"The legal architecture that Fidesz spent 16 years building does not disappear overnight," says Vlad Makszimov in the latest episode of Arena Europa.
Listen at the top of this article, or find all episodes and links to Spotify and Apple Podcasts here.
Fidesz is led by Victor Orbán. The Hungarian parliamentary elections of April 2026 are the most competitive in sixteen years.
But in this episode of Arena Europa, host Vlad Makszimov, PhD Fellow at ARENA Centre for European Studies, and his colleague Alida Steigler, PhD Fellow at the University of Oslo with a law degree from Eötvös Loránd University in Budapest, argue that the result is only one part of the story.
Mostly free, but deeply unfair
Hungarian elections are, in a meaningful sense, free — people can vote, ballots are counted, results are published. But free and fair are two different things.
Makszimov and Steigler highlight three structural features of the Hungarian electoral system make it harder for the opposition Tisza party to convert lead in the polls to electoral victory. These are: a compensation mechanism that gives the leading party a double premium in seat allocation; a gerrymandered constituency map; and a media landscape dominated by pro-government voices, underpinned by state advertising.
"Independent outlets don't just face a hostile political environment — they also face a structurally distorted market," says Makszimov.
Arena Europa mini-series on Hungary
This episode is part of Arena Europa's mini-series on Hungary, examining what democratic backsliding looks like in practice, why protecting core values is so hard, and what Hungary's story tells us about Europe and its partners.
The previous episodes in the series are:
Arena Europa is a podcast series from ARENA Centre for European Studies. Find all previous episodes and listening options here.
Yet even the freedom of elections, the two suggest, is increasingly under pressure. Steigler, who votes from Norway by post, describes the anxiety her move provokes among friends and family back home.
"There is paranoia, uncertainty, lack of trust in the system," she says.
Evidence of this includes the leaking of lists containing the names of opposition supporters, she argues, which risks having "a chilling effect" on the perceived secrecy of the vote — even when the formal right to vote freely remains intact.
Institutional and political obstacles
Even a change of government, the Steigler and Makszimov argue, would leave Hungarian democracy facing an uphill battle. A Fidesz-aligned president may stall legislation. The Constitutional Court is packed. Cardinal laws — covering everything from the judiciary to media regulation — require a two-thirds supermajority to amend. The chief prosecutor, appointed in 2025, serves until 2034.
The legal "scaffolding needs to come down brick by brick," says Makszimov.
"And that requires our enthusiasm for democracy and democratic resilience."
Steigler offers a cautiously optimistic note on the question of institutional loyalty.
"I don't think the majority have been enablers out of loyalty to the party, but more out of self-preservation," she says.
Civil servants and public administrators, she suggests, may find it in their interest to serve whoever holds power — meaning that the patronage logic Fidesz built into the state could, under new leadership, work in a different direction.
Read also: Safeguarding EU values in Hungary: Navigating next steps amid increasing repression
The EU's window of opportunity
EU-level rule of law enforcement, the podcast participants argue, must continue regardless of election outcomes — and the case for it is actually stronger, not weaker, if the opposition wins.
Magyar has made bringing EU money home a central campaign promise, and EU funds are subject to legal deadlines in 2026. This, Makszimov argues, creates a window for the EU to front-load conditionality requirements in a way that a new Hungarian government could not easily refuse.
Norway, Steigler points out, has a particular role to play. Through the EEA and Norway Grants, the Norwegian state should continue chanelling support to independent civil society, investigative journalism, rights groups, watchdogs, and academic research on the rule of law — and be prepared to use that support as leverage.
"Normative pressure is important," Steigler says.
"I think Hungary should continue to be criticised for rule of law backsliding."