Challenging the Illiberal Social Contract: The Discourse of the New Hungarian Opposition

The illiberal social contract (SC) the Orbán regime built since 2010 received an unexpected and potent challenger in 2024. Péter Magyar and the Tisza party radically contest the Orbán regime's illiberal SC and consciously offer a democratic alternative. In this presentation, I will outline the elements of this democratizing counter-discourse and the questions they raise in the conceptual-theoretical context of SCs. It is noteworthy here that the challenger to the regime, Péter Magyar and the Tisza Party speak directly about social contracts, thus referring to a radical change. But the implied revolutionary change has not been invoked verbatim for quite some time. However, this changed by the turn of 2024/25, and by demanding early elections, the discourse of accelerating political time also appeared. The main characteristic of the frontier defining the counter-discourse of the Tisza is that it thematizes and denies polarization while rejecting Fidesz and the left-right dichotomy considered its foundation, including the "old" opposition. In addition, Tisza builds on religious discursive elements (like hope and love) while bringing back the nation as an integrative element of a new SC. While the example of the Orbán regime shows that the existence of a SC is not a value-in-itself, the case of the Tisza provides insight into the discursive problem of revolutionary change (democratization) and the role of using the language of the SC in that process. With what discursive strategies (including the mobilization of emotions, even a religious emotional-linguistic infrastructure) is such a revolutionary transition possible? Does a "SC" as a conceptual tool have a role? Will the rejection of polarization as a political strategy not lead to an increase in polarization, and how might this affect the creation and resilience of a new, now democratic, social contract?