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Hungary
A Hungarian Trademark (a “Hungarikum”): the
Moral Panic Button12
Melani Barlai3 & Endre Sik4
Keywords: migration discourse; refugee discourse; moral panic;
Hungarian government; Hungarian Voting Advice Application
1. Introduction
Hungary was one of the countries that reacted most quickly to the
migration wave that shook Europe in autumn 2015, and to the crisis at
EU and global level that followed. This was also due to rapid decline of
the popularity of the populist right governing parties in autumn 2014,
which was registered by most of the opinion polls5. The only difference
was in the rate and extent of the swings. In October 2014, 37% of the
total population supported Fidesz, while in November this figure was
25%, decreasing gradually to 22% by July 2015 (Tárki, 2015). To regain
the government's apparently waning popularity, the communications staff
began to search for topics that seemed most suitable to winning back the
sympathies of the population, i.e. topics which, if promoted, the govern-
ment’s spin doctors knew for a fact would win the approval of the people.
One such topic, in addition to the "discussion" on reintroducing death
penalty, seemed to be xenophobia. The rise in xenophobic sentiment
compared to the rest of Europe has been identified in numerous studies
since the 1990s (most recently: Bernát et al., 2015; Juhász & Molnár,
2016; Sik et al., 2016).
1 The concept of moral panic first appeared 1972 in “Moral Panics” by the soci-
ologist Stanley Cohen who defined it as "A condition, episode, person, or groups
of persons that emerged to become defined as a threat to societal values and
interests”.
2 Credit to Anikó Bernát (Tárki) and Bori Simonovits (Tárki) for their reviews.
3 Melani Barlai, netPOL-Network for Political Communication/University Graz,
Andrássy University Budapest, H-1088 Budapest, Hungary; E-Mail: mela-
ni.barlai@andrassyuni.hu
4 Endre Sik, Tárki Research Institute, Hungary Budapest; Andrássy University
Budapest, Hungary; E-Mail: sik@tarki.hu
5 Research institutions Századvég, Médián, Tárki and Nézöpont.
M. Barlai & E. Sik
148
In the first part of this article we outline the issues and frames of mi-
gration discourse and their background information as defined by the
Hungarian government and which were subsequently included for reflec-
tion in the migration questionnaire for the Hungarian voting aid applica-
tion. Examining the utilisation of the Vokskabin questionnaire serves to
establish the level of acceptance of the Hungarian government’s and the
EU’s migration policy by Hungarian political parties and society. To sum
up, the facts here are partly compiled from collected secondary data
which include the combination of texts and images published in third-
party sources. They also present our own study supported by the Vok-
skabin voting aid application.
2. Historial Background
2.1. Political Context
Although Hungary is a small country with roughly ten million citi-
zens and ethnic Hungarians6 living abroad, its important geopolitical
position became more visible during the migrant crisis due to its
Schengen external borders. These were ideal conditions for Orbán´s iso-
lationist path within the EU which rapidly produced imitation effects
among like-minded countries like the Visegrád and Western Balkan
states. A decline in rankings of international organisations such as Free-
dom House and Transparency International (TI) as reaction to Orbán's
illiberal democracy followed. The recent Corruption Perception Index
(CPI) of TI reports a further decline of Hungary on the scale of corrup-
tion, where the country reached its historical low of 48 points (of the
possible 100) (Transparency International, 2016). In the category of press
freedom Hungary was classified as "partly free". The media system was
rated worst categories legal and political environment. “National Media
and Infocommunications Authority (NMHH), whose leader also chairs a
five-person Media Council tasked with content regulation; council mem-
bers are elected by a two-thirds majority in the parliament” (Freedom
House, 2016) whereby Fidesz was able to fill the office with his own
people. Since 2010 the conservative media scene dominates the media
system which is controlled by the government. „Almost all state advertis-
ing is directed toward public media and outlets owned by pro-government
6 Their number is estimated at 2-5 millions.
Hungary 149
businessmen” (Freedom House, 2016). In recent years the Hungarian
economy has been facing a difficult situation. 2009 state bankruptcy
could only be avoided with the help of an EU and IMF loan of 6.5 billion
euros (Oberhuber, 2010). According to calculations of the World Eco-
nomic Forum (WEF) and the International Institute for Management De-
velopment (IMD), Hungary's competitiveness has fallen drastically over
the past decade. In the past ten years Hungary has declined from place 38
to 69 (out of 140) on the competitiveness scale (World Economic Forum,
2017).
