Financial Times: Orbán’s defeat offers a nuanced lesson: under the right conditions nationalist populism can be defeated at the ballot box, though it can endure for a long time. One message for would-be Orbáns elsewhere, presenting themselves as a radical break from tired incumbents, is that they will come undone if they cannot deliver economically. Monopolising the media message can only suppress criticism for so long…
WP Editorial: The lessons of Viktor Orban’s defeat
Democratic norms have eroded dramatically in Hungary. Press freedoms were under attack, the rule of law was compromised and Orban’s Fidesz party had tilted the playing field with extreme gerrymandering.
Yet the main reason for Orban’s fall was endemic corruption. He built what the Hungarian sociologist Bálint Magyar called a “mafia state” that funneled European Union funds to regime loyalists. Transparency International has ranked Hungary as the most corrupt country in the E.U. four years running….