Representation and Participation in Movements. Strategies of Environmental Civil Society Organizations in Hungary

Südosteuropa 63 (2015), no. 3, pp. 491-514

ENViRoNMENTALiSM ANd GREEN PARTiES

ARON BUZOGáNY

Representation and Participation in Movements. Strategies of Environmental Civil Society Organizations in Hungary

Abstract. Effectively using the space provided for political mobilization by the legalization of associations and the rise of public concern on environmental damage, environmental groups were among the main drivers of democratic transition in Hungary in the 1980s. However, the socio-economic problems caused by transition have quickly eclipsed the importance laid on environmental policy. Over the years, environmental non-governmental organizations (ENGOs) have reacted with a number of different strategies. These extend from party formation, lobbying, and partnership with public authorities to acting as ‘watchdogs’ of the state. Focusing on these representational and participatory strategies of Hungarian ENGOs, the present article shows that the different roles played by ENGOs complement each other and that change in opportunity structures—including those provided through the process of European integration—determine choices in their repertoires of action.

Aron Buzogány is a Research Associate at the Otto-Suhr-Institute for Political Sciences at the Free University, Berlin .

This paper is dedicated to the memory of JoAnn Carmin (1957-2014), whose expertise and empathy for environ mental movements in the region will be greatly missed.

Introduction. From Communism to Consumerism

Because environmental policy tackles interactions between humans and nature, and relations between the state and society at the same time, a study focusing on environmental mobilization can provide a useful analytical lens for understanding the complexity of political and societal developments typical of societies in transition 1. For the Southeast European (SEE) states, such

1 JoAnn Carmin / Stacy D. Vandeveer, Central and Eastern Europe from Transition to Accession. EU Enlargement and the Environment. Institutional Change and Environmental Policy in Central and Eastern Europe, Environmental Politics, no. 3 (2005), 12-34; Adam 492 Aron Buzogány an analytical lens is a particularly welcome one . The political and economic transitions of these states were paralleled, and sometimes even preceded, by environmental transitions. The SEE countries suffered from a legacy of forced and intensive industrialization, which had created a significant number of environmental hotspots in the region.2 On paper, most of these countries had adopted relatively well developed systems of environmental protection by the 1970s. In practice, however, lack of coherent policy and clear institutional structures together with poor enforcement of existing laws perpetuated a major problem, which was met with increasing dismay by the population. Indeed, resistance to the environmental consequences of forced modernization became a common issue that was taken up throughout the state socialist world during the 1980s .3 The attractiveness of the ‘Green 1989’ movement4 was partly based on the purportedly apolitical character of environmentalism: no authoritarian regime could for long get away with claiming that it was ‘against nature’. Thus, the environmentalists’ campaign to protect nature became a powerful master- frame that united criticism of state socialist systems, and ultimately became highly political through its role in delegitimizing state power. Though, during the socialist period, environmental degradation had created similar problems to those that had been known in large parts of Western Europe and acted as one of the triggers for regime change, the market liberalization of the early 1990s brought in a period of ‘natural clean-up’, due to the economic breakdown that followed the demise of the state socialist regimes. Many of the industrial sites causing the most pollution were closed due to their inef- fectiveness when competing in an increasingly global market. However, with a pick-up of economic growth in parts of the SEE region towards the end of

