The Orbán Enigma: How a Former Liberal Turned Hungary into a Global Illiberal Laboratory

Exposes the inner workings of Orbán’s Hungary and assesses how his style of politics has affected states and electorates worldwide.How did a simple boy from the Hungarian countryside end up leading political life in his country for decades?How, as Prime Minister of a small Central European state, did he become one of the most influential illiberal rulers in the world?How and why did Hungary turn into a neo-authoritarian laboratory? And what geopolitical game is Viktor Orbán playing between continental alliances and global powers?This book is a political biography of Orbán, but also offers first-hand historical analysis of Hungary post-1989.What started as an imperfect, albeit fully-fledged, democracy has been replaced by a new constitutional system. Orbán’s Hungary is a constantly radicalising electoral autocracy, with two intertwined role models: Putin’s Russia and Trump’s new America.The Orbán Enigma explains how Hungarian democratic backsliding has become a hot-button issue for the