Early consolidation and performance crisis: The majoritarian-consensus democracy debate in Hungary

The current period of early consolidation has been a turning point in East-Central European democratisation. It has provoked, however a majoritarian-consensual debate, first of all in Hungary, as is discussed in this article in a shorter theoretical and in a longer 'empirical' part. The introduction deals with the conceptual framework, followed by its application as a Hungarian case study, in an East-Central European context. It is argued that Hungary may be the model for the competing conceptions of democracy in political practice, since (i) an extended version of consensual democracy was established in the early 1990s but opposed by the first government; (ii) there was an attempt by the second government to complete consensual democracy but it failed; (iii) an abrupt turn it-as made towards majoritarian democracy in the late 1990s by the third government. In Hungary there has been a long debate on majoritarian versus consensual democracy, involving politicians, experts and the general public. Finally, some broad conclusions can be drawn about the troubles of the young democracies.