Fagan / JoAnn Carmin, Environmental Mobilization and Organisations in Post-Socialist Europe and the Former Soviet Union, Abingdon 2011; Adam Fagan, Environment and Democracy in the Czech Republic. The Environmental Movement in the Transition Process, Cheltenham 2004. 2 David Turnock, Environmental Problems and Policies in East Central Europe. A Changing Agenda, GeoJournal 55, no. 2-4 (2001), 485-505. 3 Jane I . Dawson, Eco-Nationalism . Anti-Nuclear Activism and National Identity in Russia, Lithuania, and Ukraine, Durham 1996; Adam Fagan, Environment and Democracy in the Czech Republic. The Environmental Movement in the Transition Process, Cheltenham 2004; Tamás Fleischer, Jaws on the Danube. Water Management, Regime Change and the Movement Against the Middle Danube Hydroelectric Dam, International Journal of Urban and Regional Research 17, no. 3 (1993), 429, DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-2427.1993.tb00231.x; Katrina Schwartz, Nature and National Identity After Communism. Globalizing the Ethnoscape, Pittsburgh/PA 2006; Edward Snajdr, Nature Protests. The End of Ecology in Slovakia, Seattle/WA 2008. All internet references were accessed on 13 August 2015. 4 Olaf Corry, The Green Legacy of 1989. Revolutions, Environmentalism and the Global Age, Political Studies 62, no. 2 (June 2014), 309-325, DOI: 10.1111/1467-9248.12034; Kacper Szulecki, Hijacked Ideas. Human Rights, Peace, and Environmentalism in Czechoslovak and Polish Dissident Discourses, East European Politics & Societies 25, no. 2 (2011), 272-295, DOI: 10.1177/0888325410387643. Environmental Civil Society Organizations in Hungary 493 the 1990s, most states started to experience similar environmental problems to those the West European states had suffered some decades previously. This development from ‘communism’ to ‘consumerism’ has also changed the face of environmental activism in the whole area. During the 1980s and early 1990s overall societal democratization and the opening up of the policy process were key demands enthusiastically supported by public opinion; but in the later 1990s popular support for green issues decreased rapidly. As happened in many newly established democratic systems elsewhere, the economic problems caused by transition now eclipsed the importance attributed to environmental policy within governments and parliaments, which appeared unreceptive to environmental concerns 5. A certain reinvigoration of environmentalism in the SEE region occurred in the 2000s. Much of this was related to processes of internationalization. New ideas, many of them diffused and transported by social movements, found their way to the SEE countries. Growing disenchantment with the environmental footprint of ‘actually existing’ market capitalism also brought out the fact that many of the hopes invested in democratization and the market economy remained illusory. It was the EU accession process in the region, however, that exerted the most important immediate effect. Membership candidacy, and then EU membership itself, had serious implications for the political systems of the countries of the region—even in those states with only rather distant membership prospects.6 The legal harmonization process triggered by the EU’s Copenhagen Criteria led to the adoption of EU laws (or adaptations to comply with them) . These, set out in the 31 chapters of the acquis communautaire, contain, in Chapter 22, close to 200 EU legal acts in the field of environmental policy. For civil society actors, the massive wholesale adoption of EU environmental law opened up great possibilities . They could provide the European Commission with information about violations of EU law, bring legal cases before national courts and mobilize the public 7. Even if often faced with weak domestic institutions to uphold the

5 Liliana Andonova / Edward D. Mansfield / Helen V. Milner, nternationalI Trade and Environmental Policy in the Postcommunist World, Comparative Political Studies 40, no. 7 (2007), 782-802, DOI: 10.1177/00104140 06293215. 6 Cf. Frank Schimmelfennig / Ulrich Sedelmeier, The Europeanization of Central and Eastern Europe, Ithaca/NY 2005; for the impact of the EU on the Western Balkans, cf. particularly Arolda Elbasani, ed, European Integration and Transformation in the Western Balkans. Europeanization or Business as Usual?, Abingdon 2013; Adam Fagan, The New Kids on the Block. Building Environmental Governance in the Western Balkans,Acta Politica 45 (2010), 203-228, DOI: 10.1057/ap.2009.19; Adam Fagan, Building Environmental Governance in Bosnia- Herzegovina. Europeanisation and Transnational Assistance in the Context of Limited Statehood, Environment and Planning C. Government and Policy 30, no. 4 (2012), 643-657, DOI: 10.1068/c11251. 7 Rachel A. Cichowski, The European Court and Civil Society. Litigation, Mobilization and Governance. Cambridge, New York 2007. 494 Aron Buzogány laws, this support could provide important leverage for actors who had previously been even weaker. Most of the developments mentioned—the enthusiasm for pro-environmentalist thought in the late 1980s with its attendant movement, disillusionment during the 1990s, and reinvigoration in the 2000s—are reflective of trends in the whole region this special issue covers. The remainder of this article zooms in on the case of Hungary. Hungary’s environmental sector provides a rich example of the changes occurring during the complex transitions and of the challenges the environmental movements have faced. In regional terms, Hungary can be considered an early leader, both in early environmental mobilization8 and in its having a quite elaborate legal and institutional framework governing environmental policy 9. This makes study of the Hungarian case useful too for comparison with states having a weaker environmental civil society or weaker state institutions or both . The primary aim of this article is to understand how social movements change as they adapt to new challenges. To further this enquiry, the focus will be on the different roles and ‘repertoires of action’ used by environmental organizations 10. In particular, I identify two ideal-typical roles civil society organisations play: representation and participation. I analyse these by focusing on different repertoires of action. The findings show that the different roles played by civil society organizations complement each other and that change in opportunity structures—including those provided through the process of European integration—determine changes in strategy. In general, the differentiation of the

