In his article published by Hungarian daily Magyar Nemzet, Hungarian PM Viktor Orban touches on issues such as the political tactics of liberals, the future of Christian democracy, as well as the state of Europe and the EU.

Illiberal, conservative, Christian democratic, liberal

„The struggle for spiritual sovereignty and intellectual freedom that we launched years ago in Tusnadfurdo is gradually bearing fruit. Rebellion against political correctness, against the dictates of loopy liberal doctrine, modes of expression and style is flowing in an ever broader channel. An increasing number of people are demonstrating growing courage in freeing themselves from the shackles of the suffocatingly restrictive, solely approved mode of speech, the only accepted concept of democracy, and the only endorsed interpretation of Europe and the West,” writes Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban at the beginning of his article published by daily Magyar Nemzet. „The escape attempt is not simple,” he added, however, „the rebellion against liberal intellectual oppression” is growing stronger.

„It seems that conservative and Christian democratic parties and political movements can finally escape the deadly embrace of liberals. From whatever heights they are declared, statements such as there is no such thing as illiberal democracy are now being recorded in the book of political stupidity. Conservative political thinkers have finally summoned up courage and are using a clarity of thought – which even surpasses the elegance of mathematical reasoning – to prove that liberalism and conservatism represent two irreconcilable positions in political theory. They have shown the flaws in the arguments of those who wish to place conservatism under the umbrella of liberalism. To put it kindly, errors are committed by those who claim that the separation of the branches of power, civil and political freedoms, the protection of private property and governance within boundaries – meaning the rule of law – can only be conceived within the intellectual confines of liberalism, and can only be implemented through liberal democracy,” PM Orban argued.

„The modern-day conflation of conservatism and liberalism can be traced back to conservatives and liberals putting aside their fundamental – and then still obvious – differences in their great battle against totalitarianism,” the Hungarian premier continued, adding that politicians, journalists and even scholars have alternated between conservative and liberal ideas and concepts with ease for around two decades in the conviction that there is nothing wrong with that. 

„Now, however, the situation has changed, and matters have taken a serious turn. What earlier seemed like a minor intellectual error, a bad position, a tolerable deformity, now prevents clarity of vision on important issues. It conceals the fact that today liberalism and liberals once more pose the greatest challenge and opposition to conservatives and Christian democrats. The basic tenets of Christian democratic and liberal thinking are diametrically opposed to each other. In their attacks, liberals take aim at the very things that are most important to us, the cornerstones of the political order we yearn for, the values at the core of conservative-Christian democratic heritage – such as nation, family and religious tradition,” Viktor Orban pointed out. „There is a recognition that if things continue like this, then Christian-conservative forces will be assisting in the weakening of nations, the elimination of religious traditions, and the debasement and mockery of the family. Here, in Central Europe, this reckoning has reached the level of public and state policy. Here the red warning light has lit up, we have activated the emergency brake, and – primarily in Poland and Hungary – we have rung the alarm bells. Here, there has been enough strength to pull the European People s Party (EPP) – the political home of Christian democrats and conservatives in Europe – back from the brink of the abyss. Here, there has been a survival instinct strong enough and a voice loud enough to declare that we must not put the future of European Christian democracy at risk – not even for the sake of such an understandable German demand that Brussels coalition party structure should conform to that in Berlin to allow for harmonising , the two centres of power in the easiest way,” he explained.

Viktor Orban argued that „liberals believe that every country – including those which are not currently being governed as liberal democracies – must be forced to accept that form of governance. By contrast, Christian democrats reject that form of foreign policy, because in their view societies are held together and maintain peace in a variety of ways and, as has recently been proved by the Arab Spring, liberal democracy can bring chaos and collapse, and do more harm than good. This is one reason we are rooting for another victory for Donald Trump, because we are very familiar with the foreign policy of US Democratic administrations, built as it is on moral imperialism. We have tasted it, albeit under duress. We didn t like it, and we don t want a second helping.”

„Our policies also diverge on the issue which, in Brussels, is elegantly referred to as subsidiarity,” PM Orban pointed out, adding that „according to liberals, it is best to cede our national governments powers to international organisations – and as many of those powers as possible”. Christian democrats, however,” can see that such organisations are inevitably prone to despotism which they tend to call the rule of law but which is simply the rule of blackmail ; they are vulnerable to infiltration by Soros-style networks, and if they are forced to choose between the citizens of individual national communities and the big guns of global capital, in the end they will always opt for the latter. The citizens of European nations soon realised that today s European institutions do not serve them, but the interests of George Soros and his ilk. They are not prepared to swallow Brussels hogwash that the reason a financial speculator enriching himself through the ruin of others is roaming the corridors of Brussels is simply to offer his altruistic help to Europe.”

Regarding the issue of migration, Viktor Orban continued, liberal and comservative politics also appear to clash.

„According to disoriented liberals, there is no reason to fear mass immigration, or even a flood of immigration; and there is no reason to fear it even if the national and religious traditions of the uninvited guests are starkly different from ours, or indeed opposed to ours. We are told that terrorism, crime, anti-Semitism and the emergence of parallel societies are only temporary irregularities, or perhaps the birth pangs of a radiant new world about to come into being. But the conservative-Christian democratic camp rejects such an unpredictable experiment on societies and individuals, because they believe that the risks of chronic intercultural tensions and violence are unacceptably high. Unless we ignore the laws of mathematics, it is not difficult to see the reality of a certain and slow, but accelerating population replacement.”

