The Challenge from Within: EU Development Cooperation and the Rise of Illiberalism in Hungary and Poland

Abstract

This article examines how the emergence of 'illiberal democracy' in Hungary and Poland has impacted the behaviour of these two countries in the EU's international development policy making processes. Adapting Hirschmann's concepts of voice, exit and loyalty, the article argues that three factors may have undermined the loyalty of these member states towards EU development policy, increasing the likelihood of them using more extreme forms of voice (vetoes) or even enact partial exits from the policy area. Erosion of loyalty is seen to be more likely if (1) illiberalism actually impacts bilateral development policies in the two countries; (2) they have poor track records in influencing EU development policy; and (3) alternatives to EU level action emerge. Applying this framework, a greater erosion of loyalty is expected in the case of Hungary than for Poland. Hungary's recent actions in EU development policy are in line with the expectations from the framework: it has increasingly been using more extreme forms of voice following the 2015 refugee crisis, while Poland has been a less 'problematic' member state in the policy area.

Publication DOI: https://doi.org/10.30950/jcer.v16i2.1078
Divisions: College of Business and Social Sciences > School of Social Sciences & Humanities > Politics, History and International Relations
College of Business and Social Sciences > School of Social Sciences & Humanities > Aston Centre for Europe
Additional Information: This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
Uncontrolled Keywords: EU development cooperation,Hungary,Illiberalism,Poland,Voice and exit,Political Science and International Relations
Last Modified: 18 Mar 2024 17:45
Date Deposited: 16 Apr 2020 08:53
Full Text Link:
Related URLs: https://www.jce ... ticle/view/1078 (Publisher URL)
http://www.scop ... tnerID=8YFLogxK (Scopus URL)
PURE Output Type: Article
Published Date: 2020-07-30
Accepted Date: 2020-04-06
Authors: Szent-Iványi, Balázs (ORCID Profile 0000-0002-5883-4601)
Kugiel, Patryk

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