8 Cf. Liliana Botcheva, Focus and Effectiveness of Environmental Activism in Eastern Europe. A Comparative Study of Environmental Movements in Bulgaria, Hungary, Slovakia, and Romania, Journal of Environment & Development 5, no. 3 (1996), 292-308, DOI: 10.1177/ 107049659600500303; Krista Harper, Wild Capitalism. Environmental Activists and Post- socialist Political Ecology in Hungary, New York 2006; Katy Láng-Pickvance, Democracy and Environmental Movements in Eastern Europe. A Comparative Study of Hungary and Russia, Boulder/CO 1998; Anna Vári / Pál Tamás, Environment and Democratic Transition. Policy and Politics in Central and Eastern Europe, Dordrecht 1993 . 9 Aron Buzogány, Hungary. The Tricky Path of Building Environmental Governance, in: Tanja Börzel, ed, Coping with Accession to the European Union. New Modes of Environ- mental Governance, London 2009, 123-147; Joanne Caddy / Anna Vári, Hungary, in: Helmut Weidner / Martin Jaenicke, eds, Capacity Building in National Environmental Policy. A Comparative Study of 17 Countries, Berlin 2002, 219-238; Laurence J. O’Toole / Kenneth Hanf, Hungary. Political Transformation and Environmental Challenge, in: Susan Baker / Petr Jehlicka, eds, Dilemmas of Transition, London 1998, 93-112 . 10 JoAnn Carmin / Deborah B. Balser, Selecting Repertoires of Action in Environmental Movement Organizations. An Interpretive Approach, Organization & Environment 15, no. 4 (2002), 365-388, DOI: 10.1177/1086026602238167; Russell J. Dalton / Steve Recchia / Robert Rohrschneider, The Environmental Movement and the Modes of Political Action,Comparative Political Studies 36, no. 7 (2003), 743-771, DOI: 10.1177/0010414003255108. Environmental Civil Society Organizations in Hungary 495 movement as a whole and the division of labour among its constituent parts enables it to follow multiple strategies. ‘Roles’ and ‘repertoires’ also help structure the paper. The next section outlines the conceptual framework, which combines insights from theories of civil society and research on governance and participation, as well as work from the field of social movement studies. Section three discusses organizational structures and the development of the contemporary Hungarian environmental movement. Here I pay particular attention to the travails of green party formation by highlighting factors that stood behind the success of Politics Can Be Different (Lehet Más a Politika, LMP). This green party gained seats at the parliamentary elections in 2010 and 2014 and is one of the few examples of such a party being successful in the former socialist region. Section four turns to the policy role of environmental non-governmental organizations (ENGOs) and shows how both participation and protest shape their activities. Finally, section five concludes by highlighting some of the factors that stand behind the change in repertoires of action .

Roles and Repertoires of Action in Civil Society Organizations

Both the normative literatures on civil society11 and that covering participatory governance12 stress (though with different implications and focus) that non-state actors, including ENGOs, can be understood either as internal or as external to the state. The role perceptions of civil society actors are thought to play a large part in determining their strategic choices when they opt for different reper - toires of action. The literature usually differentiates between collaborative and conflictive strategies. Collaborative strategies are preferred when civil society is perceived as being internal to the state. This ‘internal’ understanding of civil society is usually the one taken up in governance research, which focuses on the potentials of non-state actors acting as co-producers of governance outputs. 13 The co-producing role is related to the service provision from non-state actors, which offers resources, including specific knowledge and expertise unavailable to policy-makers in exchange for influence over the policy process or its outcomes. By participating in the policy process, civil society networks increase the legitimacy of policy itself and help public actors defend their goals, both publicly and intra-institutionally. Conversely, the external perspective highlights that

