The new Hungarian Media Law

Hungary has a lot to thank to the new law on Medias. Although there weren’t many articles written about the successful European Presidency, at least we made it to the international press with the new law: almost all major European and American daily and weekly papers published harsh critics on the new Media law, which was passed by the governing party having a majority on the parliament (Fidesz-KDNP), a law that has upset not only the opposition.

All against one, one against all!

Criticism coming from different directions - which were mostly pinned on the fact that the law breaches several democratic principles (freedom of press, pluralism) – were, in its majority, unheard by the governing party. Fidesz, sticking to the law, has phrased its objections on several occasions, claiming the accusation to be unfounded because foreign press has reacted so quickly that they must not have had the time to read the text of the law thoroughly. With this statement the government has put in jeopardy the professionalism of papers like Le Monde, The New York Times and The Economist. Fidesz’s second objection was that the law has just come into force so its practical effects on the Medias cannot yet be judged by anyone. Hearing this argument the alarm in our head went off, even without the thorough knowledge of the text, because the rule of law is about creating laws in a way that their outcome in the regulated area is predictable before they become operative. It has to be assured preliminary with checks and balances that a measure is not contradicting any constitutional or European norms so that its practical use or the decision of certain individuals would not be pointing afterwards to the fault of the lawmaker.
Wide range of interpretations and flexible paragraphs

So what is this law about and why has it stirred so much controversy in and outside of Hungary? There has already been a law on Medias before 2010, which was to supervise and to control to a certain extent the different areas of the Media while at the same time preserving the freedom of the press and pluralism. Two principles that, according to critics, are endangered with the enforcement of the new measure. The new law regulates the Media much more than the previous one did. Besides, the text of the law can be interpreted extensively and its phrasing can lead to its political abuse. It is not clear for example what is considered to be against “collective morality” and “human dignity” in the Media.

An unbalanced composition of the Media supervising authorities for outbalanced information

Parallel to the birth of the new Media law a new authority was created. It is not a coincidence that the Media supervising authority’s power was also very controversial. The law does not draw clear lines and boundaries because the exact interpretation is left by the lawmaker to the executor of the law. However, most of the criticism is not about their power but about the composition of the supervising authorities. The five members of the Media Supervising Authorities are exclusively composed of the governing party’s people by the governing Fidesz-KDNP coalition. Despite the fact that the essence of the regulation of the Media would be to inform the public in an outbalanced way, it is precisely the Supervising Authorities’ body where this balance is absent and where all opposing views are excluded.

Criticism from the EU

The controversy about the new Hungarian Media Law reached the European Committee too. The Commissioner responsible for the Media, Neelie Kroes expressed her disapproval on three technical points, all of which breached the principle of proportionality. Those were, since then, corrected in the law. It is true that Neelie Kroes does not mention in her letter that the composition of the Media Supervising Authorities would breach democratic principles. This can be explained by a simple fact: the composition of such authority is not regulated by European law, since nobody thought of creating a measure in Europe clearly stating that the regulation of the Media should not be determined by party politics.

For this reason, instead of the European Committee it was a number of European Deputies that expressed their criticism during the Hungarian Prime Minister’s, Viktor Orbán’s visit to Brussels. The harshest critics came from Daniel Cohn-Bendit, Green Party Deputy: he drew Viktor Orban’s attention to the fact that in a democracy the Media should be supervising politics and not the other way around.

Many say that the fuss about the Media law is excessive and that the whole issue was only treated so exhaustively because it intersected with Hungary taking over the European Presidency. It is well possible that if Hungary does not take on the Presidency at that exact time then foreign press and the EU overlook the questionable law. Also, since the opposition in Hungary is at its weakest now, there would have been no one to object. However, due to the timing a number of flaws came to surface, few of which have been corrected by the national Parliament.

It is a fact that some of the criticism has later on been proven wrong but the grand majority were very constructive. It is possible that the European Presidency also influenced the scale of the scandal. But it could be that along other measures of the Orbán government - such as the retroactively enforced bank taxation, or the reduction of the power of the Constitutional Court - , the new law on Media was the last drop and it was expectable that foreign democracies admonish Hungary to respect democratic principles.