Europeanization of the Hungarian Legal Order: From Convergence to Cancellation?

Abstract

Since the political transition of Hungary in the late 1980s, the law of the European Union has been the primary external influence on the modernization of domestic legislation. This chapter aims to illustrate that Hungary, as a passive and receptive actor, implemented all components of EU law which were prerequisites for EU membership. This has resulted in an intense convergence in rules and values of the domestic and EU legal order until its accession to the EU in 2004. After accession, however, Hungary started to move from a constructive to confrontational Member State, which has led to a substantial divergence between the laws of Hungary and EU law. This chapter analyzes these processes and attempts to identify the possible consequences of this alteration in the Hungarian stance to the adoption of rules, values, and regulatory models originating from EU law. It will be demonstrated with case studies ranging from recent Hungarian economic legislation to the constitutional reform, illustrating how this new role of Hungary negatively affects the adaptability of Hungarian legal order and leads to canceling the convergence to the European law.

Keywords: Hungary, implementation of EJ law, democratization, rule of law, convergence and divergence

JEL Classification: K1, K19, K38