Category: VOLUME III, No. 2

ON LUCK AND FOOTBAL

When asked on one occasion how Poland managed to post a year of moderate growth in 2009, when the rest of Europe stumbled drunkenly into the red, the Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk famously remarked “we were lucky!” Everyone needs a certain amount of luck in politics, and Viktor Orbán’s

VIKTOR ORBÁN IN STRASBOURG: RETURN MATCH

On 7 February, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán spoke before the European Parliament in Strasbourg – at his own request – to explain his government’s policies and face MEPs’ questions. This followed a previous appearance in January 2011, during which he came under sustained attack. This time, he and his

MUDDY WATERS

Values and Dangers in the Hungarian Economy Whe investment bank analysts’ community and the Western political commentariat, writing about Hungary, have mostly focused on the twists and turns of the policy disputes/dialogues between the Hungarian authorities and the duo of the International Monetary Fund and the European Union as former

MAPPING POVERTY

The Roma Strategy NT: What have been the results of your first months in office?ZB: The first result – and this is a very important one for Hungary, not just for me personally – has been the creation of the European Framework for Roma Integration. In our presidency of the EU last

THE MAIN VICTIM IS NATURE

In the 1980s and 1990s, Jaromír Šíbl was one of very few Slovaks to openly oppose the massive Gabčíkovo–Nagymaros hydroelectric project on the River Danube. The contract to build it was signed in 1977 by the Communist governments of Czechoslovakia and Hungary, and work began immediately on both sides of the

INAUGURATION SPEECH OF THE 2012 WALLENBERG YEAR

Today is the beginning of a series of events in Hungary and Sweden accompanying the commemorative year, organized by the two countries to honour a person whose memory constitutes one of the most important symbolic links between our two nations. We remember the Swedish diplomat who saved tens of thousands

WALLENBERG: MAN OF DESTINY

In Hungary, for many years after 1948, it was not possible to write or speak about Raoul Wallenberg in public. In November 1984, I broke the taboo for the fi rst time with an article entitled “The politics of saving lives”, published in the Hungarian cultural weekly Élet és Irodalom. Naturally,

ROMA INTEGRATION: OPPORTUNITIES AND OBSTACLE

Inside and Outside Majority Culture Inside and Outside Majority Culture Does a Roma philosophy exist? Many would not hesitate to answer “no”. Others declare that such a philosophy probably does exist, and would want to know more about it, but find it impossible to get access to it. I often

THE STATE AS SENTINEL PART I

Catch-up Strategies in the Far East Since the earliest times, the history of economics has been marked by the fundamental collision of two confl icting approaches regarding the question of economic development, those of the faithful adherents to the principle of the free market on the one hand, and those

WHAT IS WRITING BUT TRANSLATING

Marina Tsvetaeva and The Poem of the Mountain Too much rubbish? Little sweeping? –Grieving mountains! Poets coupled by a single dash –suspended…over nothingness – the no one of our bodies.(Marina Tsvetaeva, An Attempt at a Room) “What is writing poetry but translating?” Tsvetaeva asked in a 1926 letter to Rilke. Is not it always a question