Hajdú-Bihar Case Study: Corporatist “Partnership” or Elitist Clientelism?

Abstract

Including Hungary in our set of cases implies reference to general characteristics of the Hungarian transformation path as well as to the specific features of the Hungarian regional policy framework. The Hungarian emphasis on legalistic approaches in building institutions and civil society has already been compared with the Polish path, where symbolic social conflict and symbolic integration became an important medium of change. As a result, in the field of political and economic interest mediation a high degree of institutional differentiation and organisational consolidation in Hungary went along with only limited legitimacy and power of social actors, which were scarcely rooted in society. In Poland, a diffused and liquid party system and an only weakly institutionalised arrangement in economic interest mediation coincided with stable political “camps” and relatively legitimate and strong social actors.