News from the CEU Democracy Institute

In 14th edition of the Democracy Bulletin, your quarterly newsletter from the CEU Democracy Institute (DI), we are spotlighting our standout accomplishments and top-notch publications from the past months, including our Annual Report, the upcoming Budapest Forum, and the Invisible University for Ukraine.

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HIGHLIGHTS

Our Annual Report 2023/24

Our Annual Report of the 2023/24 Academic Year is another testament to our unyielding dedication to the advancement of democracy through research, collaboration across academic and professional disciplines, free exchange of ideas, and public engagement. Being at the forefront of efforts to renew and strengthen democratic and open societies through world-class research, the CEU Democracy Institute (DI) is a world leader in forming interdisciplinary collaboration, and public engagement for the promotion of democracy research. Read it here.

Budapest Forum 2024: Building Sustainable Democracies

Based on the success of the last years, the Budapest Forum, the conference that hit the international policy event scene in the last three years gathering mayors, commissioners, MEPs, decision makers, policy experts, academics, and activists, will return on September 18-19, 2024. As before, the conference is organized by the Municipality of Budapest, Political Capital, and the CEU Democracy Institute to discuss the most pressing issues currently facing citizens of democratic and nominally democratic countries. See the full program here.

Unpacking the Link Between Gender-based Violence and Autocratization

At the invitation of our Inequalities and Democracy Workgroup and organizers Andrea Krizsán and Conny Roggeband, political scientists from all over the world gathered in Budapest in June for a two-day workshop to unpack how gendered violence – physical, sexual, psychological, economic and semiotic – becomes a mechanism for promoting and sustaining autocratic regimes, and how gender-based violence aids would-be autocrats in coming to power. Read the most important takeaways here.

Invisible University for Ukraine Summer School

The Invisible University for Ukraine (IUFU) held its third Summer School in parallel in Lviv, Ukraine, and in Budapest, Hungary, from June 29 to July 8, with 55 Ukrainian students. While most students came from Ukraine, some have arrived from European countries, where they temporarily reside in refuge. The Summer School this year explored the problematic nature of wartime expression and articulation. Learn more here.

Context Program Launched

Our new interdisciplinary course Context Program is our joint project with the Independent Art Department, offering free courses in Hungarian to university students of any field, starting in September 2024 in Budapest, at the DI. The series of 6+1 sessions in the fall semester aims to engage university students who are open to new ideas, who want to learn about the (near) past and present, rather than erase it, with a deepening of academic knowledge and a variety of art practices.

RESEARCH

DE- AND RE-DEMOCRATIZATION

Zsofia Bocskay Joins as Post-doctoral Fellow

Zsofia Bocskay specializes in political communication within illiberal regimes, focusing on party communication strategies such as campaign tones, agenda setting, populism, and affective polarization. She employs a multi-method approach, combining quantitative and qualitative analyses to explore how parties influence public discourse and voter perceptions, particularly under authoritarian rule.

Andras Bozoki on Hungary in the European Union

In their new book, our Research Affiliate Andras Bozoki and Zoltan Fleck analyze the unexpected collapse of Hungarian democracy with the aim of contributing to the exposure of the structural weaknesses of contemporary democracy.

DEMOCRACY IN HISTORY

Utopia and Democracy: The Conference of the Utopian Studies Society/Europe

The conference, organized and hosted by our research project “Democracy in East Central European Utopianism”, welcomed around 130 participants from five continents, with the aim of enriching the intellectual history of the concept of democracy by drawing attention to its relationship with various forms of utopianism.

Biographical Research Quo Vadis?

The international conference on challenges in the study of life (hi)stories and social change, organized by the International Sociological Association, ELTE Faculty of Social Sciences and us, approached the question of the current state of biographical research in relation to one of its central focal areas: researching social change.

ENVIRONMENT AND DEMOCRACY

REAL DEAL Summit in Budapest

In June, the workgroup organized and hosted the REAL DEAL Summit, a major conference of researchers and practitioners that examined the project’s research activities and test cases in 13 countries and on the European level. The three-day Summit attracted about 70 participants from over 20 countries.

Sonya Ziaja Awarded

Our Research Affiliate Sonya Ziaja (University of Baltimore) has been named as the 2024-25 Pace | Haub Environmental Law Distinguished Junior Scholar Award recipient due to her cutting-edge research in environmental governance, and the intersection of law & tech that has influenced climate adaptation strategies.

