The Revolt of the Provinces: Anti-Gypsyism and Right-Wing Politics in Hungary

289 Pages·2018·3.17 MB·English

by  Kristóf Szombati

The Revolt of the Provinces
DISLOCATIONS
General Editors: August Carbonella, Memorial University of Newfoundland; Don
Kalb, University of Bergen & Utrecht University; Linda Green, University of Arizona
The immense dislocations and suff ering caused by neoliberal globalization, the
retreat of the welfare state in the last decades of the twentieth century, and the
heightened military imperialism at the turn of the twenty- rst century have
raised urgent questions about the temporal and spatial dimensions of power.
Through stimulating critical perspectives and new and cross-disciplinary frame-
works, which re ect recent innovations in the social and human sciences, this
series provides a forum for politically engaged, ethnographically informed, and
theoretically incisive responses.
For a full volume listing, please see back matt er
The Revolt of the Provinces
Anti-Gypsyism and Right-Wing Politics
in Hungary
Kristóf Szombati
_
berghahn
N E W Y O R K • O X F O R D
www.berghahnbooks.com
First published in 2018 by
Berghahn Books
www.berghahnbooks.com
© 2018 Kristóf Szombati
All rights reserved.
Except for the quotation of short passages
for the purposes of criticism and review, no part of this book
may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or
mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information
storage and retrieval system now known or to be invented,
without writt en permission of the publisher.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A C.I.P cataloging record is available from the Library of Congress
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 978-1-78533-896-0 hardback
ISBN 978-1-78533-897-7 ebook
To my parents, Zsuzsa and Béla, who taught me the virtue of endurance.

CONTENTS
List of Tables and Maps viii
Foreword ix
 Ivan Szelenyi
Preface xiv
Introduction 1
Chapter 1 Historic Contextualization:
Gypsies, Magyars, and the State 25
Chapter 2 Popular Racism in the Northeast:
The Case of Gyngyspata 55
Chapter 3 Redemptive Anti-Gypsyism:
The Transposition of Struggles from
the Social to the Political Domain 98
Chapter 4 Right-Wing Rivalry and the Dual State 143
Chapter 5 The Limits of Racist Mobilization:
The Case of Devecser 173
Chapter 6 From Racism to Ultranationalism:
Jobbiks Transformation through an
Ethnographic Lens 210
Epilogue 232
References 242
Index 255
Photographs follow page 126
vii
TABLES AND MAPS
Table 2.1. En gros price of grapes as compared to in ation
and other fruit items (19912010). 60
Table 2.2. Number of individual agricultural producers
by region (1991, 2000, 2007). 61
Table 2.3. Number of viticultural producers by region
(2000, 2007). 62
Table 2.4. Number of people unemployed in Gyngyspata
(20002013); growth years in italic and in ection point
underlined. 63
Table 2.5. Criminal statistics for Gyngyspata (19902012);
years when the military post was dismantled (1995) and
the criminal report was published (2006) in bold. 69
Table 5.1. Number of people unemployed in Devecser
(20002013); growth years in italic and in ection point
underlined. 185
Map 2.1. Map of Hungary featuring Gyngyspata. 57
Map 2.2. Map of Gyngyspata featuring the border zone
(marked with stripes) and other landmarks. 85
Map 5.1. Map of Hungary featuring Devecser. 175
Map 5.2. Map of Devecser featuring the area contaminated
by the red mud spill (marked with stripes) and other
landmarks. 192
viii
FOREW ORD
Ivan Szelenyi
This is a carefully researched book and may be the best one I have
read about the rise of the New Rightnot only in postcommunist
Europe, but in Europe as such. Its empirical focus is on the last twen-
ty- ve years in Hungary and on how anti-Roma sentiments were
exploited by the political Right to build its base and establish a polit-
ical hegemony, which at this point looks unchallengeable. Szombati
shows that it is not eternal racism that is being appealed to. The
racist component of far-right politics cannot be taken for granted. Us-
ing Roma as the enemy served a purpose at one time, but when it
did not do so any longer the Right broadened its scope, found new
others beyond Gypsies, and launched into what the author calls
ultranationalism.
With two well-documented local case studies, Szombati shows
how anti-Roma prejudices may or may not lead to anti-Roma mobi-
lization. In both cases, the structural preconditions for racist mobi-
lization were present (namely, the devastating impact of neoliberal
globalization), but what made the diff erence was a micropolitics em-
bedded in slightly diff erent trajectories and experiences. These are
interesting cases and the conclusions are persuasive. The Gypsy
problem can be solved (or perhaps bett er put, managed) with
appropriate policies.
The author elegantly links the success of racist mobilization to
political economy: racism is a useful tool for mobilization where an
ethnic majority feels itself to be on the losing side, even if the
ethnic minority is no winner at all. Under such conditions it be-
comes possible to blame others for our su ff ering.
I agree: the unspeakable conditions many Roma live in since the
mid or late 1980s in former communist countries are not the same as
they have always been and cannot be a tt ributed to eternal racism.
Although we have solid evidence that Roma were since time imme-
morial discriminated against, at least in Europe, their social stand-
ix