor, K. and Littler, M. (2020). Invented nostalgia: the search for identity among the Hungarian far-right. C. Norocel; A. Hellström and M. Jorgensen (Ed.). in Nostalgia and hope: intersections between politics of culture, welfare and migration in Europe (p.119-134). Springer Open.
Kopecky, P. and Mudde, C. (2002). The two sides of euroscepticism: party positions on European integration in East Central Europe. European Union Politics, 3(3), 297-326.
Korkut, U. (2012). Liberalisation challenges in Hungary: elitism, progressivism and populism. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Körösenyi, A. (2018). The theory and practice of plebiscitary leadership: Weber and the Orbán regime. East European Politics and Societies and Cultures, 20(10), 1-22.
Kovacs, A. (2013). The post-communist extreme right: the Jobbik party in Hungary. R. Wodak, M. Khosravinik and B. Mral (Ed.). in Right-wing populism in Europe: politics and discourse, (p.223-234). Bloomsbury Publishing.
Kovalcsik, T. and Bodi, M. (2023). Geographical realignment of the Hungarian voting behaviour between 2014 and 2022. Modern Geografia, 18(1), 59-77.
Kowalczyk, M. (2017). Hungarian Turanism. From the birth of the ideology to modernity: A outline of the problem. Historia i Polityka, 27(20), 49-63.
Kreko, P. and Juhasz, A. (2015). Desperate search for the lost popularity: governmental campaign against refugees and migrants in Hungary. Budapest: Friedrich Ebert Stiftung.
Kreko, P. and Mayer, G. (2015). Transforming Hungary – together? An analysis of the Fidesz-Jobbik relationship. M. Minkenberg (Ed.). in Transforming the transformation? The East European radical right in the political process (p.183-205). Routledge.
Kyriazi, A. (2022). Ukrainian refugees in Hungary: government measures and discourse in the first year of the war. SSRN Electronic Journal.
Metelkina, S. (2018). Laszlo Toroczkai: we can save Europe from migrants-Asotthalom is a good example. https://www.geopolitica.ru/en/article/laszlo-toroczkai-we-can-save-europe-migrants-asotthalom-good-example/.
Mudde, C. (2007). Populist radical right parties in Europe. Cambridge University Press.
Mudde, C. (2017). Populism: an ideational approach. C. R. Kaltwasser, P. Taggart, P. O. Espejo and P. Ostiguy (Ed.). in The Oxford handbook of populism, (p.27-47). Oxford University Press.
Müller, J-W. (2016). What is populism? University of Pennsylvania Press.
Murer, S. (2015). The rise of Jobbik, populism and the symbolic politics of illiberalism in contemporary Hungary. The Polish Quarterly of International Affairs, 24(2), 79-102.
Nagy, B., Boros, T. and Vasali, Z. (2013). More radical than the radicals: the Jobbik party in international comparison. R. Melzer and S. Serafin (Ed.). in Right-wing extremism in Europe: county analyses, counter-strategies and labour-market oriented exit strategies. Friedrich Ebert Stiftung.
Neumayer, L. (2008). Euroscepticism as a political label: the use of European Union issues in political competitions in the new member states. European Journal of Political Research, 47(2), 135-160.
Oross, D. and Tap, P. (2021). Moving online: political parties and the internal use of digital tools in Hungary. European Societies, 25(2), 246-370.
Our Homeland Movement. (2018). Alapító Nyilatkozat. https://mihazank.hu/alapito-nyilatkozat/.
Özoflu, A. and Arato, K. (2024). Perceptions of Hungarian political elites of the EU’s foreign and security policy during the war in Ukraine. B. Troncota, A. Özçelik and R. Cucuta (Ed.). in Reconfiguring EU peripheries: political elites, contestation and geopolitical shifts (p.33-54). Helsinki University Press.
Ozorai, F. (2018). Can theories of mainstreaming travel from west to east? A comparative study of the French National Front and Jobbik Movement for a Better Hungary (MA diss.). CEU Department of Political Science.
Palaguta, N. and Kurowicka, A. (2016). Electoral system and election outcomes in Hungary, 1990-2014. J. Dubrow and N. Palaguta, (Ed.). in Towards electoral control in Central and Eastern Europe (p.207-216). Warsaw: IFIS Publishers.
Pirro, A. (2014). Populist radical right parties in Central and Eastern Europe: the different context and issues of the prophets of Patria. Government and Opposition, 49(4), 599-628.
Pirro, A. and Róna, D. (2019). Far-right activism in Hungary: youth participation in Jobbik and its network. European Societies, 21(4), 603-626.
Pop-Eleches, G. (2010). Throwing out the bums: protest voting and unorthodox parties after communism. World Politics, 62(2), 221-260.
Pytlas, B. (2015). Radical right-wing parties in Central and Eastern Europe. Mainstream party competition and electoral fortune. Routledge.
Redai, D. (2024). Leave our kids alone. Child protection, sex education, LGBT+ rights and anti-gender politics in Hungary. A. Holvikivi, B. Holzberg and T. Ojeda (Ed.). in Transnational anti-gender politics: feminist solidarity in times of global attacks (p.141-160). Springer International Publishing.
Rudas, T. (2010). A Jobbik törzsszavazoirol. Budapest: TARKI, 512-526.
Schulteis, E. (2018). How Hungary’s far-right extremists became warm and fuzzy. https://foreignpolicy.com/2018/04/06/how-hungarys-far-right-extremists-became-warm-and-fuzzy/.
Sikk, A. (2012). Newness as a winning formula for new political parties. Party Politics, 18(4), 465-486.
Sitter, N. (1999). The East Central European party systems: the development of competitive politics in a comparative politics perspective (PhD diss.). London School of Economics and Political Science.
Štětka, V. and Mihelj, S. (2024). Media trust and news consumption in the illiberal public sphere. The illiberal public sphere: media in polarised societies. Cham: Springer Nature Switzerland, 87-117.
Szabados, K. (2015). The particularities and uniqueness of Hungary’s Jobbik. G. Charalambous (Ed.). in The European far-right: historical and contemporary perspectives (p.49-57). Friedrich Ebert Stiftung.
Szelenyi, I. and Csillag, T. (2015). Drifting from liberal democracy: traditional/neo-conservative ideology of managed illiberal democratic capitalism in post-communist Europe. Intersections, 1(1): 1-31.
Szigeti, T. (2018). Far-right Toroczkai announces new ‘Platform’ within Jobbik, threatens party split. Hungary Today.
Szöcs, L. (1998). A tale of the unexpected: the extreme right vis-a-vis democracy in post-communist Hungary. Ethnic and Racial Studies, 21(6), 1096-1115.
Thorleifsson, C. (2017). Disposable strangers: far-right securitisation of forced migration in Hungary. Social Anthropology, 25(3), 318-334.
Toka, G. (2019a). The 2018 Hungarian national elections. Social Report, 314-340.
Toka, G. (2019b). Hungary: a paradoxical episode under electoral authoritarianism. L. Sio, M. Franklin and L. Russo (Ed.). in The European Parliament elections of 2019 (p.161-165). Luiss University Press.
Toth, A. and Grajczjar, I. (2015). The rise of radical right in Hungary. P. Krasztev and J. Til (Ed.). in The Hungarian patient: social opposition to an illiberal democracy (p.133-164). CEU Press.
Tremlett, A. and Messing, V. (2015). Hungary’s future: anti-immigration, anti-multiculturalism and anti-Roma? https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/hungarys-future-antiimmigration-antimulticulturalism-and-antiro/.
Uitz, R. (2008). Hungary. G. Meseznikov, O. Gyarfasova and D. Smilov (Ed.). in Populist politics and liberal democracy in Central and Eastern Europe (p.37-69). Institute for Public Affairs.
Vachudova, A. and Hooghe, L. Euroscepticism after communism. Causes and consequences of euroskepticism. Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam.
Varga, M. (2014). Hungary’s ‘anti-capitalist’ far-right: Jobbik and the Hungarian Guard. The Journal of Nationalism and Ethnicity, 42(5), 791–807.
Vékony, D. (2019). Country Report: Hungary. European University Institute.
Walker, N. (2022). Hungary: 2022 General Election. London: House of Commons Library, Research Briefing.