2.2. Migration History
For more than three hundred years from the 16th century onwards,
Hungary was an integral part of the diverse Hapsburg Empire as regards
population and cultural traditions, where migration processes across the
inner boundaries of the empire were considered normal. Following World
War I, these internal relocations were replaced by forced migration pro-
cesses. Due to the Trianon peace treaty, numerous areas inhabited by
Hungarian minorities outside the borders of the Hungarian motherland
were created, and between 1919 and 1923, 200,000 Hungarians belong-
ing to these minorities relocated to Hungary. This trend seemed to turn
after World War II. Estimates suggest that between 1947 and the end of
communism, nearly 400,000 people emigrated from and fled Hungary,
most of them in the aftermath of the brutally quelled 1956 uprising (for
more information see: Colville & Pouilly, 2006, p. 10). In the 1980s
Hungary was considered a popular immigration destination, a claim sub-
stantiated by the fact that around 150,000 foreigners – most frequently
citizens and refugees from neighbouring communist countries7 – (Sárosi
& Tóth, 2009) chose Hungary, the "merriest barrack in the Eastern bloc",
to become their home. Asylum procedures were made even easier with
Hungary becoming a party to the 1951 Geneva Convention "relating to
the status of refugees" in 1989, although given Hungary’s geographical
restriction this merely concerned refugees arriving from Europe. After
1990 the Yugoslav Wars unleashed a new wave of migrants on Hungary.
The first wave arriving in Hungary included ethnic Hungarians from Cro-
atia and Serbia and members of other ethnic groups. They were followed
7 Ethnic Hungarians fleeing Ceauşescu's dictatorship from the end of the 1980s
made up the largest numbers of immigrants.
M. Barlai & E. Sik
150
by Muslim Bosnians escaping from persecution in Bosnia and Herze-
govina and later, towards the end of the 1990s, by Roma and Albanians
fleeing from Kosovo (Kováts, 2014, p. 332). After the removal of the
geographical restriction adopted in 1997, the first asylum seekers from
non-European countries affected by armed conflicts started to arrive,
primarily from Iraq, Bangladesh and Afghanistan (Menedék, 2008). Be-
tween 2008 and 2012, Hungary accommodated 14,000 asylum seekers.
From 2009 this figure dropped to an annual 2,000, but has been rapidly
on the rise since 2013. The largest numbers arrived from Afghanistan,
Russia, Syria and Pakistan (KSH, 2013, p. 4). With the increasing num-
bers of refugees, the number of those being granted refugee or subsidiary
protection status also rose. While in 2008, a total of 9.4 % of those apply-
ing for asylum was granted one of the two statuses, this ratio rose to
21.4% in 2012 (KSH, 2013, p. 4). The escalation of the Syrian conflict
triggered the largest wave of refugees into Europe experienced so far and
a crisis ensued, which spurred furious debate among EU member states
(and the EU seems to be split into two halves on this) about the appropri-
ate methods to be adopted by the EU to handle and resolve this crisis and
about the degree of involvement of the nation states.
Figure 1: Asylum seekers in Hungary 2014-2015
Source: Immigration and Asylum Office, 2016
However, before presenting the stance the Hungarian government
takes on asylum matters, here is a brief outline of the current situation in
Hungary. As the first reaction on the Syrian conflict the Hungarian Gov-
42,777
21,865 20,912
177,135
25,170
151,965
0
20.000
40.000
60.000
80.000
100.000
120.000
140.000
160.000
180.000
Asylum seekers total From Europe From outside Europe
2014
2015
Hungary 151
ernment decided to close the Syrian Embassy in Budapest by the end of
2012. The press release of the Foreign Ministry stated: “Hungary no
longer considers the diplomats representing the Bashar al Assad regime
here as legitimate diplomatic representatives” (Xinhua, 2012, December
19).