There are also irreconcilable differences in education policy. According to conservatives, we must focus on characteristic national traditions. Schools must reinforce the sex identity that the Creator has conferred on each child at birth, and should also protect the ideal and values of the family. Also, minors should be kept away from gender ideology and rainbow propaganda. Liberals see this as medieval backwardness at best, and as clerical fascism at worst. In their view the purpose of school education can only be to lead children towards their inner selves, making them capable of self-realisation, introducing them to the beauties of the universal political order, therefore peeling away from them the enveloping layers of tradition inherited from the lives of their great-grandparents, grandparents and parents. 

According to Viktor Orban, the political strategy of liberals is based on dividing the world of politics into two segments. „On one side are liberals, who are honest, good people and who accept that all honest, good people must come to the same political beliefs and conclusions on the basis of the rules of reason; and on the other side are those who have strayed from the field of liberalism because their ignorance or primordial instinctive hatred prevents them from moving forward with the times and with history – the self-evident goal of which is to lead us to the happiness provided by liberal world values, world peace and world governance. Therefore, from the viewpoint of loopy liberals, a single group is formed by the following: Trump and Johnson; Christians standing on the foundations of the New Testament and Jews standing on the foundations of the Old Testament; all kinds of ayatollahs; dictators of every rank and order, Communists and Nazis; and, without any doubt, we Central European Christian democrats. This is an idea that s being echoed by 90 per cent of the Western media.”

We, Christian democrats, however, use our own intellectual system to describe the universe of politics. With due modesty one can say that this is more intelligent than the currently dominant but narrow-minded liberal depiction of the world, which now governs international organisations. 

The only chance for Christian democracy is if it engages in an open intellectual and political fight. If it stands up for itself and articulates the four statements that can change the whole of European politics: our basic national and Christian principles are not liberal; they came into being before liberalism; they stand in opposition to liberalism; today liberalism is destroying them. 

Europe and its place in the world

In the middle of the first decade of the new millennium, 81 per cent of all investment in the world economy came from the West and 18 per cent from the East. Today, just over a decade later, 58 per cent of all investment comes from the East and 40 per cent from the West. The pace of technological development is hard to grasp. Europe, which envisions technological competition based in the economy of the civilian sphere, is so far behind that it has lost sight of the United States and China, which are competing on the basis of the economy of the military sphere. And since all epoch-making technology and innovation has arrived in civilian economic systems from research for armed forces, Europe cannot even enter this competition until it has an army of a size which can be taken seriously – in other words, a common army.

Barely twenty years ago, the European Union announced that within ten years the euro would be competing with the dollar in the world economy, we would create a single market from Lisbon to Vladivostok, and Europe would storm to the forefront in the global race that is technological progress. These were the goals, and this is what happened: the dollar has knocked out the euro; we are using sanctions to cut ourselves off from the Russian market; and we are buying important technologies from our competitors.

In 2012 the European Commission s Directorate-General for Research and Innovation noted that in 2010 the EU had contributed 29 per cent to total world production, and predicted that by 2050 this would fall to 15-17 per cent. Today in 2020 this has already happened – so thirty years earlier than predicted. The Directorate-General also predicted that demographic problems would lead the European Union to support increased migration. Another estimate was that by 2050, 20 per cent of the population of Europe – excluding Russia – would be Muslim. Today it seems likely that by 2050 we can expect majority Muslim populations in major Western cities.

It comes as no surprise that Central European countries have chosen a different future, free of immigration and migration. Nor is it surprising that the focus of V4 policy is on improving competitiveness, even if Brussels wants to move in precisely the opposite direction: climate goals pursued to the point of absurdity, a social Europe, a common tax system, a multicultural society.

It comes as little surprise that what was foreseeable with a little common sense has indeed happened. The West has lost its attractiveness in the eyes of Central Europe, and the way we arrange our lives does not seem very desirable to the West. In the coming years we need to keep Europe together whilst acknowledging that there seems to be no chance of a change in this historical trend. They cannot force their will upon us, and we are unable to shift them from their current intellectual and political track. Even in this impasse we need to find a way to cooperate, until Europe s future is decided in Italy: to the right or the left. The withdrawal of the United Kingdom may represent a decline in the power of those who support national sovereignty, oppose migration and believe in economies based on competition. But these forces have succeeded in preventing Brussels intervention to push the Polish Christian democrats out of power. The right wing in Croatia and Serbia has stabilised its positions for years to come, the Slovenians are also on the right track towards achieving this, and the survival chances of Bulgaria s ruling party and premier – who are under an all-out attack – are not bad, either. PM Babis and Fidesz are holding up, and the new Slovak government has not left the V4 camp. The rule of law which should instead be called a rule of blackmail system has not been introduced. Although the Netherlands is conspicuously distancing itself from the EU and its position is increasingly reminiscent of the United Kingdom s pre-Brexit stance, we have succeeded in keeping them in for the time being. We have also managed to sustain the survival chances of the eurozone, to prevent the collapse of stricken southern states, and to preserve Central Europe s economic dynamism, and we have yet to be trapped between the grindstones of the global struggle between China and the United States.

We must remain on the path of agreements and compromises, and – no matter what the European Parliament says – we must implement the grandiose financial and budgetary plans that we successfully finalised during the summer. This is possible, providing that the Germans succeed in managing the process of installing Chancellor Merkel s successor without exceeding Level 4 on the Richter scale.