The problem of national character in understanding Hungary’s political history

Abstract

The study of Hungary’s complex political history yields valuable lessons for understanding the background of the country’s current regime hallmarked by its prime minister Viktor Orbán. This article aims to uncover why some aspects of this previously examined political heritage could not be adequately explained and what tools could be utilised to rectify this shortcoming. The examination of deeply running particularities of a country’s political workings is needed, something that is not a new challenge nor a revolutionary approach: The research of national character, a now rather overlooked area of social sciences holds the answers to the more intricate questions presented by the historical approach, but this method itself isn’t straight forward in drawing conclusions either. This article therefore aims to also understand the ways in which national character studies can be used to a proper scientific standard besides hypothesising how that might help in uncovering deeply rooted peculiarities in Hungarian political behaviour. For this a partial overview and processing of theoretical works on national character is necessary. The results show that there is indeed a raison d’être for the concept of national character and although very difficult to properly grasp, attempts to formulate a coherent picture for a nation’s collective mindset are not in vain. This paper therefore not only stands by the concept’s existence but also argues for its probable benefit for political science through the example of the continuing research on patterns of Hungarian political history. The main issue found persistent with the concept however is the insurance of proper scientific standards, a problem that needs to be overcome in order to legitimise the usage of national character studies in this day and age.