and now, thanks to capitalism, we’re getting into a new debt spiral
and before you start defending the current system, ask yourself, why is it “communism’s” (i would debate that it was ever actually communist) fault that their cronyism ruined the system, but now it’s not capitalism’s?
Oh I hate the current system. Just marginally less so than the previous one, mostly due how the current system worked around the 2000s. The current debt spiral is not a coincidence, it’s the same effect in play as it was with communist era. Orbán is building up the same system we had with Kádár or even Rákosi - a bunch of state-owned or state-controlled companies organised by a central planning committe which may or may have accurate ideas of how the economy should work
When the hungarian communist saga began, there were a few incredibly stupid ideas they implemented, but the example I’d go with is “We will be the country of iron and steel” (a vas és acél országa leszünk). It was more or less forcing heavy industry on Hungary, despite Hungary having basically no reasources or reasonable ability for anything such. But, since that was what the communist party decreed, it was carried through. Make a bunch of such decisions with impunity and you have a lot of flaws in the economy, each making it do worse. It’s how a dominantly agricultural country managed to have a famine, too… which lead to a revolt and the downfall of Rákosi.
Then when Kádár replaced Rákosi, and things improved but nothing fundamentally change. We were still part of the USSR - he was kept in power by the Red Army - so there was no way to admit the communist model he inherited was failing. So they kept it chugging along, financing the crappy economy from increasing debts. Until the whole thing imploded.
And now we get to modern Hungary. Orbán is in power. He has hsf complete free reign of the country for what, 14 years? Our biggest domestic produce is now propaganda, which is probably the only thing that works properly now. He is changing every law any day as he sees fit. He’s turning most of the economy into state-owned or state-controlled companies. He can even decree how the economy should work - since they can pass any laws, he can freely control say, the price of anything (they just did enacted a new such law today). He even decreed we’ll be the country of batteries, and decided that hungary will be sporting a few dozen chinese battery factories despite us having no resources or any geographical/societal potential for such (we’ll be importing all resources for the factories and we need to use chinese/phillipine labor there). And to make this crappy economy chug along, we’re getting increasing amounts of debts to mask the inefficiencies. Which, I think, will soon implode on us.
As for your question, I’m not sure if it’s communism or cronyism that was the issue. A country is a big and complex thing, and it’s hard give hard answers, Did the Rákosi/Kádár system fail because they pushed commuism too hard, or was it because they were idiots following the wrong idea? Probably a bit of both if you ask me. The way they implemented a planned economy was a top-heavy system completely impervious to criticism. And for most of us that was the communist system playing out in reality.
There could’ve been cronyism involved, but probably wasn’t much. If anything, our current Orbán system is displaying cronyism and corruption way worse than the previous ones. Funnily enough it’s driving the nostaliga for the old system back, but it’s also not counteracting the propaganda to make people not keep voting this shit back every 4 years.
the steel and battery thing is a parallel that i didn’t connect, that is a very good point. i just keep stressing out about the poisoning of the surrounding areas. hungarians are already pretty “relaxed” about safety regulations, the chinese are even worse
i would disagree that they pushed communism at all, in marx’s theory democracy should be not just in politics, but in the workplace too, but having one party and they deciding what everyone does (and if you disagree, you disappear) is very counter to that
and that was a problem from the very first election the russians had, after the revolution - lenin (who i think was well intended) didn’t like the results, that the moderates won, so he forced his way (which was a fatal mistake to be clear). marx did describe a temporary, transitional phase of “workers’s dictatorship” before the actual communism, and the bolsheviks latched on to that hard, and kept it going, and eventually this was exported to hungary as well - “the singular party knows what the people want and need, or else”
there are some famous examples of soviets appointing people to important positions because of how loyal they were, like guy who ran the chernobyl experiment, trofim lysenko who caused mass starvation with an untested agricultural theory, or the general who blew up himself and a few hundred other people trying to rush a space rocket launch for the anniversary of the bolshevik revolution, even though nobody told him to do so
fortunately hungary, the “happiest barrack” didn’t have it this bad, but it was common that only party members got positions, and often they knew nothing about the subject. a biology teacher told me about how back in the day, the leader of the local farming collective didn’t even know what protein was
imo the current system is worse because they don’t even put the incompetent people in power to actually do the job, they only do it to enable them to steal as much as possible
and now, thanks to capitalism, we’re getting into a new debt spiral
and before you start defending the current system, ask yourself, why is it “communism’s” (i would debate that it was ever actually communist) fault that their cronyism ruined the system, but now it’s not capitalism’s?
