TY - JOUR
T1 - More Power, Less Support
T2 - The Fidesz Government and the Coronavirus Pandemic in Hungary
AU - Batory, Agnes
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
Copyright © The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of Government and Opposition Limited.
PY - 2022/2/22
Y1 - 2022/2/22
N2 - Conventional wisdom suggests that populists thrive in times of crisis. However, for populist radical right parties in government, managing a genuine calamity is both an opportunity and a challenge. On the one hand, crises provide the opportunity to project leadership and quell opposition to their rule. On the other hand, crisis response requires competence. Probably the most successful governing populist radical right party in the European Union, Viktor Orbán's Fidesz in Hungary, did not resolve this tension entirely adequately in the course of the COVID-19 pandemic. While the party consolidated its grip on power, the high human and economic costs of mismanaging the second and third waves of the pandemic started to erode its popular support. In ideational terms, the COVID-19 pandemic accentuated the populist, nativist and authoritarian tendencies that had long characterized the party.
AB - Conventional wisdom suggests that populists thrive in times of crisis. However, for populist radical right parties in government, managing a genuine calamity is both an opportunity and a challenge. On the one hand, crises provide the opportunity to project leadership and quell opposition to their rule. On the other hand, crisis response requires competence. Probably the most successful governing populist radical right party in the European Union, Viktor Orbán's Fidesz in Hungary, did not resolve this tension entirely adequately in the course of the COVID-19 pandemic. While the party consolidated its grip on power, the high human and economic costs of mismanaging the second and third waves of the pandemic started to erode its popular support. In ideational terms, the COVID-19 pandemic accentuated the populist, nativist and authoritarian tendencies that had long characterized the party.
KW - European Union
KW - Fidesz
KW - Hungary
KW - pandemic
KW - populism
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85125527204&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1017/gov.2022.3
DO - 10.1017/gov.2022.3
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85125527204
SN - 0017-257X
VL - 59
SP - 1017
EP - 1033
JO - Government and Opposition
JF - Government and Opposition
IS - 4
ER -