11 Iris M. Young, Inclusion and Democracy, Princeton/NJ 2000. 12 Jan Kooiman, ed, Modern Governance. New Government-Society Interactions, London 1993 . 13 Adrienne Héritier / Martin Rhodes, New Modes of Governance in Europe, Basingstoke 2011 . 496 Aron Buzogány civil society’s role is delimited by the state, assigning non-state organizations the role of ‘watchdogs’. This emphasizes the conflictive and controlling aspect of civil society. As watchdogs, civil society networks evaluate the development of particular policies and appraise how committed the policy actors are in im- plementing them, bringing any perceived shortcomings before the wider public. Other perspectives on civil society do not emphasize its role in the policy process to the same degree, but underline civil society’s autonomy from the state and stress the importance of its representational role. Along these lines, normative political theorists differentiate between civil society as ‘self-organization’ and as ‘public sphere’ 14. Both Cohen and Arato’s concept of a ‘self-defensive’ role of civil society and Young’s notion of ‘self-organization’ place an emphasis on the structure of the organization, its formal and informal rules, and the services it produces on behalf of its members . This perspective resonates particularly well with the tradition of a morally grounded dissident civil society that emerged in Eastern Europe during the state socialist period and which has, in the words of György Konrád, perceived itself as apolitical or even anti- political 15. The post-1989 situation raised participation in actively developing policies and the civil sphere to a normative challenge: criticizing while remaining outside became much more difficult to defend morally than it had been in the 1970s and 1980s .16 One implication of this development has been that civil society actors have had to enter the political sphere and adhere to the logic of party competition—something inherently alien to the ‘apolitical’ actors in the dissident movements of these countries . Table 1 summarizes the internal and external dimensions of how representation and participation are understood in civil society organizations. The political role can be regarded as an internal one that perceives civil society actors as part and parcel of the political system . Empirical evidence for these internal roles comes from activities concerned with party political competition—for example, the founding of a green party. On the other hand, we can regard the

14 Jean L . Cohen / Andrew Arato, Civil Society and Political Theory, Cambridge/MA 1992 (Studies in Contemporary German Social Thought); Young, Inclusion and Democracy. 15 György Konrád, Antipolitika. Az autonómia kisértése [Antipolitics. The temptation of autonomy], Budapest 1989; for a more recent evaluation of the dissident heritage on political thought in Central and Eastern Europe, cf. Barbara J. Falk, The Dilemmas of Dissidence in East-Central Europe. Citizen Intellectuals and Philosopher Kings, Budapest, New York 2003; Marlies Glasius, Dissident Writings as Political Theory on Civil Society and Democracy, Review of International Studies 38, no. 4 (2012), 343-364, DOI: 10.1017/S0260210511000155; Alan Renwick, Anti-Political or Just Anti-Communist? Varieties of Dissidence in East-Central Europe and Their Implications for the Development of Political Society, East European Politics & Societies 20, no. 2 (2006), 286-318, DOI: 0.1177/0888325405274672. 16 Tomaž Mastnak, The Reinvention of Civil Society. Through the Looking Glass of Democracy, European Journal of Sociology 46, no. 2 (2005), 323-355, DOI: 10.1017/S000397560500 0111 . Environmental Civil Society Organizations in Hungary 497

Table 1: Representation, participation, and organizational strategy choices of ENGOs Relationship to the political Representation Participation system (Role) (Politics) (Policy) Partnership and Internal Party politics co-governance

External Self-organization Watchdog

self-organization of civil society organizations as an external strategy for representation. As for participation in the policy process, we differentiate between active partnership (internal strategy) and an (external) watchdog role. Empiri- cally, what is of interest are the roles taken up by ENGOs in the policy process, such as cooperation with authorities or protest activities . Bearing these basic—sometimes oversimplifying—distinctions in mind, there are several possible explanations for strategy choice. A number of researchers have differentiated between different choices of repertoires of action.17 The political opportunity structures approach in social movement studies would suggest that the choice of the organizational strategy hinges upon the openness of the political system 18. These explanations stress the role of the political system in encouraging or discouraging certain activities, and this in turn depends on how particular political processes function and which access points are available for specific political activities. Factors such as the openness of the political system, the stability of political alignments, or the presence of elite allies might enhance opportunities for societal actors. The availability of open legal structures can also be influential. 19 Existing research on the transnationalization and Europeanization of social movements highlights how political opportunity structures increase with the multi-level character of polities .20 Europeanization gives societal actors strong opportunities and strong allies, as it has connected them to existing sectoral