Oh I hate the current system. Just marginally less so than the previous one, mostly due how the current system worked around the 2000s. The current debt spiral is not a coincidence, it’s the same effect in play as it was with communist era. Orbán is building up the same system we had with Kádár or even Rákosi - a bunch of state-owned or state-controlled companies organised by a central planning committe which may or may have accurate ideas of how the economy should work
When the hungarian communist saga began, there were a few incredibly stupid ideas they implemented, but the example I’d go with is “We will be the country of iron and steel” (a vas és acél országa leszünk). It was more or less forcing heavy industry on Hungary, despite Hungary having basically no reasources or reasonable ability for anything such. But, since that was what the communist party decreed, it was carried through. Make a bunch of such decisions with impunity and you have a lot of flaws in the economy, each making it do worse. It’s how a dominantly agricultural country managed to have a famine, too… which lead to a revolt and the downfall of Rákosi.
Then when Kádár replaced Rákosi, and things improved but nothing fundamentally change. We were still part of the USSR - he was kept in power by the Red Army - so there was no way to admit the communist model he inherited was failing. So they kept it chugging along, financing the crappy economy from increasing debts. Until the whole thing imploded.
And now we get to modern Hungary. Orbán is in power. He has hsf complete free reign of the country for what, 14 years? Our biggest domestic produce is now propaganda, which is probably the only thing that works properly now. He is changing every law any day as he sees fit. He’s turning most of the economy into state-owned or state-controlled companies. He can even decree how the economy should work - since they can pass any laws, he can freely control say, the price of anything (they just did enacted a new such law today). He even decreed we’ll be the country of batteries, and decided that hungary will be sporting a few dozen chinese battery factories despite us having no resources or any geographical/societal potential for such (we’ll be importing all resources for the factories and we need to use chinese/phillipine labor there). And to make this crappy economy chug along, we’re getting increasing amounts of debts to mask the inefficiencies. Which, I think, will soon implode on us.
As for your question, I’m not sure if it’s communism or cronyism that was the issue. A country is a big and complex thing, and it’s hard give hard answers, Did the Rákosi/Kádár system fail because they pushed commuism too hard, or was it because they were idiots following the wrong idea? Probably a bit of both if you ask me. The way they implemented a planned economy was a top-heavy system completely impervious to criticism. And for most of us that was the communist system playing out in reality.
There could’ve been cronyism involved, but probably wasn’t much. If anything, our current Orbán system is displaying cronyism and corruption way worse than the previous ones. Funnily enough it’s driving the nostaliga for the old system back, but it’s also not counteracting the propaganda to make people not keep voting this shit back every 4 years.
the steel and battery thing is a parallel that i didn’t connect, that is a very good point. i just keep stressing out about the poisoning of the surrounding areas. hungarians are already pretty “relaxed” about safety regulations, the chinese are even worse
i would disagree that they pushed communism at all, in marx’s theory democracy should be not just in politics, but in the workplace too, but having one party and they deciding what everyone does (and if you disagree, you disappear) is very counter to that
and that was a problem from the very first election the russians had, after the revolution - lenin (who i think was well intended) didn’t like the results, that the moderates won, so he forced his way (which was a fatal mistake to be clear). marx did describe a temporary, transitional phase of “workers’s dictatorship” before the actual communism, and the bolsheviks latched on to that hard, and kept it going, and eventually this was exported to hungary as well - “the singular party knows what the people want and need, or else”
there are some famous examples of soviets appointing people to important positions because of how loyal they were, like guy who ran the chernobyl experiment, trofim lysenko who caused mass starvation with an untested agricultural theory, or the general who blew up himself and a few hundred other people trying to rush a space rocket launch for the anniversary of the bolshevik revolution, even though nobody told him to do so
fortunately hungary, the “happiest barrack” didn’t have it this bad, but it was common that only party members got positions, and often they knew nothing about the subject. a biology teacher told me about how back in the day, the leader of the local farming collective didn’t even know what protein was
imo the current system is worse because they don’t even put the incompetent people in power to actually do the job, they only do it to enable them to steal as much as possible