According to the first graph the number of asylum seekers from non-
European countries rose significantly compared to previous years and hit
a new peak at 177,000 applications in 2015. By that time the Hungarian
government's roadmap for its anti-refugee policies was complete, includ-
ing state-controlled communication strategies, preparation of legal rea-
soning and the erection of barbed-wire fences on several border sections.
3. Political Discourse: the Starting Point
The pro-government market research institute, Századvég, whose re-
search related revenue comes mainly from government contracts (Buda-
pest Business Journal, 2017), prepared the ground for the feasibility of an
at that time already designed anti-refugee campaign with an opinion poll
conducted between January and September 2015. As a result of the struc-
tured telephone interviews with randomly selected people Századvég
concluded:
More than two thirds of the population consider Hungarian immigration
laws too lenient and advocate tougher rules. In addition to this, the majority
of those surveyed think that the European Union is incapable of protecting
European citizens against terror attacks like the one committed in Paris.
(Századvég, 2015a)
Figure 2: Support for stricter immigration laws (January-September 2015)
Source: Századvég, 2015b
82
74
70
16
21
23
2
5
7
0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%
Sep 15
June 15
Jan 15 Support
Not support
M. Barlai & E. Sik
152
Figure 2 also clearly shows the continued increase of the initial figure
until the middle of 2015.
4. Preparing Moral Panic8
Even though this data suggests there was no need to fuel xenophobia
in the population by artificial means, the government's public relations
team went to great lengths through the media to further persuade those
who had already been persuaded or who were open to be persuaded.
As evidenced by a study from 2015, the government (and chiefly the
prime minister himself) played the key role in shaping the discourse on
migration as early as in January 2015 (Bernáth & Messing, 2015, p. 14).
The researchers highlighted that "the hegemony of the government and
the politicians of the governing parties is so enormous (112 speeches and
presentations) that all other opinions pale in comparison" (Bernáth &
Messing, 2015). These results mirror the structure of the Hungarian me-
dia system which is characterised as a propaganda manufacture (Herman
& Chomsky, 1988) controlled from the respective governments. Hungari-
an media and communication experts describe the media policy as media
wars (Bajomi-Lázár, 2001; Hankiss, 1993).
4.1. Discovering and Pushing the State-Owned “Moral Panic”
Button
Strategic governmental communication in itself would probably not
suffice to create moral panic, which Cohen defined as a "condition, epi-
sode, person, or groups of persons that emerged to become defined as a
threat to societal values and interests” (1972). Having said that manipula-
tion (see below for further explanation) reaching out to every single in-
habitant of a country carries much more weight than state-orchestrated
media manipulation could ever carry, regardless of the extent of such
orchestration. This is because someone either reads, listens to or watches
the media or they don't. But a campaign like the one above reaches a
wider public, and if this impact is reinforced by all the media channels
available, use of the phrase moral panic-mongering institutionalised by
the government seems justified. In order for us to imagine this, let’s think
of a button that, when pushed, triggers huge waves of manipulative con-
8 Erős, 2015; Kitzinger, 2000; Róna-Tas, 2015
Hungary 153
tent to flood the country time and time again. Since we assume this ma-
nipulation is a globally unique phenomenon due to its full-scale reach,
costs, complexity, long-term planning and centralisation we recommend
registering it as a "Hungarikum" (for further information: Ministry of
Foreign Affairs, 2010). Considering the moral panic concept with a spe-
cial focus on the media campaigns of the government in the next step we
analyse the anti-immigration campaign of the Hungarian government
regarding three categories: “exaggeration and distortion, predictions and
symbolizations” (Cohen, 1972, p. 19). We assume that the government is
using the xenophobia widespread in Hungary (explained below) to build
a longer-term strategy of national unity. At the same time it is creating an
enemy image as subject of the moral panic which is perceived as a threat
to social values and national interests, thus to moral order (Cohen, 1972).
These allow her to activate the panic button at any time (Sik, 2016).
In the course of the current international media attention about the
modification of the Hungarian Higher Education Law, which is suspected
of discriminating against the American Central European University
(CEU) founded by György Soros, the Austrian political scientist and
professor at CEU, Anton Pelinka also emphasised that the Hungarian
government is using xenophobia and anti-Semitism attitudes as its do-
mestic policy-making tools (Pelinka, 2017). The national consultation
"on immigration and terrorism"9 in 2015 forms part of the government’s
strategy. The need for consultation was justified as follow:
The EU is also responsible for the current situation (refugee crisis), which
has encouraged migrants to move towards Europe. It is about questions that
will determine our everyday life and our common future. If we do not act,
we will not recognize our country in a few decades. (Hungarian Govern-
ment, 2015)
In a letter personally addressed by Orbán, all Hungarians entitled to
vote received the questionnaire containing 12 questions about migration
policy.
