The abortion of a 'conservative’ constitution-making. A discourse analysis of the 1994-1998 failed Hungarian constitution-making enterprise

Szűcs, Zoltán Gábor (2014) The abortion of a 'conservative’ constitution-making. A discourse analysis of the 1994-1998 failed Hungarian constitution-making enterprise. Other. [s.n.]. (Unpublished)

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Abstract

What are the similarities and the differences between the failed constitution-making enterprise of the left-wing coalition (1994-1998) and the enactment of the Basic Law of Hungary by the right-wing parties (2011-2012)? In my paper, I argue that there is a fundamental difference of political visions underlying the failure of the first enterprise and the controversial nature of the other: the socialists and the liberals represented a consensualist vision of politics that was the heritage of the political culture of the Kádár-regime and the democratic transition; the right-wing coalition, on the contrary, stressed a conflictual vision. The failure of the first enterprise was a result of the weakening of the political culture of political consensus: though no one dared to explicitly refute a consensual way of constitution-making yet, but the rightist parties only half-heartedly participated in the procedure. By contrast to this, the success of the second was a by-product of the qualified (two-thirds) majority of the right-wing parties representing a conflictualist political style in the parliament rather than a result of a capacity (let alone a design) to create a non-partisan agreement on the issue. In my paper, I will describe these two visions, their origins, and their influence on the outcomes of the constitution-making debates.

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