17 Carmin / Balser, Selecting Repertoires of Action in Environmental Movement Organi- zations; Dalton / Recchia / Rohrschneider, The Environmental Movement and the Modes of Political Action . 18 Herbert Kitschelt, Political Opportunity Structures and Political Protest. Anti-Nuclear Movements in Four Democracies, British Journal of Political Science 16, no. 1 (1986), 57-85, DOI: 10.1017/S000712340000380X. 19 Chris Hilson, New Social Movements. The Role of Legal Opportunity, Journal of European Public Policy 9 (2002), 238-258, DOI: 10.1080/13501760110120246. 20 Margaret E. Keck / Kathryn Sikkink, Activists Beyond Borders. Advocacy Networks in International Politics, Ithaca/NY 1998; Douglas R. Imig / Sidney G. Tarrow, Contentious Europeans. Protest and Politics in an Emerging Polity, Lanham/MD 2001. 498 Aron Buzogány policy networks at the EU level.21 This process makes governments more accountable by upgrading participatory rights and by introducing issues into the public sphere that did not receive attention before.22 Civil society groups have often recognized the windows of opportunity opened up by the accession process and they have started putting pressure on governments to introduce and then enforce EU legislation. While the political opportunity structures perspective provides an adaptable tool for understanding strategies of social movement organizations in different settings—including the transnationalization of activism—it remains somewhat unclear what the main focus of the concept actually is . The concept is equally applied to the understanding of (new) party strategies,23 protest activities,24 and policy outcomes 25. In this article, I differentiate between political opportunity structures that relate to the political strategies of actors and policy opportunity structures, which concentrate on policy developments. Political strategies are related to the representation of organizational activities (see above) and concern strategies of action: party formation and self-organization. In contrast, policy opportunities determine organizational strategies that have been termed the ‘partnership’ and ‘watchdog’ roles. In what follows, I focus first on representational strategies, and then on participation-oriented ones, as found in Hungarian environmental organizations.

Representation

Organizational Structures of Environmentalism in Hungary

Effectively using the space provided for political mobilization by the legalization of associations and the rise of public concern on environmental damage, environmental groups were among the main drivers of democratic transition in Hungary. The people at the roots of these new groups were scientists critical of the prevailing situation, traditional conservation organizations, and church and university groups. Due to the restrictive nature of the one-party state, such groups were often forced to coexist with official state structures. These included

21 Antoaneta Dimitrova / Aron Buzogány, Post-Accession Policy-Making in Bulgaria and Romania. Can Non-State Actors Use EU Rules to Promote Better Governance?, Journal of Common Market Studies 52, no. 1 (2014), 139-156, DOI: 111/jcms.12084. 22 Tanja Börzel / Aron Buzogány, Environmental Organisations and the Europeanisation of Public Policy in Central and Eastern Europe. The Case of Biodiversity Governance, Environ mental Politics 19, no. 5 (2010), 708-735, DOI: 10.1080/09644016.2010.508302. 23 Ferdinand Müller-Rommel, New Politics in Western Europe . The Rise and Success of Green Parties and Alternative Lists, Boulder/CO 1989. 24 Kitschelt, Political Opportunity Structures and Political Protest. 25 Miranda A. Schreurs, Environmental Politics in Japan, Germany, and the United States, Cambridge 2002. Environmental Civil Society Organizations in Hungary 499 the Hungarian Environmental Association set up by the Popular Patriotic Front (Hazafias Népfront), the quasi-civil societal arm of the nomenclature. Other organizations coexisted within the structures of the Communist Youth League and its environmental organization, the Youth Environmental Council. In general, environmental protection was one of the few areas where questions and initia- tives from below did not automatically face an immediate coercive reaction from the state .26 By the mid-1980s the Hungarian state socialist regime was not able or willing to keep environmental groups under effective control. Mass- demonstrations, triggered by the Hungarian government’s plans to complete the Gabčikovo-Nagymaros Dam on the Danube, became crystallizing points for opposition groups, including those with aims not restricted to environ - mental issues 27. Thus, though the state administration had initially regarded environmental protest fairly positively—and partially even as a driver towards professional economic management and scientific progress—environmentalism soon became a ‘Trojan horse’28 containing not only opposition groups, but also reformers within the state administration who were demanding market liberalism and democracy. Fighting for environmental sustainability, human rights, and democratic institutions simultaneously, the organization founded to oppose the Dam, the Danube Circle (Duna Kör), received both strong grassroots support and help from outside . Especially after the Danube Circle was awarded the prestigious Right Livelihood Prize (1985), the Hungarian communist party could not afford the negative media coverage it would get from clamping down on green groups. 29 Ultimately, the protests against the Nagymaros Dam were successful, and the government withdrew from continuing with the construction. But the protests had already opened the floodgates for political change, pushing the overall democratization of the political system forward. Among the new members of the first democratically elected Hungarian Parliament of 1990 many had had their opinions formed in the Danube Circle . Enthusiasm for environmental policy was reflected in the first years of democratic transition, and it resulted in the adoption of relatively progressive legislation in the field. As early as 1992, a government regulation introduced the concept of environmental impact -as sessment, which had been one of the key demands of the protest movement in

