András Mink in defence of liberalism

Critics of liberalism - particularly among the right-wing in Hungary - have blamed it for everything bad that's happened in the country in the last twenty years. But in fact liberal policies have barely been implemented since the fall of communism, writes commentator András Mink in the magazine Beszélő: "Can one argue that the downfall of liberal democracy is due to the general failure of liberalism? This point of view would make sense if the Third Hungarian Republic christened in 1989/90 had pursued the political, socio-political and cultural goals of modern liberalism. ... To put it differently: if the political agenda of the Republic had been defined by liberal ideas and programmes. But the opposite is in fact the case. If liberal democracy seems in decline nowadays, it's because it was only ever present here in the form of trace elements and a formal framework. Consequently the failure of the Third Hungarian Republic is not due to the excrescences of (neo-)liberalism as opponents of liberalism never stop bellowing out in chorus, but by the very lack of liberal political principles and programmes, as well as the macroeconomic and political problems that result from that lack."

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