Nationalism

It’s not only the language and resetting of the agenda that the ruling parties of Hungary and Poland have in common. However, they do not mirror each other either.

In the anti-immigrant narrative, immigration itself is not the key problem. Hungary is a good case in point.

Three elements seem to have played a decisive role in this: voluntary servitude, the Polish brand of inferiority complex, and a deep-seated Polish anti-Semitism and more general exclusivism.

Why did the collapse of neoliberalism lead to this right-wing populist wave fuelling xenophobia? Neoliberalism was held together by a story.

I want to go back to feeling I can be both Polish and Jewish, but Poland is making that increasingly difficult. The main obstacle for me aren’t the fascists themselves. It’s Poles who watched the march and did nothing.

Men and women wearing face-masks chanted, „Pure Poland, white Poland” and „Clean blood, lucid mind,” as well as „Sieg Heil” and „Ku Klux Klan.”

No representatives of the Polish government condemned the demonstration. Meanwhile, police secured the march and arrested those who tried to block it.

In Poland the pluralising gaze has not yet reached a confident critical mass.

A Fidesz proposal to amend the procedure of nominating judges would privilege legal bureaucrats and deter trained judges.

The main characteristic of Orbán’s political machinery is his ability to masterfully combine different fears.