26 Zsuzsa Gille, Social and Spatial Inequalities in Hungarian Environmental Politics. A Historical Perspective, in: Peter B . Evans, ed, Livable Cities? Urban Struggles for Livelihood and Sustainability, Los Angeles/CA 2002, 132-162. 27 András Lányi, Porcelán az elefántboltban [Porcelain in the Elephant Store], Budapest 2009; Miklós Haraszti, The Beginnings of Civil Society. The Independent Peace Movement and the Danube Movement in Hungary, in: Vladimir Tismaneanu, ed, In Search of Civil Society. Independent Peace Movements in the Soviet Bloc, New York 1990, 71-88. 28 Gille, Social and Spatial Inequalities in Hungarian Environmental Politics, 150. 29 Gille, Social and Spatial Inequalities, 160. 500 Aron Buzogány

2000 1800 1600 1400 organisations of 1200 No. of organizations No. Nr 1000 800 600 400 200 0

Foundations Non‐profit organizations Total

Figure 1. The number of registered Hungarian ENGOs (1992-2013). Source: Hungar- ian Statistical Office, A nonprofit szervezetek száma and Geyza Mészáros, Civil szerveződések a környezetvédelemben [NGOs in Environmental Protection], Statisztikai Szemle 79, no. 3 (2001), 234-248, http://www.ksh.hu/statszemle_archive/2001/2001_03/2001_03_234.pdf.ő Statisztikai Szemle the late 1980s. Comprehensive legislation on environmental protection (Law LIII of 1995) and water management (Law LVII of 1995) followed in 1995. Though much of the appeal the Hungarian environmental movement had gathered was lost during the time of regime change, it has remained to this day one of the best organized segments of Hungarian civil society.30 The number of environmental NGOs in Hungary has more than tripled since the early 1990s, rising from fewer than 600 in those times to over 1,800 by 2013. 31 On average 84 groups were established annually in the years between 1991 and 2000. 32 The

30 Veronika Móra, A zöldek (környezet-, természet- és állatvédő szervezetek) [The Greens (environment-, nature- and animal-protection organizations)], Civil Szemle 5, no. 1-2 (2008), 119- 131, http://www.civilszemle.hu/downloads/cikkek/2008/14-15szam_2008_1-2_Mora_119-131. pdf; Tsveta Petrova / Sidney Tarrow, Transactional and Participatory Activism in the Emerging European Polity. The Puzzle of East-Central Europe, Comparative Political Studies 40, no. 1 (2007), 74-94, DOI: 10.1177/0010414006291189; Susan Rose-Ackerman, From Elections to Democracy. Building Accountable Government in Hungary and Poland, Cam bridge, New York 2005. 31 Hungarian Statistical Office, A nonprofit szervezetek száma, megoszlása és összes bevétele tevékenységcsoportok szerint (2005-2013) [The number, division, and total income of non-profit organizations, grouped according to their activities (2005-2013)], 2013, http:// www.ksh.hu/docs/hun/xstadat/xstadat_eves/i_qpg004.html. 32 OECD, Environmental Performance Review Hungary, Paris 2009. Environmental Civil Society Organizations in Hungary 501 number of these organizations active at present is estimated at being between 400 and 600,33 with approximately 40% operating as private or public foundations and the remaining 60% registered as non-profit entities (see Figure 1). A survey of Hungarian ENGOs carried out by JoAnn Carmin in collaboration with the Regional Environmental Centre shows a quite high level of profes- sionalization among them.34 Approximately two-thirds of the ENGOs in her survey are membership-based. Almost half of them (48%) have permanent staff, with an average of five full-time employees. At the same time, an overwhelming number of them depend on volunteers. The most important sources of funding come from domestic governments (59%), from individual contributions (32%), and from the organizations’ own economic activities, such as sales and rent- als (20%). More than half of Hungarian ENGOs operate with annual budgets below 10,000 EUR and only 5% can count on budgets above 25,000 EUR. In this 2007 survey, 71% of the ENGOs reported that their financial stability was more stable than two years earlier, or at about the same level, while 25% reported a less stable financial situation. The issues the ENGOs mainly take up show an emphasis on ‘traditional’ conservation matters, such as the protection of nature, environmental education, habitat protection and biodiversity preservation . At the same time, about half of the ENGOs report involvement in direct action (56%) and engagement in policy advocacy (51%). The available data also show a further organizational diversity in the Hun- garian environmental movement.35 According to Móra, the movement can be divided into five subgroups.36 National alliances and networks form the most visible grouping. These are essentially Budapest-based groups active in specific, functionally differentiated subfields of environmentalism. They carry solid technical and legal expertise, have well-trained expert staff, and their efficient networks reach out internationally. Such groups are well established within the policy-making community and have good media presence. Examples of such organizations include: the Clean Air Group (Levegő Munkacsoport), focusing on pollution, sustainable transport issues and eco-taxation; the Energia Klub, concerned with energy efficiency; the Waste Task Force (Hulladék Munkacsoport, Humusz) which tackles waste policies; and the public interest law organization, the Environmental Management and Law Association (EMLA). Some of these groups have regional chapters as well. Closely connected, and sometimes overlapping in membership, are the classical conservation organizations which

