The publication of the preliminary feasibility study about the construction of the possible Hungarian sections of a future high-speed railway (HSR) line connecting the major cities of the Visegrád Four states has stirred up a lot of dust in the quiet summer holiday season. The case has been of concern to the public ever since V4 ministers decided in 2018 to explore the possibility of establishing an HSR link across the region. In the following, I address the issues most frequently raised by the Hungarian and international press in relation to the initiative, with the intention of listing open-minded and debatable arguments supporting the realization of Central East Europe’s most revolutionary transport project.
Think tank founder Gerald Knaus proposes to fine Poland 5,2% billion Euros for not implementing an ECJ ruling. In fact, there are no clear rules for imposing fines. This must change.
The EU can inflict murderous financial punishment on states who don’t implement rulings of the European Court of Justice. This instrument has never been used to really hurt a member state – but legally, it can. Poland may soon become the first country to feel the pain. The political consequences could be disastrous for all concerned, including the EU itself.
While the clash between the EU and Hungary on the law for the migration of minors still hits the news, let’s set the focus for a second on the strictly legal aspects of the controversy.
It was only this year that the German public realized that there were heated debates about the electoral system hardly known to the average German citizen. At the beginning of 2021, opposition groups filed a petition with the Constitutional Court challenging the reform of the German electoral system.
Judicial confirmation battles have become particularly heated in the United States. Most recently, in April 2021, President Biden established a commission of legal scholars to examine the future of the Supreme Court.
Current fellows of the Budapest Fellowship Program visited Transylvania between 13-17 June, 2021. During their stay, they had the chance to learn about the historical, political and cultural aspects of the past and present of Hungarians in Transylvania. We spoke with Nicole Nemeth, who has been conducting research on the rights of Hungarian minorities for the past ten months, focusing primarily on Transylvania. We were curious to know how she, as a researcher, lawyer and American citizen, sees issues such as autonomy, language and minority rights.
The European Council of 24-25 June 2021 was historical but not for the reasons you might think. Where some saw a vocal defence of “common values” against the umpteenth attack from the Hungarian government, others saw a worrying evolution amid the one-sided media noise: the official advent at the highest political level of cancel culture in the EU.
It’s now some thirty years since Soviet forces withdrew from Hungary and the all the aims of the 1956 revolution were finally achieved. By the end, it was a curious relationship.
Fake science undermines the academic sphere’s integrity and the individuals’ ability to form evidence-based opinions. But what's to key to its success?
"A curiosity as to the nature of “Europe” is something that Márai pioneers." - Tibor Fischer on the great Hungarian prose writer Sándor Márai and his legacy.
German authorities began tracking „politically motivated crime” in 2001. In 2020, more such crimes were registered than in any year before. Social tensions are rising.
Tensions have again escalated in the seven-year long conflict between Russia and Ukraine. Ryan Brockhaus analyzes the long-term consequences of the recent Russian troop amassment on Ukraine's border.
President Biden recently announced that he will pull out all US troops from Afghanistan putting an end to a twenty-year-long seemingly endless conflict. This made Julius Strauss lament on the times he spent there first as a reporting journalist and later as a political officer of Her Majesty's government.
Three weeks later, Von der Leyen’s humiliation in Istanbul in front of a poor-spirited Charles Michel and a sly Erdogan is still the talk of the town, in Brussels and beyond. No wonder, this incident is much more than a storm in a glass of water or the perfect buzz for social network and meme addicts. This picture is rather the metaphor of some of the EU’s most pressing challenges and an embarrassing admission of its weakness.
While Brazil has been attacked internationally, British Columbia is cutting old-growth forest in some areas where trees date back to the Middle Ages three times faster than the Amazon rainforest.
Last December the High Court of London delivered a landmark judgment which is called to make an impression. Or rather, to enlighten on the ideological and medical drifts on a subject which does not allow an appeased debate: transsexuality and that of minors in particular. By Rodrigo Ballester.
While there has been a marked shift in focus on individual identity over the past decades, a critical and grounding element of the definition of oneself is the concept of nationhood and national identity. The theory of “nationhood,” however, is not merely where one is from, or even where their ancestors were from geographically, but is a far more intricate and nuanced conception.
Fidesz has left the European People’s Party’s (EPP) parliamentary group. The two year long drama between the EU’s Christian-Democrat umbrella party and it’s strongest performing (in terms of electoral results) single member has thus essentially come to an end. What happened is in the news: Fidesz has left the EPP’s parliamentary group.
Do we want to sail those waters preserving our democracies or are we ready to trade our rights for a couple of clicks to a trust of “illuminated” Big Techs? By Rodrigo Ballester.
Now, as the "media noise" is dying away it's worth looking back to the Hungarian-Polish veto of 2020. Was it something actually extraordinary in the way the majority of the media coverage presented? Or not at all? A unique analysis by Rodrigo Ballester.
With all eyes focused on the ongoing disputes of the 2020 United States Presidential election, there is another battle taking shape before our eyes that is set to have a significant impact on both the legal and legislative branches for decades to come.
A small project in British Columbia using videos of grizzly bears and facial recognition technology looks set to lead to a remarkable breakthrough in bear science. A fascinating story by Julius Strauss.
After a bruising US presidential election season, the inauguration of a Joe Biden Administration on January 20th appears all but certain. Despite the antics of name-calling and mudslinging on both sides of the political aisle, the results of the 2020 election will have very important implications in how the United States will interact with long-standing multi-national institutions. It is widely felt within these institutions, that America has undermined, or even abandoned much of the international order over the last four years under President Trump.
Populism has become a dirty word in politics, although in its original meaning it should be an elementary democratic virtue. What the People (“populus”) want, expect, express, should be part of the political discussion in any democracy.
Media don’t always trust their readers to form “responsible” opinions. The result is something critics call “Nanny Journalism”, which not only informs, but tries to guide the public. A view from the inside.
The currently Hungary-based American author - a Junior Fellow of the Budapest Fellowship Program - analyzes the great social division around the US elections and proposes a possible, localist solution.
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