Don’t Listen to what I Say, Look at what I Do - Special Legal Order in the Illiberal State: The Case of Hungary
Don’t Listen to what I Say, Look at what I Do - Special Legal Order in the Illiberal State: The Case of Hungary

Summary/Abstract: The illiberal state operates according to its own particular logic, constantly balancing on the edge between despotism and democracy. With the arrival of the Covid-19 pandemic and the special legal order to Hungary, fears of the country turning into dictatorship grew stronger. This turn did not come to pass however the Fidesz-led illiberal government did not pass up the opportunity presented by the pandemic to use and abuse the special legal order to their advantage. In this article I will examine how the special legal order operates in the illiberal logic of the Hungarian regime. The analysis will be structured around four features of illiberal regimes as described by András Sajó and will give an overview of how Fidesz has further weakened the system of checks and balances, how it further restricted transparency and public debate, how it used the state of danger to centralise more power and resources, and how it is currently using it to uphold the system of giving boons to the people.

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