Losing Dominance, West Gives Bad Responses to Challenges, Orban's Policy Chief Says

Hungary has succeeded in building a complex, export-oriented and fundamentally innovative economy. After 2010, Hungary was able to move towards an open, export-oriented, complex economy and an economic model capable of growth.

Budapest, 2023. december 12. Orbán Balázs, a miniszterelnök politikai igazgatója beszédet mond a új könyvének, a Huszárvágás - A magyar konnektivitás stratégiája címû kötet bemutatóján Budapesten, a Mathias Corvinus Collegium (MCC) Hunyadi Mátyás-termében 2023. december 12-én. MTI/Hegedüs Róbert Fotó: Hegedüs Róbert

Starting from this situation, Hungary has managed to build a complex, export-oriented and fundamentally innovative economy.

In 2000, we ranked 23rd among the most complex economies in the Harvard Economic Complexity Index, while today we rank 11th, with a highly diversified export product structure, which is also extremely favorable in regional comparison,

he pointed out.

As a percentage of GDP, Hungary spent the most on culture and sport in Europe, and we have managed to prevent the collapse of the fertility rate, Balazs Orban said, speaking about figures.

After 2010, Hungary was able to move towards an open, export-oriented, complex economy and an economic model capable of growth,

he added.

In Balazs Orban's opinion, decoupling from Eastern countries impairs our chances of growth. At the roundtable discussion entitled Changing world, unchanging interests: Hungary's strategy for connectivity in a shifting world order, Balazs Martonffy, research director at the John Lukacs Institute, highlighted that

historians will analyse this as a specific kind of Hungarian model, and I'm sure they will also attach other adjectives to show how this sort of very high-risk, high-risk-tolerant, model-changing foreign policy, a foreign policy within the Western model, could be implemented by a state, with what motives, with what success, with what effectiveness.

Viktor Eszterhai, a research fellow at the John Lukacs Institute, stressed that the United States basically focuses on competition as a great power, but connectivity is also at play. In some areas, there is cooperation with China, for example. Balazs Tarnok, head of the Europe Strategy Research Institute, said that Europe is looking for its place in this new world order and the future will tell whether it can find it. This has not necessarily happened yet. European Parliament elections are coming up this year and Hungary will hold the rotating presidency from July 1.

Cover photo: Balazs Orban, the Hungarian PM's political director (Photo: MTI/Robert Hegedus)