33 Móra, A zöldek, 119-131. 34 JoAnn A. Carmin et al., Environmental NGOs in Central and Eastern Europe. Summary of Survey Findings, Cambridge/MA 2008. 35 Attila Fonyó / Kyra Tomay, A magyarországi zöldszervezetek a politikai döntéshozatalban [The Hungarian green organizations in the political decision-making process], in: Dénes Némedi / Vera Szabari, eds, KÖTŐ-JELEK 2006-2007, Budapest 2007, 155-183. 36 Móra, A zöldek 119-131. 502 Aron Buzogány either function as umbrella organizations or are national chapters of internationally active ENGOs, sometimes both. These organizations, such as the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) Hungary, Friends of the Earth Hungary–National Alliance of Conservationists (Magyar Természetvédők Szövetsége, MTVSZ), the Hungarian Ornithological Association (Magyar Madártani és Természetvédelmi Egyesület , MME), Birdlife Hungary, and Greenpeace Hungary, are actively involved in a large number of activities ranging from conservation and awareness-raising campaigns to policy-making. A third tier of the environmental movement con- sists of regional organizations in Hungary’s ten to twelve larger cities. Groups such as Reflex (Győr), Életfa (Eger), EMisszió (Nyíregyháza) or Pécsi Zöld Kör (Pécs) have become local brokers and also provide expertise for other, smaller, community-based organizations. Local organizations are the most numerous and often develop around particular issues or as chapters of youth organizations or local heritage groups. Often these groups are only loosely connected to the environmental movement, but they might seek advice and support in case of need. According to Krista Harper, there is something of a split between rural and urban groups, roughly corresponding with the nature protection vs. environmental action cleavage in how the organizations orient themselves.37 Perhaps more importantly, external aid tends to intensify differences between ENGOs, separating off those who receive it into a set of highly professionalized, resource-rich groups engaged in policy-making and able to receive project-based funding. The other, much larger group of less well equipped organizations tends to focus on grassroots issues at the local level. It does not have the resources to become active in policy-making, and is dependent on the work of volunteers.38 The rapid growth and diversification of the environmental movement has magnified the need for the groups to speak with one voice. This function is ful- filled by the Green Annual Meeting (Zöld Országos Találkozó, OT) which brings together several hundred activists for quite a few days. This annual meeting basically functions like a ‘green parliament’: it deliberates on pertinent current issues and has a multitude of functional working groups. 39 It also elects seventy to eighty delegates who sit on boards overseeing the work of different public authorities. Apart from the annual meeting and the work of the Steering Com - mittee (Egyeztető Tanács), which has a small secretariat, most coordination takes place informally, and this includes the monthly ‘last Wednesday’ meetings, which bring together representatives of ENGOs who are actively involved in

37 Harper, Wild Capitalism . 38 JoAnn A. Carmin, NGO Capacity and Environmental Governance in Central and Eastern Europe, Acta Politica 45, no. 2 (2010), 183-202, DOI: 10.1057/ap.2009.21. 39 István Farkas, A környezet- és természetvédö mozgalom együttmüködési rendszere [The environment and nature protection movement’s system of cooperation], Civil Szemle 2, no. 3 (2005), 47-58. Environmental Civil Society Organizations in Hungary 503 policy-making issues. A new development in the mid 2000s was the increase in networking among a core of Budapest-based ‘elite’ groups (the Energia Klub, Greenpeace, Humusz, Levegő, MME, MTVSZ, Védegylet, and the WWF), informally called the ‘Green 8’. These collaborations heralded the emergence of a new type of more confrontational environmentalism and the emergence of ecopolitics. The rise to prominence of ecopolitics had its background in the appearance of a ‘second generation’ of environmentalists who leant towards urban subculture and were influenced by the contacts and ideology of Western anti-globalization (or ‘alter-globalization’) groups. The most prolific group in this field was the Budapest-based ‘Protect the Future’ movement known as Védegylet, which became active in a range of issues not limited to environmentalism but extending from environmental justice, post-ecologism, and ethical consumerism to protest against developments in health care and education reform, protest against the privatization of public utilities, and championship of sustainable urban design strategies (‘urban cyclism’) and housing rights.40 Védegylet played a central role too in the genesis of the green party called ‘Politics Can Be Different’, to which we turn in the following section.

