Hungary
Hungary

Summary/Abstract: The authors start the article by describing a number of relevant phenomena such as post-communism, the shadow economy and the shadow society which are, in their opinion, one of the reasons for the swift development of the vouluntary sector in Hungary. They state that the civil sector is consideres to be one of the means of political change and the origin of political parties. The article goes on to deal with the history of the voluntary sector (the origins of the civil society organizations date back to the 18th and 19th centuries); the structure of the present sector, which is supported by numerous organisations classified in 19 clusters; the legal regulation of non-profit organisations; tax policy, national and local policy. As part of the elements of the voluntary organisations (such as networking, which represents various relationships between participants in the non-profit sector) the characteristics of the organisations are outlined (supported by facts from the 1992 survey carried out by the Hungarian Central Statistical Office). Nevertheless, Hungary's non-profit sector is in a critical position, thanks to the economic crisis, with a 15 per cent unemployment rate on the one hand and a lack of management know-how among leaders in the sector on the other: The solution lies, in the author' opinion, in better cooperation between the non-profit, state and market sectors.

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