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‘The goal is not necessarily to sit at the table’—Resisting autocratic legalism in Hungarian academia
Author(s) -
Labanino Rafael,
Dobbins Michael
Publication year - 2022
Publication title -
higher education quarterly
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.976
H-Index - 42
eISSN - 1468-2273
pISSN - 0951-5224
DOI - 10.1111/hequ.12290
Subject(s) - autocracy , authoritarianism , status quo , government (linguistics) , political science , legalism (western philosophy) , representation (politics) , period (music) , political economy , public relations , politics , sociology , public administration , law , democracy , linguistics , philosophy , physics , acoustics
Abstract The article analyses the strategies of Hungarian higher education interest organisations against the encroachments on academic freedom by Viktor Orbán's governments. We contrast the 2012–2013 and 2017–2019 protest waves and find that innovations in strategy came from new organisations in both periods, whereas established ones were rather passive or opted for the status quo. However, in the second period, new actors consciously declined to pursue wider systemic goals and aimed at building up formal organisations instead of loose, movement‐like networks. The focus on keeping a unified front and interest representation on the workplace level did not change the overall outcome. Just like during the first period, the government was able to reach its goals without major concessions. Nevertheless, during the second protest wave the government was unable to divide and pacify its opponents, which stripped it of its legalistic strategy and revealed its authoritarianism.