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by Mária Csanádi (Author), Márton Gerő (Author), Miklós Hajdu (Author)
In this book, six researchers from different professional backgrounds examine the dynamics of the development and reproduction of an authoritarian system. The chapters empirically show how the authoritarian system gradually captures -- and diffuses into -- the society's and the economy's subsystems; describe how it captures the national, intermediate, and micro level sub-structures and reproduces itself as it expands. It empirically analyzes the mechanisms, instruments, and institutions of political capture. The authors distinguish between and explore welfare, development, and recombinant projects and their interrelationships. They study the existence of political favoritism in the case the politically connected enterprises based on an analysis of the corruption risk of 242,183 public tenders. They detail the crony system's functioning and political connections' network aspects in the rapid enrichment of politically connected enterprises. The book exemplifies the vulnerability of democratic institutions to authoritarian and populist regimes, including the tendency for institutionalized corruption to develop systemically, its destructive power in the public and business sectors, and the built and natural environment.
This conceptually synthetic and empirically rich book demonstrates the vulnerability of democratic settings to authoritarianism and populism. Six scholars from various professional fields explore here the metamorphosis of a political party into a centralized authoritarian system. Viktor Orbán and his Fidesz party needed less than ten years to accomplish this transformation in Hungary. In 2010, after winning a majority that could make changes in the constitution - two-thirds of the parliamentary seats, they evolved and stabilized the system, which produced again the two-thirds majority in 2014 and 2018.
The authors reveal how a democratic setting can be used as a device for political capture. They show how a political entity managed to penetrate almost all sub-fields of the economy to arrive at institutionalized corruption, and how the centralized power structure reproduces itself. With the help of a powerful empirical apparatus--among others analyses of more than 220,000 public tenders, redistributions of state subsidies, and the interconnectedness of those privileged with the political elite -- the authors detail the functioning of a crony system and the network aspects of political connections in the rapid enrichment of politically-linked businesses. Their studies demonstrate the role of political capture in this redistribution and how this capture leads to a new social stratification.
Author Biography
Maria Csanádi is DSc in political science, scientific advisor, emerita at Institute of Economics of the Centre for Economic and Regional Studies in Hungary. Márton Gerő is Assistant professor of sociology at the Eötvös Loránd University, Faculty of Social Sciences and a research fellow at the Centre for Social Sciences. Miklós Hajdu is MSc in survey statistics, assistant lecturer at the Corvinus University of Budapest. Imre Kovách is DSc in sociology, Scientific advisor, Institute of Sociology CSS, professor, University of Debrecen, head of Sociology PhD program. István János Tóth is a senior research fellow at the Institute of Economics of Centre for Economic and Regional Studies at the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and managing director of Corruption Research Center Budapest (CRCB). Mihály Laki, DSc of economics is scientific advisor, emeritus, Institute of Economics. From 1968 he was working at the Institute for Economic and Market Research (KOPINT), and from 1982 at the Research Institute of Cooperatives. He had been a research fellow of the Institute of Economics since 1989. His research field covers empirical and theoretical research on issues on firm behavior, privatization, entrepreneurship and market structures in transitional countries, especially in Hungary.