INEQUALITIES

New Posts in the CCINDLE Project

Members of the research group published two posts in the CCINDLE project blog series: one by Andrea Krizsan and Mirjam Sagi on feminist responses to attacks on gender equality and LGBTQ rights in the Hungarian Parliament, and one by Andrea Krizsan and Conny Roggeband on how autocratization can be gendered.

New Article in Special Issue

Dorottya Redai authored an article titled “Lesbian Resistance Through Fairytales. The Story of a Children’s Book Clashing With an Authoritarian Anti-Gender Regime in Hungary” in the special issue "Neo-Fascism's ‘Gender Ideology’ and Queer/Lesbian Resistance" of the Journal of Lesbian Studies.

MEDIA AND TECHNOLOGY

Reuters Institute Digital News Report 2024

The 13th edition of the Digital News Report, published by the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at the University of Oxford, based on an online survey of almost 100,000 people in 47 countries, has been released with the chapter on Hungary written by DI colleagues Judit Szakacs and Eva Bognar.

Revision of Investigative Journalism MA Curriculum

As part of the project “Strengthening Quality Journalism in the Western Balkans and Turkey II,” the revision of the investigative journalism MA program curriculum has started, with the aim of creating a condensed version for a one-year MA degree program.

RULE OF LAW

New Article on Statelessness

In a new paper in the Annual Review of Law and Social Science, the workgroup’s lead researcher Dimitry Kochenov questions the demonization of statelessness and mildly attacks the wrongful assumptions underpinning UNHCR's approach to this issue.

Article on the EU’s Lawlessness Law

In their article in the Hague Journal on the Rule of Law, Sarah Ganty, Aleksandra Ancite-Jepifanova and Dimitry Kochenov scrutinize the application of the EU's Lawlessness Law at the EU-Belarus border, where all the principles of EU law, human rights and basic civilizational standards have been suspended under the pretext of the 'instrumentalization of migrants'.

PODCASTS

The Trojan Horse Has Arrived

Andras Bozoki reflects on what has made the anti-democratic turn in Hungary so effective and discusses what has surprised him the most about the evolution of the Orban regime.

Industrial Policy and Energy Transition Amidst Geoeconomic Restructuring

David Karas was one of the guests on the Roundtable, a podcast by the Second Cold War Observatory, discussing how great power rivalry is playing out across eastern Europe.

The World of Higher Education - Illiberal Universities

Andrea Peto and Jo-Anne Dillabough (Cambridge University) were invited to talk about illiberal universities in a new episode of the World of Higher Education podcast series.

Making Sense of the EU

Zsolt Enyedi joined Ramona Coman (Université Libre de Bruxelles), to discuss how academic research can contribute to understanding various aspects of the illiberal challenge.

REVIEW OF DEMOCRACY

The Review of Democracy (RevDem) is our online journal to discuss, analyze, reflect on, and develop possible solutions to the challenges to democracy across the globe today. Check its most important publications from recent weeks:

Expansion and Reinvigoration – The Review of Democracy in Its Fourth Year

Now in its fourth year, the journal has undertaken notable changes in recent months and expanded in exciting new directions. Co-Managing Editors Ferenc Laczo and Robert Nemeth highlight these changes in their editorial.

How Charm Shapes Politics

Julia Sonnevend analyzes the main techniques politicians use to appear charming, and compares the uses of such techniques by liberal and illiberal political leaders.

Two Paths to Power

Meloni and Orbán are often treated as closely comparable political actors. However, their trajectories are widely divergent, and this is reflected in their respective understanding of both domestic political action and international alliances, Stefano Bottoni writes in his op-ed.

The Vehicle of Change is Always Politics

Sanjay Kumar discusses the recently concluded elections in India, and weighs in on some of their unique features, the emerging patterns of change, and what the election verdicts mean for democracy and politics in the Global South.

Europe’s Largest Minority Left Without Political Representation in the EP

Despite the fact that it is difficult to meaningfully address Roma inclusion without effective political representation, the representation of Roma – Europe’s largest minority – has been severely neglected across the European political space, Roland Ferkovics argues in his op-ed.

Ukraine Will Not Slide into Authoritarianism

Pat Cox, former President of the European Parliament, reflects on the new term of the European Parliament and the importance of the rise of the right in the EU. He also discusses his work in Ukraine after 2012.

Learn more about the CEU Democracy Institute