9 The questionnaire can be viewed at the following link: http://pestisracok.hu/e-
nemzeti-konzultacio-online-is-lehet-valaszolni-a-bevandorlasrol-es-
terrorizmusrol-szolo-kerdoivre/
M. Barlai & E. Sik
154
Public or national consultations exist in other parts of the world as
well but, in contrast to those10, the Hungarian national consultation is
anything but a consultation. It was clear from the outset that there would
be no dialogue, as filling in a questionnaire cannot be considered part of a
dialogue. Moreover, the questions included in the questionnaire had been
defined "in a top-down and centralistic fashion" (Pintér, 2015). The
wording of the questions and the answer options precisely predetermined
the intended direction of the answers (Czene, 2016). In other words, the
questions asked in the "national consultation" rode over all the specific
rules of the industry as they were partly directive and inappropriate for
any dialogue or discussion. They served the sole aim of creating the
framework within which the population’s thinking should be confined,
according to the government (Czene, 2016). Any criticism of the consul-
tation was confidently countered by government spokespersons, suggest-
ing that the national consultation was not an opinion poll and therefore
industry-specific rules did not apply. The proper response to it should be
“if it looks like a spade then call it a spade” – if people are being sent a
questionnaire enquiring about their opinion, and the data is subsequently
consolidated and analysed, then the government can call it what they
want, it’s still an opinion poll. Admittedly, it is correct that the conducted
consultation falls short of a research study as the figure of roughly one
million returned answers cannot be considered representative, and the
breakdown of the answers into percentages does not qualify for an analy-
sis.
As far as the results of the consultation costing EUR 3.5 million in to-
tal are concerned, there is nothing to be surprised about, the people gave
the answers that the government expected them to give. Containing 12
10 For illustration purposes only we present the following examples which we
found after a short trawl on the internet: an international umbrella organisation
conducted a national consultation on the future of community-supported agricul-
ture in 13 countries (including Hungary) (http://urgenci.net/actions/the-common-
ground-forcsa-in-europe-project/national-consultations/); the Ministry of Educa-
tion of Trinidad and Tobago initiated a national consultation including the main
stakeholders (teachers, parents, etc.) and experts in order for them to express
their views on raising the quality of education (http:// mtest.gov.tt/start.aspx);
under the aegis of the UN, forums were held in 88 countries for those interested,
where representatives of the state, the private sector, science, civic society and
the media were invited to reflect on 11 topics related to the theme "The World
We Want" (https://www.worldwewant2030.org/sitemap).
Hungary 155
questions, the questionnaire was returned by one million out of the eight
million eligible respondents, the vast majority of whom were in support
of the government's refugee policies (Herczeg, 2015) and replied yes, for
instance, to questions like "Is there any relationship between immigration
and terrorism? Should immigrants care for their needs themselves?" and
"Should it be possible to detain illegal immigrants?" (Hungarian Gov-
ernment, 2015).
Later on, the government summed up the results of the national con-
sultation in one sentence, which in itself was already the moral panic
button:
Figure 3: “The people have decided: Hungary must be protected”
Source: Hungarian Government, 2015
5. Pushing the Moral Panic Button
Once the button is in place, it just has to be pushed. To achieve this,
several waves of professionally designed campaigns were conducted
through all media channels and irrespective of cost: the first phase fo-
cused on the national consultation (see figure 4), then, following verbal
attacks on Soros.11 In the second and third phases Brussels served as a
11 Referring to the smear campaign waged against the “migration- and refugee-
friendly” NGOs supported by the US multi-billionaire and ethnic Hungarian
George Soros.
M. Barlai & E. Sik
156
projection surface for two rounds of "witty" indoctrination (see figures 5
and 6)12, preparing the ground for the referendum in October 2016.
