Hungarians share stories about family breakdowns, painful personal experiences, career endings and loss of loved ones, in an oral history archive chronicling life under Fidesz.
When Luca Varadi watched the news about the landslide defeat of the Fidesz party at Hungary’s April 12 general election, her first reaction was one of euphoria: 16 years of Viktor Orban’s rule were finally over. But her joy was soon tempered by feelings of anger and frustration.
“What’s the price we had to pay for all those years? What has it all taken away from us?” she asked herself.
Varadi, a sociologist and associate professor at the Vienna-based Central European University (CEU), poured her feelings out in a Facebook post that went viral in Hungary. People shared similar mixed feelings and more: stories about families torn apart, painful personal experiences, abrupt career endings, and the loss of loved ones.
“There has been so much written about democratic backsliding and the erosion of democratic institutions, but so little about how this system really impacted on people’s personal lives,” Varadi tells BIRN in an interview.
Rather spontaneously, she decided to launch the Igy eltunk itt (“This Is How We Lived Here”) initiative with her fellow researcher, Tamas Kohut. Essentially an oral history archive, the two are currently conducting personal interviews with people who have registered to share their stories. It’s a meticulous exercise. So far, they have received more than 240 submissions and conducted 54 interviews, but their target is at least 400 to have a diverse sample of different age groups and professions, spanning the country.
The interviews will be edited and published online – possibly also in book format – as a memento of one of the most consequential periods of Hungarian modern history.
“I believe this is not only about Hungary,” she says. “These stories are vivid examples of what democratic backsliding and the emptying of democratic institutions can really do to people’s everyday lives. Not just in Hungary, but anywhere.”
When Varadi discusses the interviews, she becomes emotional. People share with her their losses, their pain, their sacrifices and often their moral dilemmas. “The losses are not abstract; they are palpable,” she says.
Forced into exile
Edit and Peter were among the first to register for Varadi’s project to share their experiences.
This couple with a small child once had a comfortable life in a mid-sized provincial town in Hungary. Edit was a popular German teacher at a local school, where her students cherished her. But she was also an outspoken critic when it came to politics, and she stood up for academic freedom when the Fidesz government started to roll back teachers’ autonomy and implement education reforms.
Edit became increasingly uncomfortable for her colleagues. An atmosphere of silence and tension surrounded her at school, while parents criticised her because of her political views. Ultimately, she gave up and quit her job – and the country. She moved to Germany where she now teaches German to refugees. Soon after, her husband, once a journalist in the local media, joined her. Now he delivers frozen vegetables to earn a living, leaving behind his journalistic ambitions.
Edit lost her mother while living abroad, a loss they can hardly forgive themselves for. “This is a painful experience that comes up very often. Practically with all the people who felt forced to leave Hungary, the trauma is there: leaving behind loved ones,” Varadi explains.
Close to 400,000 people left Hungary over the last 16 years. While most moved for higher wages and better career opportunities, Varadi’s interviews also show that many departed to escape the political system. Emigration was one of the most common survival strategies.
The new Tisza government is trying to lure them back, but many may opt to “wait and see”. There have been some early returners, though.
“We talked to a former university lecturer who gave up her career and left because she could not face the hate-mongering political billboards all around the country,” Varadi recounts.
This academic sold everything and left for Belgium, a country whose language she did not even speak, to care for the elderly. The election night of April 12 changed her life again. “This is my home, I am coming back,” she told Varadi. She was going to pack her belongings and return Hungary to start afresh, with no job or house to return to.
Those who stayed
The vast majority, of course, stayed in Hungary and adopted different survival strategies.
A journalist working for Hungary’s public service broadcaster confessed to Varadi that now he feels he was a coward. He was “only” responsible for cultural content, did not have to do political reporting, but he was one of the hundreds who helped operate what many now refer to as “a factory of lies and propaganda” on state channels.
“I never crossed a professional red line myself,” he justifies in the interview, but goes on to admit that he earned a good salary that afforded him and his family a comfortable life.
While many talk about intimidation, self-censorship and adaption to the system, some stories prove that courage did sometimes pay off. A man who worked on development projects in a provincial town described the mounting pressure he felt from local authorities to award projects – and the public money that came with them – to Fidesz-aligned companies. Yet he did not bow, and decided to maintain strict application criteria. He was prepared to be fired, but to his surprise nothing happened. There were no reprisals.
The conversations often take a turn and raise questions about individual or joint responsibility. “Many people ask the question how could this all happen to us? And above all: why did we let it happen?” Varadi says.
Did Hungarian society simply follow the century-old patterns of making compromises, adapting and succumbing to pressure in order to survive, as was done under the rule of the Turks, the Habsburgs and the Soviets?
“One thing is for sure: there were no guns pointed at people’s heads,” Peter Kreko, director of the Budapest-based Political Capital, tells BIRN.
Kreko, a social psychologist, finds it perhaps most surprising that Orban managed to keep his grip on power for 16 years without resorting to violence, primarily through the manipulation of information. “This was a perfect ‘information autocracy’,” he says.
Kreko believes people always had a choice, and this was especially true for those working for the state media or the public administration. But many followed what historian Timothy Snyder has described as ‘anticipatory obedience’: trying to figure out what is expected of them and behave accordingly.
When it comes to conformism or adaptation, Kreko says, Hungary is not very different from its regional peers, but it is certainly true that Hungarian society has a historical tendency to bow to authoritarian leaders.
“What we see is that many people were afraid, felt intimidated,” is how Varadi explains it. Many feared negative consequences if they spoke up. Many sacrificed their right to free speech for their comfortable lives. And by doing so, many became accomplices of the system.
Stefano Bottoni, an Italian-Hungarian historian researching Central European modern history, points to the general lack of solidarity and mistrust in Hungarian society. “There were no institutions people would have trusted. The most common channel to rebel against the system was to write angry Facebook posts,” Bottoni tells BIRN.
He believes stronger trade unions, something like Solidarity in Poland in the 1980s, would have helped build critical communities, but they are virtually non-existent in Hungary. “We helped weaken the resilience of the system, believing that we don’t need those institutions, we will figure out a survival method all by ourselves,” he says.
Varadi shares this analysis: “Many people felt powerless and left alone. When the teachers went on to strike there was virtually no solidarity from the society.”
Lessons for the future
Varadi and Kohut’s This isHow We Lived Here is not just a project about the past. They hope it can help the next generation – in Hungary but also elsewhere – understand what happened and avoid committing the same mistakes.
The social psychologist Kreko also believes it is very important for Hungarian society to confront the past 16 years and also to take responsibility for having allowed this system to emerge and take root.
The historian Bottoni argues that confronting the past and carrying out the lustration Hungary lacked after 1990 are absolutely vital, but so too is building a culture of critical debate, perhaps even within families.
Varadi and Kohut have listened to dozens of stories about families and friendships breaking apart as political hate-mongering poisoned people’s everyday lives. “A woman who joined an NGO was attacked by her grandmother as a traitor betraying her country. She had to walk on eggshells to avoid anything politics or work related,” Varadi says.
This woman was lucky compared to others who suffered total estrangement with family because of differing political views.
Varadi hopes their project can help heal some of the wounds inflicted during the last 16 years and, above all, document the individual price we all pay when living under authoritarian regimes.
“So much energy wasted on compromises and individual survival strategies – such a huge loss,” she sighs.
Source: balkaninsight.com
