Hungarian Conservative

Conservative visions of the future of Europe after the European elections; the cultural crisis in the Western world as influenced by far-left movements including the ‘Woke’; and international security and geopolithical challenges—these were the main topics of the Free Speech and Freedom of Thought: British and European Conservative Visions of the Future of Europe conference held at the Danube Institute on 18 June. The all-day event aimed to bring together British, European, and American scholars and public figures to discuss how conservative political strategies can shape a world in flux.

The Free Market Road Show was held in Budapest for the ninth time. At the ceremonial opening of the event, John O’Sullivan, president of the Danube Institute, presented the condensed Hungarian version of world-famous economist Friedrich A. Hayek’s (1899–1992) book The Road to Serfdom. On the occasion of the 80th anniversary of the publication of the Nobel Prize-winning economist’s work, the Danube Institute, under the auspices of the Austrian Economics Center, published the booklet in Hungarian with the aim of making Hayek’s most important teachings easily accessible to Hungarian students.

Recently, the Danube Institute co-hosted an event with Helena History Press where Danish author Jaap Scholten talked about his personal experiences while travelling throughout Ukraine in the first six months of the war.

The Third Danube Institute Geopolitical Summit took place last week in the Castle District of Budapest, with such illustrious guests sharing their insights as former Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott, former Czech President Václav Klaus, Head of the Committee on Foreign Affairs and Hungarians Abroad Zsolt Németh, and Lewis Libby, researcher at the Hudson Institute and advisor to former US President George W. Bush.

The third day of Tusványos remained as eventful as the previous one, with many prominent Hungarian government officials taking the opportunity to share their thoughts on stage. What follows is a brief recap of the most important points they made.

Highly respected experts, such as former Constitutional Court Justice István Stumpf, Gadi Taub, Senior Lecturer at the Federmann School of public policy from Israel, and James Allen of the University of Queensland in Australia, shared their views on the controversial concept of ‘rule of law’. Their lectures were followed by a discussion between State Secretary for European Affairs János Bóka and Ákos Bence Gát, head of foreign affairs at the Danube Institute.

The historian from Florida calls people on the right who give up on their values due to social pressure ‘Vichy conservatives’, because they surrender when outnumbered by the opposition just as easily as the leaders of the Nazi-collaborator Vichy regime in France did. Back then, the German occupiers appeared to be a hegemonic force; today, it’s the radical left that seems to be invincible.

Chris Rufo also issued a warning to his Budapest audience: just because CRT would not fit in the Hungarian historical context, does not mean it cannot be successfully propagated here, as it is not a theory that is overly concerned with logical consistency.

By 1956, disillusionment with chivalric or martial ideas or even just ordinary love of country was again de rigueur in the world of words.