Ayrıntılar

Birincil Dil

İngilizce

Konular

Avrupa ve Bölge Çalışmaları , Karşılaştırmalı Siyasi Hareketler

Bölüm

Araştırma Makalesi

Yazarlar

Attila Gökhun Dayıoğlu ^*
0000-0001-7197-1670
Türkiye

Erken Görünüm Tarihi

18 Nisan 2025

Yayımlanma Tarihi

21 Mart 2025

Gönderilme Tarihi

17 Kasım 2024

Kabul Tarihi

9 Şubat 2025

Yayımlandığı Sayı

Yıl 2025 Sayı: 117

DOI

https://doi.org/10.36484/liberal.1586918

IZ

https://izlik.org/JA43BE38LE

APA

Dayıoğlu, A. G. (2025). The Hungarian Radical Right and Its Transformation: from MIEP to Mi Hazánk. Liberal Düşünce Dergisi, 117, 185-207. https://doi.org/10.36484/liberal.1586918

The Hungarian Radical Right and Its Transformation: from MIEP to Mi Hazánk

Abstract

Keywords

Macar Radikal Sağı ve Dönüşümü: MIEP’ten Mi Hazánk’a

Öz

Anahtar Kelimeler

Kaynakça

Ayrıntılar

Birincil Dil

Konular

Bölüm

Yazarlar

Erken Görünüm Tarihi

Yayımlanma Tarihi

Gönderilme Tarihi

Kabul Tarihi

Yayımlandığı Sayı

DOI

IZ

Kaynak Göster