‘States are free to reject decisions or judgements that are inconsistent with the treaties they signed,’ Senior Research Fellow at the European Centre for Law and Justice Nicolas Bauer told Hungarian Conservative.
‘I am convinced that the current leadership in Brussels does not take into account the opinion or expectations of the majority of European people, and we even see that they represent non-European interests in Brussels on key issues, such as illegal migration, the war in Ukraine or the EU’s competitiveness,’ Hungarian Member of the European Parliament Balázs Hidvéghi stated in an interview with Hungarian Conservative.
‘You have to have different levels of political engagement. You have to win at different levels, the intellectual level, the battle of ideas level, you’ve got to win at this level. And then you’ve got the next level down, that you’ve got to win on policy, and win the debate politically, and then politicians translate these ideas into their own language and then they have to be able to convey that message to the voters. These are two different roles, but they are also overlapping. Like Edmund Burke, one of the greatest conservative thinkers, was also an active politician.’
‘I was on stage already before I could have any inhibitions. That’s not to say that I don’t have them in other areas, but I feel lucky that I was given this way of life. It was put in front of me, and I couldn’t imagine my life without it. It gives me security.’
‘One of the peculiarities of the Hungarian spirit is that—no doubt as a result of our historical past—we have an openness to a kind of spiritual attitude that is willing to make sacrifices, in prayer and fasting, to obtain peace.’
According to Nikola Kedhi, Chairman of the Board of Directors at the Albanian Policy Center, defending a nation’s sovereignty requires a constant battle in the media, academia, and the political field.
‘Being a conservative in Berkeley is like you’re surrounded by Marxists. I think sometimes Hungary feels the same, surrounded by these European progressive elites,’ John Yoo, former US government official and Emanuel S. Heller Professor of Law at the University of California, Berkeley stated in an interview with Hungarian Conservative.
‘The more I travelled in America, the more I realized that there is no state in the U.S. where Hungarians have not created something lasting; where there is not some Hungarian thread, some Hungarian history, some Hungarian contribution. We wanted to visualize this centuries-old creative process and make it easily accessible to the widest possible audience. That’s how the idea of the HuGo app was born, and of course it took years to fine-tune the concept with our developers arriving at the publicly available version we have today.’ Anna Smith Lacey on the HuGo app and the power of the community.
‘I’m the Executive Director, but I also know that if there’s garbage, somebody must take it out. Similarly, I’m six feet tall, so if something in the back or on the top needs to be reached, I do it. When I was locked in the elevator once, the repairman showed me how to fix the elevator if I ever got stuck in it again. I am the chief bottle washer or the brain, the archivist, the curator when needed. I wear all these hats. Since I’m approachable, everybody feels they know me from different events in town. For some, I even became the face of the Hungarian community in New Brunswick.’
‘Since 1990, we have had to find new ways of explaining the issues. The communist dictatorships have collapsed, everything seems to be going fine, nice-sounding laws are being passed, but these are not being enforced, and in some cases the situation is deteriorating. The countries have European Union membership, and many border issues have disappeared thanks to the Schengen agreement, but problems remain.’
‘The average Ukrainian soldier is about 45 years old; a lot of men have left the country; and Ukraine has become a country of widows. A disproportionate number of men have died in recent years. And since we don’t plan to send troops, how do we solve the ‘‘manpower’’ problem?’
‘Viktor Orbán showed us that an alternative to the leftist, open-border government is not only possible but can be highly successful and popular amongst the people. That’s inspiring. However, for it to be a true success, the seeds planted by Hungary in the rest of Europe have to sprout as well. And that is not the responsibility of Viktor Orbán or the Hungarians, but of right-wing politicians in other countries.’
‘We have a presence on many sites and platforms online, and we are investigating every part of the internet where users can chat, exchange or upload and share materials with each other, or can publish articles on a certain topic, or any social media or cloud sharing service, and even video game platforms,’ Captain Bence Szabó of the Hungarian National Bureau of Investigation told our website.
‘I think the Biden administration behaved and spoke recklessly about Ukraine in the run-up to the war, and about the Ukrainian prospects for NATO accession and joining the EU—even though the United States obviously can have an opinion about that, but it’s not part of that process, while it is part of the NATO process. Whereas Trump had more of a carefully mixed record.’
