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History of Hungary - Post WWII

In 1949 Hungary is declared a People’s Republic. After the war the Communists divided the large estates among the peasantry and nationalised the means of production, following the Stalinist line of heavy industry and collectivised agriculture. Secret police terror, forced displays of loyalty and worsening living standards generate deep resentment.

In February 1956 Nikita Khrushchev denounced Stalin at a closed session of the 20th Party Congress in Moscow and in July, amid increasing expectations of sweeping reform and democratisation, the hard-line leader of the Hungarian Socialist Worker’s Party, Matyas Rakosi, was forced to resign.

On 23 October 1956 student demonstrators demanding the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Hungary were fired upon in front of the radio station in Budapest, and a 20-metre high statue of Stalin near Heroes’ Square was pulled down during the demonstration. The next day Imre Nagy, a reform-minded Communist, was made prime minister. Yet, despite promises of improvements from the newly appointed officials, the disorder spread. On 28 October Nagy’s government offered an amnesty to all those involved in the violence and promised to abolish the AVO, the hated secret police, but the fighting intensified with some Hungarian military units joining the rebels. Soviet troops, who had become directly involved in the conflict, began a slow withdrawal.

On 31 October hundreds of political prisoners were released and there were widespread reprisals against AVO agents with summary street executions carried out by the angry crowds. The same day Britain and France intervened militarily in Egypt in a dispute over the Suez Canal, diverting world attention from Hungary. On 1 November Nagy announced that Hungary would leave the Warsaw Pact and become neutral. At this, the Soviet forces began to re-deploy and on 4 November Soviet tanks moved into Budapest en masse, crushing the uprising with brute force. The fighting continued until 11 November, resulting in 3000 Hungarians being killed and another 200.000 fleeing to neighbouring Austria. Nagy was arrested and deported to Romania where he was executed two years later.

After the revolt, the Hungarian socialist Workers’ Party was reorganised, and Janos Kadar turned an old Stalinist slogan around to become, ’He who is not against us is with us’, to symbolise the new social unity. After 1986 Hungary abandoned strict central economic planning and control for a limited market system based on incentives and efficiency. This ’goulash Communism’ turned Hungary into what were called ’the most amusing barracks in the camp’ during the bleak 1960s and ’70s. In order to secure UN recognition, the Kadar regime announced an amnesty for those imprisoned for participating in the revolution in 1962.

In June 1987 Karoly Grosz took over as premier. In January 1988 all restrictions were lifted on foreign travel. In March demonstrations for democracy and civil rights brought 15,000 onto the streets. In May, after Kadar’s forced retirement, Grosz was named party secretary general. Under Grosz, Hungary began moving towards full democracy, change accelerated under the impetus of other party reformers such as Imre Pozsgay and Rezso Nyers. Also in June 1988, 30,000 demonstrated against Romania’s plans to demolish Transylvanian villages.

In February, 1989 the Communist Party’s Central Commitee, responding to ’public dissatisfaction’, announced it would permit a multy-pary system in Hungary and hold free elections. In March for the first time in decades, the government declared the anniversary of the 1848 Revolution a national holiday. Opposition demonstrations filled the streets of Budapest with more than 75,000 marchers. Grosz met Mikhail Gorbachev in Moskow, who condoned Hungary’s moves toward a multy-party system and promised that the USSR will not interfere in Hungary’s internal affairs.

In May Hungary began taking down it’s barbed-wire fence along the Austrian border – the first tear in the Iron Curtain. June brought the reburial of Prime Minister Nagy, executed after the 1956 Revolution, drawed a crowd of 250,000 at Heroes’ Square. The last speaker, 26-year-old Viktor Orban publicly calls for Soviet troops to leave Hungary. In July President George Bush visited Hungary. In September Foreign Minister Gyula Horn anounced that East German refugees in Hungary would not be repartiated but would instead be allowed to go to the West. The resulting exodus shakes East Germany and hastens the fall of the Berlin Wall.

At a party congress in October 1989 the Communists agreed to give up their monopoly on power, paving the way for free elections in March 1990. The party’s name was changed from the Hungarian Socialist Workers’ Party to simply the Hungarian Socialist Party and a new programme advocating social democracy and a free-market economy was adopted. This was not enough to shake off the stigma of four decades of autocratic rule, however, and the 1990 election was won by the centrist Hungarian Democratic Forum (MDF), which advocated a gradual transition towards capitalism. The social-democratic Alliance of Free Democrats (SZDSZ), which had called for much faster change, came second and the Socialist Party trailed far behind. As Gorbachev looked on, Hungary changed political systems with scarcely a murmur and the last Soviet troops left Hungary in June 1991.

In coalition with two smaller parties, the MDF provided Hungary with sound government during its painful transition to a full market economy. Those years saw Hungary’s northern and southern neighbours split apart along ethnic lines. Prime Minister Jozsef Antal did little to improve relations with Slovakia and Yugoslavia by claiming to be the ’emotional’ and ’spiritual’ Prime Minister of the large Hungarian minorities in those countries. In mid-1993 the MDF was forced to expel Istvan Csurka, a party vice president, after he made ultra-nationalistic and anti-Semitic statements that tarnished Hungary’s image as a bastion of moderation and stability in dangerous region. Antal died in December 1993 and was replaced by Interior Minister Peter Boross.

The economic changes of the past few years have resulted in declining living standards for most people in Hungary. In 1991 most state subsidies were removed, leading to a severe recession exacerbated by the fiscal austerity necessary to reduce inflation and stimulate investment. This made life difficult for many Hungarians, and in the May 1994 elections the Hungarian Socialist Party led by former Communists won an absolute majority in parliament. This in no way implied a return to the past, and party leader Gyula Horn was quick to point out that it was his party that had initiated the whole reform process in the first place (as foreign minister in 1989 Horn played a key role in opening Hungary`s border with Austria). All three main political parties advocate economic liberalisation and closer ties with the West. In March 1996, Horn was re-elected as Socialist Party leader and confirmed that he would push ahead with the party’s economic stabilisation programme. Arpad Goncz of the SZDSZ, Hungary’s only real statesman, was elected for a second five-year term as president of the republic in 1995. In 2000 Ferenc Madl took over his position.

In 1997 in a national referendum 85% voted in favour of Hungary joining the NATO. A year later the European Union began negotiations with Hungary on full menbership. A centre-right party Fidesz won elections. Its head, Viktor Orban became Prime Minister. In 1999 Hungary joined NATO.

Parliamentary elections, in 2002, left the Socialists and liberal party SZDSZ in a position to form a coalition. Hungary voted for joining the EU, and joined it in 2004. Laszlo Solyom is sworn in as President in 2005.