Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Political Science at the Dawn of the 21st Century
- Austria
- Croatia
- Czech Republic
- Finland
- France
- Germany
- Greece
- Hungary
- Political Science in Hungary: Towards Diversification and Professionalization
- Iceland
- Ireland
- Italy
- Latvia
- Lithuania
- Macedonia
- Moldova
- Norway
- Poland
- Portugal
- Romania
- Russia
- Slovakia
- Slovenia
- Spain
- Sweden
- Switzerland
- Turkey
- United Kingdom
- Biographical notes about the authors
Political Science in Hungary: Towards Diversification and Professionalization
from Hungary
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 12 January 2018
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Political Science at the Dawn of the 21st Century
- Austria
- Croatia
- Czech Republic
- Finland
- France
- Germany
- Greece
- Hungary
- Political Science in Hungary: Towards Diversification and Professionalization
- Iceland
- Ireland
- Italy
- Latvia
- Lithuania
- Macedonia
- Moldova
- Norway
- Poland
- Portugal
- Romania
- Russia
- Slovakia
- Slovenia
- Spain
- Sweden
- Switzerland
- Turkey
- United Kingdom
- Biographical notes about the authors
Summary
Summary: Modern political science in Hungary – as in the whole Eastern and Central European region – could not start before the late 1980s, since the undemocratic conditions of the communist regimes as well as their tight ideological control on the academia simply did not allow genuine political science research to flourish. The 1990s hallmark the years of early developments. We argue that the past decade of Hungarian political science has been characterized by a gradual movement towards professionalization and internalization. It is not to say that the developments have been utterly smooth and without setbacks. We will show that in the past years economic and political changes have indeed affected political science and higher education in a negative way. Still, we are moderately optimistic about the prospects of political science in Hungary and hope that the trend of positive developments will ultimately prevail.
Introduction
Modern political science in Hungary – as in the whole Eastern and Central European region – could not start before the late 1980s, since the undemocratic conditions of the communist regimes as well as their tight ideological control on the academia simply did not allow genuine political science research to flourish. What has the discipline achieved in the past less than three decades? Has it been possible to catch up with other social sciences, like sociology or economics, which have a longer history, and therefore a better disciplinary organization, with more departments, researchers, journals and achievements? Or is political science still “in the making,” as Arató and Tóth (2010) argued a few years ago?
We believe that political science in Hungary has undergone a remarkable development since the late 1980s and early 1990s when the fundaments of the discipline were laid down. Note that it is not more than 25 years ago when the first handbooks were published; the first par excellence political science research programmes got started; the first university departments were founded.
The 1990s hallmark the years of early developments. On the one hand, this was the period when different research schools and paradigmatic approaches took form; and this marks an important step in the development of the discipline.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Political Science in Europe at the Beginning of the 21st Century , pp. 165 - 188Publisher: Jagiellonian University PressPrint publication year: 2015