Partisan-Descriptive Ethnic Minority Representation and Regime Support

Abstract

In recent years, the Roma in Hungary have faced massive tensions with ethnic Hungarians, and the group remains in a marginalized position, with limited access to the labour market, education and housing (The Economist, 7 August 2013).¹ While the reasons for the conflict are much more complex, the lacking political integration of the group does not help its integration into the Hungarian society. At the 2006 national election, the ethnic minority party ‘MCF Union of the Roma’ had only received 0.08 per cent of the vote and no representation, despite an estimated population share of (at least) about 2 per cent (see Appendix C).²