Intellectuals in a New Democracy: The Democratic Charter in Hungary
Intellectuals in a New Democracy: The Democratic Charter in Hungary

Summary/Abstract: This paper outlines the history of a political movement of intellectuals, the Democratic Charter. The movement which peaked from 1991 to 1994, served as different groups' umbrella organization to their various demands: a reawakening of a formerly politically active civil society that seemed to have been drained as a result of party pluralism (which came into being in 1989); an articulation of a democratic consensus that could surpass partial interests; an opposition to authoritarian tendencies; an emphasis on the idea of participatory democracy as opposed to the practice of an elitist democracy based on the idea of representation; and, finally, the creation of an experimental field for a possible socialist-liberal political alliance within a political movement. Social, cultural, and political goals were mixed in the movement, of which not only participants but also organizers were often unaware. This paper delineates and analyses these varied characteristics through an empirical analysis of the Democratic Charter.

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