GoKawiilDuring his position as Prime Minister, Victor Orbán overhauled the Hungarian higher education system to align institutions with his political party's conservative ideology.Credit: Sean Gallup/Getty
The electoral defeat of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán after 16 years in power is being welcomed by scientists in the country — and elsewhere. Researchers who watched Orbán dismantle academic freedom and strip universities of their autonomy, and saw Hungary blocked from receiving funding from the European Union, are now cautiously hopeful that his successor, Péter Magyar, will repair the damage.
Some are also watching for ripple effects outside Europe. Orbán’s systematic erosion of university independence became a model for the changes to the research system now under way in the United States. And Hungary was increasingly seen as a hub for Chinese influence in Europe, with plans for the country to host the first Chinese university campus in the EU.
Magyar’s Tisza party won a two-thirds majority in Sunday’s parliamentary election — sufficient to amend Hungary’s constitution and undo many of Orbán’s structural changes. But how far those changes will extend into the university and research sectors remains to be seen, and researchers warn that simply restoring the old system might not be enough to repair the damage done to the Hungarian university sector.
“What will happen to Hungarian science now is still very uncertain and unpredictable, but at least we have some hope that the future will bring some change,” says Imola Wilhelm, a neuroscientist at the Biological Research Centre in Szeged, Hungary. “What we really need is stability and transparency. In the last few years, the scientific environment has been so turbulent here.”
Restoring trust
Under Orbán’s Fidesz party, Hungary’s scientific system was reshaped. The Hungarian Academy of Sciences was reorganized, reducing the autonomy of its research network, and management of many universities was transferred to trusts governed by boards whose members were often political appointees selected by Fidesz. In response to these changes, the Council of the European Union, a group of government ministers from each of the bloc’s 27 member states, agreed in 2022 to freeze around €6.3 billion (US$6.6 billion) in funding for research and exchange programmes for higher-education and cultural institutions, including 21 universities, in Hungary.
Peter Magyar, expected to become the next prime minister of Hungary, aims to persuade the European Commission to unlock €17 billion in funds frozen.Credit: Attila Husejnow/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty
In his victory speech, Magyar pledged that his party “will do everything to restore the rule of law, plural democracy, and the system of checks and balances”.
Science is unlikely to be the government’s immediate priority; sectors such as health care and education will probably take precedence, says Balázs Lengyel, an economic geographer at the Corvinus University of Budapest. But some changes won’t require any political involvement. Orbán’s stance on academic freedom led to many of Lengyel’s colleagues and collaborators refusing to travel to Hungary on principle. “I expect that this will change,” Lengyel says.
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