HUNGARIAN ELECTIONS 2020: A CHANGE THAT DIDN’T COME

Dejan Bursać

Abstract

The parliamentary elections held in Hungary on April 3, 2022 were the first since 2006 to promise a dose of increased competitiveness and even uncertainty; and surely the first since the beginning of the second Viktor Orban’s PM term (since 2010) in which the opposition hoped for relative success. This hope was justified by several factors: opposition parties ran together in the parliamentary elections for the first time and nominated an independent and conservative candidate close to the median voter. Furthermore, in the local elections two and a half years earlier, they won in Budapest and ten other cities. At the same time, the already controversial international position of the illiberal Orban regime was further complicated by the Ukrainian crisis, which erupted at the very beginning of the election campaign. The coalition theory regards as rational for opposition actors to maximize their votes by uniting in these situations, especially since the institutional framework of elections in Hungary as a country with a dominant party is not suitable for a fragmented opposition. Nevertheless, the Fidesz won by a landslide: they achieved the biggest-margin electoral victory since the reestablishment of a multi-party competition, winning 135 out of the 199 seats in parliament.

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