The misuses of manipulation: The failure of transitional justice in post-communist Hungary

Abstract

Hungary, like most countries in the former Soviet bloc, made numerous attempts to carry out various types of transitional justice, but the process was ultimately unsuccessful. This article argues that transitional justice in Hungary has been used primarily for political manipulation and introduces the main types of such manipulation. A discussion of the two main components of Hungarian transitional justice, retroactive criminal legislation and screening based on secret police files, illustrates the failure of this process. The article concludes by offering some tentative explanations for this failure, finding it in the sharp ideological division within the political elite and in the population's indifference towards issues of transitional justice.

Notes

¹Left – right divisions in Hungary are primarily manifested in cultural terms (nationalism and religious ideology vs. secularism and a more cosmopolitan attitude, as well as the usual differences with respect to individual rights and support for such groups as gays).

²While something similar happened in Greece, in post-communist countries nobody seriously entertained this solution.

³Ferenc Kőszeg (SzDSz) moved to put an end to the distinction that would uncover those who belonged to Department III/III, but not the other divisions. However, in 1998 the Court rejected his petition. Simply for security considerations it was questionable whether the dissolution and/or the complete declassification of the other departments would be wise, as it could gravely endanger national security.

⁴Péter Hack and Gábor Demszky proposed Motion Nr. 482.

⁵See Péter Hack's parliamentary speech, 3 September 1990, available at: http://www.mkogy.hu/naplo34/037/0370004.html, accessed 10 May 2006.

⁶Two famous victims of this process were József Torgyán, the leader of the Independent Smallholders' Party and István Csurka, then a member of MDF. In 1997 Torgyán was cleared of the charges, while Csurka admitted that he signed an agreement to become an informer, but claimed that he had never provided any reports. Ironically, this admission did not damage Csurka's standing before his followers, even though they are the most committed and vocal anti-communists in the country.

⁷Arguably, former communists also had little interest in releasing the files to the public, but their parliamentary representation at the time was too insignificant to prevent it, had the government supported SzDSz's proposal.

⁸Justice Minister István Balsai is quoted by Népszabadság to have admitted that had the screening process taken place earlier ‘it would probably have disrupted the functioning of parliament’ (quoted in Oltay 1994, p. 15). Péter Hack attributes this statement to Iván Szabó, former minister in the Antall-cabinet (Hack 2003, p. 72).

⁹‘Law of November 4th’ (1994, p. 131): 21 December 1944 is the date when the first (provisional) National Assembly convened following the Horthy era and 2 May 1990 is when the first freely elected Parliament met after the transition.

¹⁰See Lengyel (1991); and the interview with András B. Hegedűs (Magyar Hírlap 17 September 1991). Also see the parliamentary debate (in Hungarian), available at: http://www.mkogy.hu/naplo34/134/134tart.html, accessed 10 May 2006; http://www.mkogy.hu/naplo34/136/136tart.html, accessed 10 May 2006; http://www.mkogy.hu/naplo34/140/140tart.html, accessed 10 May 2006; and http://www.mkogy.hu/naplo34/141/141tart.html, accessed 10 May 2006.

¹¹For details about the Court's verdict see 11/1992 On Retroactive Criminal Legislation, passed by the Constitutional Court on 5 March 1992, see: http://www.iif.hu, accessed 10 May 2006; or in Magyar Közlöny (1992, No. 23) and AB közlöny (1992, I, 3).

¹²Some liberal deputies would have also liked to extend it to the other two departments, but their suggestions were struck down on the basis of national security. MSzP opposed the bill while SzDSz abstained, invoking constitutional worries, but Fidesz voted for it.

¹³See Béla Katona's parliamentary speech, available at: http://www.mkogy.hu/naplo34/337/3370031.html, accessed 10 May 2006.

¹⁴FKGP's leader József Torgyán was famous for making speeches starting or ending with a call for Horn's resignation.

¹⁵After Medgyessy resigned on an unrelated matter in August 2004, he suggested that the information about his counter-espionage past had been leaked by discontented members of MSzP who disagreed with the nomination of a non-party member as prime minister. See Péter Csermely's interview with Péter Medgyessy (Magyar Nemzet, 26 March 2005). Also see for example, Tamás (2005). Medgyessy also asserted that the majority of MSzP's leadership was aware of his past. For this interview see Csizmadia (2005, p. 35).

¹⁶Even Kis' argument did not suggest that Medgyessy should resign because he was a section III/II agent. According to Kis, Medgyessy should have resigned because he failed to fully disclose his past to the voters, thereby failing the test of truthfulness.

¹⁷Medgyessy defended his involvement arguing that his most important task was to prevent the Soviet discovery of Hungary's plans to join the IMF before it was a done deal, since the first attempt to join failed due to Soviet intervention.

¹⁸See also Galló (2002), for a quote reflecting the prevailing sentiment: ‘Lest we let off today's thieves because of some old problems!’

¹⁹The justification of excluding a former agent from political life was also problematic when the same did not apply to his predecessors, that is, to every minister in every former cabinet who was involved with the secret services in one way or another.

²⁰Although extending screening to every division within Department III, MSzP, deviating from the cabinet's initial motion, significantly narrowed the pool of those who should be subject to screening and consequently the bill lost its meaning. From the original proposal they took out the leaders of national trade unions, the national and local leaders of the churches, most of the editors in chief and the members of the public foundations, not least in order to preserve social peace. It also left out certain parts that would compromise MSzP, such as membership in the 1956 – 1957 militia, or those who did not write, but received and read reports from informers.

²¹See András Bőhm, 2 July 2002, available at: http://www.mkogy.hu/internet/plsql/ogy_naplo.naplo_fadat_aktus?p_ckl=37&p_uln=13&p_felsz=537&p_felszig=674&p_aktus=56, accessed 10 May 2006.

²²As such, the debate soon deteriorated into politico-historical polemics between the representatives of MSzP and Fidesz about the true nature of communist rule and arguments about who did what and in what capacity to support or undermine that rule. See http://www.mkogy.hu/internet/plsql/ogy_naplo.naplo_fadat_aktus?p_ckl=37&p_uln=13&p_felsz=537&p_felszig=674&p_aktus=56, accessed 10 May 2006.

²³An often cited example is the revelation about the leader of the extreme right Hungarian Truth and Life Party, István Csurka, that under the code name of Rasputin he also signed an agreement to become an informer, although he denied ever having furnished reports. His constituency responded with a loud and clear ‘never mind, Pista!’[nickname for István] and they all continued denouncing former communist agents, including Medgyessy. Recently Fidesz could also welcome among its supporters such former Politburo members as Imre Pozsgay and Mátyás Szűrös.

²⁴Imre Mécs, who spent two years on death row after 1956, for example, ran at the 2006 elections as a socialist candidate, and won a seat from MSzP's national list, after falling out with his party over the issue of presidential elections in 2005.

²⁵In 2002, for example, some members of Fidesz disagreed with a complete and thorough screening of the political elite as it could humiliate those former agents who, during the previous 12 years did useful work in the establishment of democracy. [Vásárhelyi (2002) argued that in Fidesz-speak it meant that those ‘good’ agents who now supported Fidesz would receive different treatment from those ‘bad’ agents who supported the left.]