12 The statements included in the "Did you know?" billboards have yet to be
reviewed by industry experts, but reading the work of Rovó & Dull (2016) is
highly recommended as a first step.
Hungary 157
Figure 4: Pushing the moral panic button – phase I
“When you come to Hungary, you can't take Hungarians' workplac-
es”; “When you come to Hungary, you must respect our culture!”; “We
don't want illegal immigrants!”
Source: Hungarian government, 2016b
Figure 5: Pushing the moral panic button – phase II
“Almost one million immigrants would like to come to Europe from
Libya alone”; “The Paris bomb attack was committed by immigrants”;
"Since the beginning of the immigration crisis, sexual assault levels on
women have surged throughout Europe”; “Brussels wants to resettle ille-
gal immigrants in Hungary equalling the population of a whole town.”
Source: Hungarian government, 2016b
This is followed again by a referendum directly reaching out to the
whole population, pushing the moral panic button once again. As before,
the topics are the sense of being threatened, the need for self-defence and
the intention of the brave government to support these areas, a common
M. Barlai & E. Sik
158
theme already heard in the round-ups of the national consultation (see
figure 6).13
Figure 6: Pushing the moral panic button – phase III
“Let’s not jeopardise Hungary's future! Vote no!”
Source: Hungarian government, 2016b
The question put to the vote (“Do you want the European Union to
have the right to stipulate the compulsory resettlement of non-Hungarian
citizens in Hungary without requiring the approval of the Hungarian par-
liament?”) shows how irrelevant the aspect of making a well-informed or
responsible decision is in regards to the national referendum, since – as
Sik emphasised in an interview (Sik, 2016) – the structure of this ques-
tion is completely identical with the following question:
13 At this point we'll take a look at the imaginative billboards created by meme
generators and the MKKP, for example those that focus on the main aspects of
pushing the moral panic button and the manipulative questionnaire techniques in
a humorous fashion, whilst showing great professional sensitivity: "Did you
know? By repeating things over and over again they will eventually start to seem
real"; "Did you know? Some people drive trucks into a crowd, others do the
same with billboards." For more examples and billboards see
www.ketfarkukutya.com.
Hungary 159
Do you agree that mayors should be entitled to decide who is to move into
your home without asking your family?” It goes without saying that this
question is nonsensical, but the questions included in the national referen-
dum were not designed to stimulate people's brainpower but rather their
emotions, since no-one likes to have their privacy threatened. (Czene, 2016)
Likewise, the continuous pushing of the panic button went on in the
media at the same rate, if not more quickly. We learnt the following from
an in-depth summary:
From 13 May to 13 August, the period preceding the campaign, the Hungar-
ian government displayed advertisements encouraging people to take part in
the referendum 10,481 times according to preliminary data from Kantar Me-
dia. They were displayed 6,224 times on TV, 2,078 times in public spaces,
1,403 times on the radio, 542 times in daily newspapers, and 53 times in
magazines. During the period of the Olympics between 5 and 13 August, the
advertisements of the cabinet’s national referendum campaign were dis-
played most, 140 times. On the likewise pro-government TV channel M4,
the governmental promos, having been shown 211 times in 9 days, came
second. (Román, 2016)
The cabinet purchased 4,219 seconds of advertisement time, which
corresponds to nearly 20% of the total advertising exposure. This figure
was only exceeded by state propaganda news: knowing that the average
number of viewers "forced" in front of their TV sets would be much
higher than usual, the TV channel MTVA used its 1-minute news during
the European Football Championship and the Olympic Games in order to
cover the government's anti-refugee propaganda. “The poor Hungarian
athletes who bent over backwards to return home wearing medals around
their necks probably won't even suspect that in reality they were mere
background actors in a never-ending governmental ad promo” (Román,
2016).14
14 One more thing we should remember is that the TV coverage of the Olympic
Games has become a state monopoly (MTVA obtained the TV rights) and the 1-
minute news, which makes it impossible to zap between the TV channels or
pursue TV-free activities due to the brevity of such breaks, were capable of
reaching large television audiences, who would not watch sports or public ser-
vice TV broadcasts on other occasions.
M. Barlai & E. Sik
160
6. Does Moral Panic Perform Better?1516
According to figure 7 it is not certain whether it was necessary at all
to push the moral panic button, since the perception of migration and
terrorism as key issues has increased throughout the whole EU.
