Hungary: New Government Needs to Restore Rule of Law - Human Rights Watch

Human Rights Watch

Hungary: New Government Needs to Restore Rule of Law - Suspend Sovereignty Protection Office; End Rule by Decree; Restore Assembly Rights

Date: April 13, 2026

ISSE Summary: Human Rights Watch’s recent analysis of Hungary, released in the context of its latest national elections in April 2026, offers a stark illustration of how emergency-derived governance can become embedded within a formally democratic system. The report argues that Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s government has, over time, leveraged crisis-driven authorities, initially justified by migration pressures, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the regional fallout from Russia’s war in Ukraine, to consolidate executive control and reshape the political playing field.

The report illuminates a structural shift: emergency powers in Hungary have beyond being exceptional tools deployed in response to discrete crises, evolving into durable mechanisms of governance. Legal frameworks introduced under emergency conditions have enabled the executive to rule by decree, sideline parliamentary oversight, and weaken institutional checks. While some emergency declarations have formally lapsed, the authorities and practices they enabled have often persisted in modified or reconstituted forms.

Human Rights Watch details how this transformation has had direct electoral implications. The regulatory and institutional environment in Hungary, shaped in part through emergency-era legal changes, has constrained media independence, limited space for political opposition, and skewed the informational landscape in favor of the ruling party. The result has been a subtler recalibration of democratic competition, in which electoral processes continue but operate on increasingly uneven terrain.

A key feature of Hungary’s trajectory is the strategic use of legal continuity. Rather than relying on a single, sweeping declaration of emergency, the government has moved fluidly between different legal regimes, migration emergencies, public health emergencies, and “state of danger” provisions, each providing a basis for expanded executive authority. This layering effect has allowed exceptional powers to be renewed, repurposed, and normalized over time, even as the underlying crises evolve or recede.

The report also demonstrates the weakness of institutional constraints. Legislative oversight has been limited by the ruling party’s parliamentary dominance, while judicial review has proven insufficient to meaningfully check executive action. At the same time, European Union mechanisms, though increasingly active, have struggled to produce timely or decisive constraints on Hungary’s internal governance practices. The result is a system in which formal legal structures remain intact, but their capacity to constrain executive power has been significantly eroded.

For ISSE, Hungary represents one of the clearest contemporary examples of what scholars have begun to describe as exceptionality, the process by which emergency measures migrate from the margins of the legal order to its center. The Hungarian case demonstrates how the state of exception need not appear as a dramatic rupture, and instead unfolded incrementally through legally sanctioned steps that cumulatively transformed the balance between executive authority and democratic accountability.

The implications extend well beyond Hungary. As Human Rights Watch suggests, the Hungarian model illustrates how emergency powers can be adapted for long-term political consolidation, even within systems that retain the outward form of constitutional democracy. This dynamic is particularly significant for other states facing recurring or overlapping crises, where the temptation to rely on flexible, executive-driven solutions is high.

Ultimately, the report reinforces a central ISSE concern: the most consequential threat posed by emergency powers is not their use in moments of genuine crisis, but their gradual normalization as instruments of routine governance. Hungary’s experience demonstrates how this process can reshape institutions, constrain political competition, and redefine the practical meaning of democratic rule—without ever formally abandoning it.

The full report from Human Rights Watch can be found here, and additional commentary on the report can be found here.