Farewell to Decentralisation: The Hungarian Story and its General Implications

The paper is based on a research project launched in 2012. The objective was to analyse, from a political science perspective, the main factors and circumstances of the process of territorial governance reform attempts before 2010, and the turning point after starting a strongly centralised model. The focus of the research was not so much on the objectives of the reforms, but rather on the context and the actors of the reform processes. It was presumed that the defeat of decentralisation could be explained by the weakness of the actors to preserve the formerly strong positions of local governments. The research hypothesised that, following the transition years, the gradually fading enthusiasm of parliamentary and party-political elites contributed to the failures of correctional reforms and to the limitation of institutional guarantees for safeguarding the interests of local governments. Municipalities were gradually being confined to a subaltern role in the power structure, and in addition to the loss of a significant share of their competencies and resources, their support on behalf of the local communities has also declined.
Rad se temelji na rezultatima istraživačkog projekta pokrenutog 2012. godine. Cilj je projekta bio provesti politološku analizu glavnih čimbenika i uvjeta u kojima se pokušavalo reformirati lokalno upravljanje u razdoblju prije 2010. te analizirati primjenu naglašeno centraliziranog modela i zaokreta koji je potom uslijedio. Rad nije toliko usmjeren postizanje svrha i ciljeva reformi koliko na njihov kontekst i sudionike u samome procesu. Pretpostavlja se da se neuspjeh decentralizacije može objasniti time da sudionici u procesu nisu bili dovoljno snažni kako bi održali ranije čvrstu poziciju lokalne samouprave. Autori polaze od hipoteze da je nakon tranzicijskog razdoblja došlo do postupnog gubitka entuzijazma parlamentarnih i stranačkih elita, što je nadalje pridonijelo neuspjehu reformi i ograničenju institucionalnih garancija koje su štitile interese lokalnih vlasti. Lokalne su jedinice postupno podređene u strukturi moći. Osim što su izgubile značajan dio nadležnosti i sredstava, podrška zajednica lokalnog stanovništva lokalnim vlastima također se znatno istopila.