Figure 7: Many Europeans concerned with security, economic repercussions
of refugee crisis
Source: PEW Research Center, 2016
15 This term refers to the „Hungary makes it better campaign“ 2013 which was
financed by the government to broadcast it also in private televisions. After it
was declared by the Constitutional Court as an illegal act broadcasting the spot
on private television was no longer possible (http://mertek.hvg.hu/2014/03/19/ki-
az-aki-jobban-teljesit/).
16 It is impossible to give a sensible answer to the question in the caption. And
this is impossible not only because the original wording of the question is non-
sensical, as the answer could be anything depending on what is being referred to,
it is impossible because we can't say to what degree the listed phenomena and
their changes relate to pushing the moral panic button, and to what degree they
can be traced back to other time-sensitive factors which are even related to each
other. It will take another couple of years for what is probably the best solution
to materialise (i.e. a natural DiD experiment; DiD = difference in difference).
Hungary 161
Within this general tendency the Hungarian data reveal figures which
exceed the average. Pushing the moral panic button seems more cost-
effective in terms of shaping the openly xenophobic trend in Hungary,
since open xenophobia hit new record levels in 2016 (Sik et al., 2016)
and 2017 and the population seems to be purging itself from the idea of
being open and welcoming (see figure 8).
Figure 8: Xenophiles, “Thinkers” and Xenophobes in Hungary between
1992 and 2017 (in %)
Source: TÁRKI, 2017
Xenophobic attitudes in Hungary have been examined since 1992.
TÁRKI measures the level of xenophobia and xenophilia about the ac-
ceptance of migrants. The question asked each year is: do you think that
Hungary: 1. should accept all asylum seekers, 2. should not accept any
asylum seekers, 3. should accept some asylum seekers, some not (then
they are asked which nationality they would accept). The first group in-
cludes xenophobic, the second group xenophile attitudes. Members of the
third group are defined as “thinkers” (Simonovits & Szalai, 2013).
When examining the trend of open xenophobia in more detail based
on five data surveys conducted since 2014 (see figure 9), we find that
compared to the noticeably high figure of April 2015, the levels dropped
for some time before skyrocketing to record levels.
15 20 31 40
19 30 33 27 38 43
26 34 30 25 24 29 32 33 29 32 40 36 39 41 56 60
73 66
60 55
71
66 64 69 57 53
67 57 62 67 70 61 58 57 59 60 49 53 51 53
43 38
12 14 9510 434547988610 10 10 12 811 11 10 612
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
90%
100%
1992
1993
1994
1995
1996
1997
1998
1999
2000
2001
2002
2003
2004
2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
2014
2015
2016
2017
Xenophobe “Thinkers” Xenophile
M. Barlai & E. Sik
162
Figure 9: Xenophiles, “Thinkers” and Xenophobes in Hungary between
2014 and 2016
Source: Sik et al., 2016
Due to the pushing of the moral panic button, which was still modest
in the spring, and became increasingly frequent and more vehement in the
process, we would expect xenophobia to spread further and further.
Compared to the spring figure though, in summer and in autumn the rati-
os of the undecided respondents increased and those of the two extreme
groups of respondents decreased. One possible reason for this is perhaps
that for a certain time the underlying arguments seemed valid and migra-
tion was constantly present in the media, which made the impact of civic
society felt. There have been no new asylum seekers in Hungary since
autumn 2015 but the government's scapegoating behaviour (i.e. the cam-
paign against the immigration quota system) has been booming ever
since, and so it is understandable why the undecided retreated again.
