Criticism of the socialist regime within the directions of the intellectual protest and counter culture in communist Hungary (1968-1988) Cover Image

A szocializmus kritikája a magyar ellenzék irányzatainak gondolkodásában (1968-1988)
Criticism of the socialist regime within the directions of the intellectual protest and counter culture in communist Hungary (1968-1988)

Author(s): Máté Szabó
Subject(s): Politics / Political Sciences
Published by: MTA Politikai Tudományi Intézete

Summary/Abstract: Although there is broad historical research in Hungary into recent history after 1989, the matter of 1956 - the Revolution/Uprising and the wave of repressions that followed - plays such a dominant role in the 'struggle for the past' that questions of dissidence and opposition in the 1970s and 1980s have received relatively little attention up to now. There are some comprehensive studies on the system transformation in Hungary where the mobilization of dissent received some attention as part of the protest culture contributing to system transition, but a comprehensive analysis of the political thought of Hungarian dissent is still missing. In authoritarian regimes repressive conditions produce hidden forms of dissent and protest within the different artistic forms of expression and among networks of artistic-bohemian subcultures.[…] The paper aims at developing a typology of the 'freedom' or 'emancipation' fight of different groups under the Kádár era between 1968 and 1988. This period is chosen because in 1968 the Hungarian regime opened up new policy windows for economic and social reforms and the regime in its original form lasted until 1988. The restoration of the planned economy and the beginning of a new 'hardliner' policy against intellectuals altered with more 'softliner', 'liberal' periods. There was a samizdat counter-publicity and alternative political thought in the making which produced different waves such as the Marxist-Neo-Marxist dissent (Lukács and his school, Hegedűs), the liberal democratic (Vajda, Heller, Kis, Bence) and the populist (Csurka, Bíró, Kodolányi) dissent and the ecological-alternative (Endreffy, Kodolányi) one and their discussions on the Kádár regime criticised from different points. The frame of analysis is the reconstruction of political opportunities opening up new freedom for intellectual expression, the use of intellectual protest, and conflict between the development of dissent and the repressive, 'hardliner' strategies of the regime. The main focus of analysis is on the alternative publicity for intellectual and political expression within the Hungarian dissent. Hungarian opposition had a humble contribution in action related to its performance in thinking. Alternative social sciences and philosophy made in Hungary were translated and/or published in a wide range of Western languages publishing houses and journals. Opposition stars were members of the Budapest school, such as Ferenc Fehér, Ágnes Heller, Mihály Vajda and György Márkus and some of their students. An important thinker for the Hungarian opposition was István Bibó, one of the non-Marxist social science intellectuals who played an important role in 1956, and who, with his intellectual and political contribution became a type of Hungarian 'Jan Patocka'. The collection of essays in his honour by Hungarian dissent was one of the important steps of Hungarian samizdat development as well as works and essays dedicated to him in the dissent.

  • Issue Year: 2008
  • Issue No: 1
  • Page Range: 7-36
  • Page Count: 30
  • Language: Hungarian