(C) Common Dreams
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How Viktor Orban Bends Hungarian Society to His Will [1]
['Patrick Kingsley']
Date: 2018-03-27
BUDAPEST — Billboards. TV campaigns. Radio programs. The anti-immigrant government of Prime Minister Viktor Orban uses different levers to influence public opinion, particularly on the subject of the European refugee crisis.
Even school textbooks.
On Page 155 of the latest eighth-grade history textbook, students are told that Mr. Orban thinks refugees are a threat to Hungary — and then encouraged to believe he is right. “It can be problematic,” the book concludes, “for different cultures to coexist.”
It is a testament to the scope of Mr. Orban’s program for remaking Hungary that part of the far-right leader’s message is now woven into the school curriculum.
For the past eight years, Mr. Orban has waged a systemic assault on the hardware of Hungary’s democracy — rewriting the national Constitution, reshaping the judiciary and tweaking the electoral system to favor his Fidesz party. Less conspicuously, Mr. Orban is also trying to recode the software of Hungary’s democracy — its cultural sphere, civil society and education system.
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[1] Url:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/27/world/europe/viktor-orban-hungary.html
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