According to French journalist Charles Sapin right-wing forces are unlikely to achieve the sweeping turnaround many anticipate in the upcoming European Parliament elections. However, in his opinion they could still shift the political centre of gravity to the right.
Xi Jinping’s visit to Europe—the first in five years—is expected to be mainly business. The Chinese president is coming primarily to conclude new deals in the three countries he visited: France, Serbia, and Hungary. According to Carlos Roa, a guest researcher at the Danube Institute, Western analysts view the visit of the large Chinese delegation with concern for this very reason, as the trip seems more like a geopolitical signal.
‘Many people have asked me why I don’t devote my time to myself and my family instead of volunteering. The answer is simple: I care about Hungarian families and the community. My mission is to preserve, nurture and pass on our Hungarian identity, our rich language and culture to the next generation. Fortunately, many of us feel the same way and many of us are working for the same goals.’
‘One of the problems with the Anglosphere is that we have these occasional bouts of hysteria. It’s a sort of psychosexual, cultural, religious frenzy,’ American writer James C. Bennett highlighted in an interview with Hungarian Conservative.
‘We need to win in each and every country because as conservatives that’s what we believe in, sovereign nation states,’ PiS MEP Radosław Fogiel nailed down in an interview with Hungarian Conservative.
Viktor Orbán has a very long record in public life, from his early days as a strong anti-communist freedom fighter, through to his first stint in government, and now to this long and successful tenure as a prime minister. He’s been able to articulate a brand of conservatism that is both economically sensible and culturally conservative and traditionalist.
‘Hopefully, under a second Trump administration, we’re going to see a new high in Hungarian–American relations that we haven’t seen since Kossuth visited America back in the 1850s,’ Republican Congressional Aide Johnny Szani pointed out in an interview with Hungarian Conservative.
‘Now, the only remaining fortresses of conservatives are small media outlets, and they strongly need international cooperation, not only for the credibility, but also to protect them against the attacks of the government,’ President of the Board and co-founder of Ordo Iuris Institute, Jerzy Kwaśniewski pointed out in an interview with Hungarian Conservative.
‘When a country achieves success like Hungary, it’s crucial to ensure that less successful countries also thrive by promoting the blueprint, pushing the strategy, and supporting one another,’ Mexican conservative film producer Eduardo Verástegui stressed in an interview with Hungarian Conservative on the sidelines of CPAC Hungary 2024.
‘I wish there were more Hungary in the European Union. if centre-right and conservative parties win elections all over Europe and come into government, then there will be a chance to change something in Europe. You can’t change anything in Brussels. Brussels is unchangeable.’
‘Viktor Orbán is the one standing up for the average European people, not their government,’ Republican Congressman Andy Harris pointed out in an interview with Hungarian Conservative on the sidelines of CPAC Hungary 2024.
Denisa Bott-Varga has been an active member of the 110-year-old Hungarian American Athletic Club in New Brunswick and leader of the local Csűrdöngölő Folk Dance Ensemble since the early 2000s, when she arrived to the US from Slovakia. In 2023, she received an Order of Merit of the Hungarian Republic for her work in Hungarian diaspora culture and folk dance. In the interview she talks about her passion for folk dance and her efforts to build and preserve the Hungarian community in New Brunswick.
‘Hungary has the ability to initiate some proposals to its neighbours regarding what steps to take to reduce the harmful effects of the war. The region needs to agree on what the long-term interests of its countries in the region are in the shadow of the war in Ukraine,’ China’s foremost political scientist holds.
Conservatism is different in every nation, and so is approach to energy solutions. In this interview, Arvid Hallén, the founder of the only Swedish conservative think tank, Oikos, addresses these topics and also provides some background on Sweden’s NATO accession.
NATO accession, defending the countries of Central Europe, success in academia and standing up for one’s heritage. These topics interest many these days, and Joanna Siekiera is an expert on them. In this interview she discusses the ‘blocking’ of Swedish NATO accession, the influence of smaller EU countries globally, academia and cybersecurity.
‘For our children, the mother tongue is a means and an opportunity for fulfilment and self-fulfilment. In the words of György Bessenyei: “Every nation becomes a scholar in its own language, but never in a foreign one.”’ Read Luke Larson’s interview with Hungarian-language school principal Berta Katona-Mironova on the situation of Hungarian-language education in Ukraine.