Hungary beware: authoritarianism can be checked, but it is rarely dismissed with a single blow | Blanche Leridon

Poland has shown that it takes far more time and energy to rebuild a country’s rule of law than it does to dismantle it

“Historic” is an adjective used too often these days, at the risk of trivialising the word and diluting its substance. But Sunday’s Hungarian election, which marked the fall of Viktor Orbán after 16 years in power, deserves the label. The chief architect of European illiberalism, the man who dismantled Hungary’s rule of law, presided over a system of endemic corruption and stood as an avowed enemy of Ukraine is gone.

The scale of the moment is undeniable. For Ukraine and for the European project, the relief is palpable. With an election turnout of 79.5% – the highest the country has seen since the fall of the USSR – and a strong mobilisation of the youth vote, the Hungarian people have delivered a clear mandate for change. Despite the explicit support of Donald Trump and the Maga-sphere, despite an electoral map gerrymandered in his favour and a locked-down media landscape, Orbán lost. What is more, he lost so decisively that he was forced to concede immediately. There is, without a doubt, reason for enthusiasts of liberal democracy to celebrate – a “Budapest spring” in its own right.

Blanche Leridon is director of French studies at Institut Montaigne, an author and a lecturer at Sciences Po Paris