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Heller, Ágnes
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2 articles of this author have been cited in the European Press Review so far.
Ágnes Heller on the battle against intellectuals in Hungary
Hungary's national-conservative government has accused the internationally renowned philosopher Ágnes Heller of misappropriating research funding. This is just a pretext aimed at silencing her and other critics, the 81-year-old philosopher writes defending herself in the left-liberal daily La Repubblica: "I am being used as a scapegoat. Why me, who never took even a cent? The accusers make no bones about their motives: I am accused of being a 'liberal philosopher', and in the vocabulary of the new government 'liberal' is synonymous with oppositional, diabolical and anti-patriotic. ... Through me (and six other alleged accomplices) they are trying to criminalise anyone who questions the policies of the Hungarian government. ... The political aim of this criminalisation is to intimidate critical voices, particularly those of philosophers. They want to force the intellectuals to be wary, and so silence them. ... We are witnessing a cultural battle, an offensive by those in power against the intellectuals. The majority of the cultural elite has already been 'eliminated'."
» more information (external link, Italian)
More from the press review on the subject » Philosophy, » Weltanschauung, » Society, » Hungary
Ágnes Heller on the crises in the young democracies
Ágnes Heller, a philosopher from Hungary and professor emeritus at the New School for Social Research in New York, says democratic deficits are to blame for the present atmosphere of political crisis in Central and Eastern Europe: "The former semi colonies of the Soviet Union, which today are young democracies, are not paying sufficient attention to the rules of democracy. Each of them is battling with its own specific problems but they all have one thing in common. The politicians in these countries have no experience with the politics of democracy. Being a politician is a profession in the same way that being a doctor is. Professional competence plays a key role in addition to intuition. You wouldn't usually allow a second year medical student to perform an operation involving complex brain surgery, but this is exactly what is happening in politics. It's not the politicians' fault that they are having to acquire the necessary skills on the job. But it is their fault that they won't admit to it and always present themselves as all-knowing."
» full article (external link, Hungarian)
More from the press review on the subject » Philosophy, » Central Europe
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