7. Pooling of NGO Discourse
One of the aims of the Hungarian voting aid application Vokskabin is
to advise citizens of socially relevant issues both during and outside elec-
tion periods. Started in the multi-election year 2014, Vokskabin was ini-
tially composed of a team of political scientists, historians and students
who primarily followed the German and Austrian examples. In contrast
to the US term Voting Advice Application, which implies the provision
of voting advice, Vokskabin distances itself from this interpretation and
defines itself as a scientific, non-partisan online voting advice application
(abbreviated: VAA) with the primary objective of providing guidance in
the most important popular issues and helping users decide on the posi-
10
9
5
4
1
51
45
56
60
46
39
46
39
36
53
0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%
July 2014
Apr 15
July 2015
Oct. 2015
Jan 16
Xenophiles
"Thinkers"
Xenophobes
Hungary 163
tions of the surveyed parties and their own opinions, particularly in elec-
tion periods (Barlai, forthc.). On the occasion of the migration crisis the
Vokskabin team compiled a questionnaire comprising 29 questions17
themed “The question of migration and refugees in Hungary” which went
online on 15 March 2017. In this set of questions we reflected on the
government’s migration and refugee policies, taking into account the
national and international criticism of government discourse and
measures on migration and refugee policies, which was mainly levelled
by Hungarian NGOs, the opposition parties and, among EU countries,
Germany. We drew on five subject areas and came up with questions
relating to the economy, social politics, culture, security policy and law.
For example:
‐ Do you think the information provided by Hungarian public media on
migration issues is based on real-life data?
‐ Do you think Hungary should legally ban wearing clothes that cover
the full body or face apart from the eyes, i.e. the burka?
‐ Overall, do you agree with the border fences built on the Hungarian
borders of the Schengen area with Serbia, Romania and Croatia?
‐ Do you think the social integration of female refugees should receive
special support?
‐ Should there be solidarity among the EU member states concerning
care for the needs of asylum seekers?
‐ Do you think the danger of terrorist attacks has increased since the
refugee crisis started?
‐ Do you consider it necessary to specifically draw refugees' and mi-
grants' attention to the fact that men and women have equal rights?
In contrast to the country-wide interest 2015 in the questionnaires
“Men and women in Hungary” and “Roma in Hungary”18 this time, both
the journalists and the users were quite reluctant. Only 200 users com-
pleted the new test. Considering that “Vokskabin Migration” received no
media coverage until 31 March (editorial deadline) and it was only the
Vokskabin, netPOL (Network for Political Communication) and András-
17 The complete questionnaire (available in Hungarian and German) can be
viewed at the following link: www.vokskabin.hu.
18 Following its launch on 4 March 2014, the election questionnaire with 26
questions was completed by 27,757 respondents in total. The questionnaires on
gender equality and Roma in Hungary 2015 were similar in their response and
have been visited by nearly 60 thousand users.
M. Barlai & E. Sik
164
sy University Budapest Facebook pages that were able to draw a certain
number of responses from users, this result is hardly surprising. On the
one hand, the low interest is symptomatic of the information overload and
on the other hand it can be interpreted as an undifferentiated and un-
reflected handling of the migration crisis in the Hungarian media. Due to
the low interest, further scientific assumptions and conclusions should be
postponed until a later date.
8. Conclusion and Outlook
In the course of the refugee crisis, through the paradoxical analogy of
the events of 1989, Orbán established a "border narrative", which was
legitimised by his electoral base in the “National Consultation on Immi-
gration and Terrorism”. In this way he created a reference framework,
which he has been using since then. At the same time, the fence construc-
tion at the Schengen external borders quickly produced imitation effects
in the EU. Consequently nationalist “populism spirals” are emerging
which centrifuge parts of the EU in the periphery. This once again makes
the structural weaknesses of the EU visible. The ignorance and contain-
ment of "peripheral" opinions may strengthen the center, but as result the
Eurosceptic and anti-EU edge cements itself (Barlai, 2017). As a result of
the anti-migration and anti-refugee actions of the Hungarian government
open xenophobia hit new record levels in 2016 and 2017. To sum up,
pushing the moral panic button seems to be effective in instrumentalisa-
tion of fear and concerns.
Also the usage of Vokskabin which provided a questionnaire on the
refugee crisis shows clearly that factual questions about the Hungarian
and the European refugee and asylum policies discussed by anti-
government actions of NGOs and the Hungarian civil society do not in-
spire interest among the citizens. In March 2017, the Hungarian govern-
ment announced to launch a new national consultation which is also go-
ing to include questions regarding the European and Hungarian migration
policy.
In this context it is to be expected that the interest in “Vokskabin Mi-
gration” will increase. Consequently, the project can help discuss the
migration and refugee crisis on a factual level and get the chance to con-
tribute to a dialogue between public and Hungarian parties.
Hungary 165
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