What is Europe?
Definitions of Europe tend to fall into two broad categories: Those presenting an immutable, historically rooted or geographic definition – and those positing a mostly ideological or programmatic construct.
The first of these sets of definitions focus heavily on history – often distant history, including epochal battles like Lepanto, Tours and the defense of Budapest (Betz and Meret 2009, 1). These visions also rely heavily on a Huntingtonian civilizational clash thesis, presenting Christian Europe in conflict with a series of (usually Islamic) enemies. This vision is frequently paired with a mainstream geographic interpretation that sees the boundaries of Europe as the Ural and Caucasus mountains (Glencross 15), the Mediterranean and the coastlines of north and western Europe. This interpretation has appeared in official EU documents and reflects a common sense geographic vision that is linked to history – the countries within these borders simply had more historical contact with each other than with external countries.
The second set of definitions describe Europe as a political project, often embodied by the European Union and a concomitant embrace of liberal democratic values. From this view, countries in the former Eastern Bloc “became” part of Europe when they embraced a particular set of ideals (perhaps best operationalized as the EU’s formal criteria for joining) and countries like Turkey and Morocco can “Europeanize” with time. While this vision may pay lip service to geographic boundaries it stresses that countries on or beyond the European periphery can join a values-based vision of “Europe.”
Neither of these definitions, each of which distinct political factions have periodically embraced, is entirely viable by itself. It is self-evident that Europe is not purely ideological and has some geographic definition – no serious observer suggests Japan or the United States is a part of Europe. Equally, Europe’s borders are not necessarily fixed by a particular set of geographical boundaries.
More controversial is Europe’s relationship with its own history. The Huntingtonian vision – often invoked with notions of blood and soil – is far from the only mechanism by which history continues to shape Europe. Europe’s history, for the most part confined within the its putative geographic borders, is defined by a struggle to remain “free from the menace of absolute rule” (Glencross 2014 – 15). Much of this, to be sure, occurred within the borders of the EU’s 28 current members or in the Council of Europe’s vaguer definition (Glencross 2014, 17) – but the nations of the former Ottoman Empire and North Africa also played a role in such struggles. This series of military and ideological confrontations, from the Reformation to the Thirty Years’ War to the World Wars, shaped the essential compromises that make today’s world possible.
A comprehensive definition of Europe must combine aspects of both ideology, history and geography: Europe is defined as a set of countries embracing external toleration and internal pluralism in response to centuries of geographically specific religious and national conflict – it is impossible for countries to fully embody the first set of criteria without having lived through the second.
What is Europe to Hungary?
The question of a definition of Europe is particularly integral to the future of Hungary – a country that could find itself on either side of putative ideological definitions of Europe. Viktor Orban’s publicly declared project to re-imagine Hungary as an “illiberal democracy” (Buzogány 2017) clashes with the liberal democratic vision of the institutions of the European Union. Instead, Orban endlessly invokes a immutable, historically rooted vision of a Christian Europe locked in a civilizational struggle with Islam.
The first iteration of this question is institutional as Orban argues, both through public speeches and government actions, with the institutions and structures of the European Union. The recent initiation of Article 7 proceedings, designed to strip countries of certain EU voting rights, against Hungary has elucidated the stakes of this confrontation. The institutions and leadership of the EU have sought to impose their definition of Europe onto Hungary. However, that does not mean Hungary is alone in its definitional challenge.
Orban’s vision of Europe is clearly not without allies. So-called “Eurosceptic” parties are often precisely skeptical of the liberalizing impulses of the EU’s ideological project – preferring more parochial national and communal visions, and also resisting the oversight of supranational regulators and anti-corruption watchdogs . More subtly, social conservative factions of the European People’s Party (of which Orban remains a member in good, if tenuous standing), like the Bavarian CSU shared aspects of Orbans historically and religiously mediated definition of Europe. Recent denunciations by EPP leader Manfred Webber mark an exception to general EPP support of Orban’s vision which was heralded by mainstream EU leaders as providing a respectable and democratic face to right wing populism (Kelleman 2015). In Poland the Law and Justice government has mirrored aspects of Orban’s attack on democratic structures and publicly supported Orban.
To Hungary, Europe is a negotiation between civilizational roots and contemporary ideology. Orban’s government seeks to emphasize the former to compensate for its abandonment of the latter as it embraces an increasingly authoritarian agenda. Orban’s personal corruption and increasingly neo-feudal economic approach also clash with EU attempts at oversight. But there is nothing permanent about this alignment. Both Hungary as a country and Orban himself were once symbols of a rising, liberal democratic Eastern Europe. Hungary as a country is a part of Europe by any reasonable geographic or historical vision. Orban’s Hungary may not be.
Bibliography
- Betz, H. G., & Meret, S. (2009). Revisiting Lepanto: the political mobilization against Islam in contemporary Western Europe. Patterns of prejudice, 43(3-4), 313-334.
- Glencross, Andrew. Politics of European Integration: Political Union or a House Divided?. John Wiley & Sons, 2014.
- Rupnik, J. (2012). How things went wrong. Journal of Democracy, 23(3), 132-137.
- Buzogány, A. (2017). Illiberal democracy in Hungary: authoritarian diffusion or domestic causation?. Democratization, 24(7), 1307-1325.
- Kelemen, R. D. (2015, June 18). EPP ♥ Orbán. Retrieved from https://www.politico.eu/article/epp-defends-hungary-orban-against-criticism/
Daniel, I liked how you used Huntington as I think its impossible to ignore that Turkey’s absence from the EU (prior to Erdogan’s pseudo-authoritarian regime) was driven by Europe’s resistance to having a country who’s population is nearly 98 percent Muslim. I made a similar point with regards to Turkey and Morocco in my post. Additionally, we can use Orban’s speech from class to add to this point as he claims that Hungary must not be overlooked due to its standing as a long time CHRISTIAN community member. Lastly, I liked your conclusion about Hungary being a clear member of Europe, yet Orban’s Hungary not necessarily being in the same situation. In the speech during class, he says that his citizens elected him and uses the “who are you to say” argument towards the rest of the EU community. Election validity aside, liberal democracy is a staple requirement for EU membership and as a result, I agree with your stance.