Hungary: Due Satisfaction in Hungarian Law

Koltay, András (2023) Hungary: Due Satisfaction in Hungarian Law. EUROPEAN REVIEW OF PRIVATE LAW, 31 (5). pp. 1059-1066. ISSN 0928-9801

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Abstract

The Hungarian legal system– like the Belgian one– recognizes ʻcourt-ordered apologies’ (in the Hungarian Civil Code1: ʻdue satisfaction’) as a possible sanction for the violation of personality rights. In a similar situation to the case at hand, the Hungarian courts could easily have reached a similar conclusion to the Belgian courts. It should be noted, however, that, under Hungarian law, the party liable to give due satisfaction (amende honorable) is always the same as the party who committed the infringement (in the case of a legal person, it is the representative who actually provides due satisfaction), so the Prime Minister could only be obliged to provide satisfaction in the event of an infringement committed by the Government (as a legal person), and the head of the secret service only in the event of an infringement committed by the body under his/her command. It is also important to note that in Hungarian law, the name of the sanction similar to ‘apologies’ is ‘due) satisfaction’, hence the name does not refer to an apology (i.e., a moral category) but to the reparation of the harm (i.e., the removal of the consequences of the infringement). However, because of the similarities in regulation, let us consider this as a difference in terminology only. Below we present the Hungarian regulation and court practice regarding satisfaction as a private law sanction.

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