Can Politics Really Be Different? Green Party Formation and Change

After the regime change in 1989, the importance of the Hungarian green movement decreased rapidly and the establishment of political parties led to its fragmentation, since members of the movement dispersed to join new parties on different sides of the political spectrum. In the following two decades, numerous endeavours to establish a green political party remained unsuccessful due to the high institutional entrance barriers set by the Hungarian constitution and the lack of a strong, unifying organization.41 In the early 1990s, a group of activists founded the Hungarian Green Party (Magyarországi Zöld Párt) which, however, was soon annihilated by internal differences and finally overtaken by an extreme right faction calling for a ‘racially clean’ Hungary. Those who

40 Szabina Kerényi, Nem tünt el, csak átalakult. Zöldmozgalom az ökológián innen és túl [It did not disappear, it just reformed. The green movement within and beyond ecology], Lélegzet 18, no. 3 (2008), 12; Szabina Kerényi, Using Pollution to Frame Collective Action. Urban Grassroots Mobilisations in Budapest, in: Eveline Dürr / Rivke Jaffe, eds, Urban Pollution. Cultural Meanings, Social Practices, New York 2011, 144-164; Éva Tessza Udvarhelyi, Reclaiming the Streets—Redefining Democracy. The Politics of the Critical Mass Bicycle Movement in Budapest, Hungarian Studies 23, no. 1 (2009), 121-145, DOI: 10.1556/ HStud .23 .2009 .1 .9. 41 Gábor Hajdu / Gábor Szegedi, Lehet más a pártrendszer? Az ökopolitika pártosodása elött álló akadályok Magyarországon [Can the party system be different? The obstacles for ecopolitics to become a party in Hungary],Politikatudományi Szemle 15, no. 1 (2006), 117-139, http://www.poltudszemle.hu/szamok/2006_1szam/2006_1_hajdu.pdf. 504 Aron Buzogány walked out on this then founded the Green Alternative (Zöld Alternatíva) which even managed to achieve some brief parliamentary representation when one lone MP elected on the Hungarian Democratic Forum ticket ( Magyar Demokrata Fórum, MDF) decided to leave this party group and side with the greens. In 1998 the Green Alternative decided to run with a coalition of other small par - ties, and in 2000 it merged with two social democratic groups to become the Green Democrats (Zöld Demokraták). In 2002, the Green Democrats entered an electoral coalition with the centrist Centrum Party, but success eluded it again. These failures led to a further merger of green and leftist groups to form the Alliance of Green Democrats (Zöld Demokraták Szövetsége). This brought together the Hungarian Social Green Party, the Green Union, the New Left (Új Baloldal), and the Hungarian Women’s Party. These regroupings were regarded by most active environmental groups as lacking credibility, but an internal debate developed among a new generation of activists in the mid 2000s about the need to become politically active . As political polarization between the conservative parties led by FIDESZ and the leftist-liberal ones led by the Hungarian Socialist Party Magyar( Szocialista Párt, MSZP) became ever more strangulating,Védegylet tried to find some way forward by proposing that the independent László Sólyom, former head of the Constitutional Court and an active environmentalist, should become president of the republic. Sólyom’s elevation to the presidency was a late and unexpected victory for the Danube Circle: the parties of the former anti-communist opposition, the conservative FIDESZ and the liberal SZDSZ (a recurring member of coalition governments with the MSZP) joined forces to elect him. 42 A related success of Védegylet was its campaign calling for the establishment of an institu - tion to protect the rights of ‘future generations’. It was seeking a new approach to help integrate long-term goals with the short-termist logic of representative democracy. The setting up of an office of ‘ombudsman for future generations’ was aimed at anchoring sustainability goals into the political process, and was seen as an effective move. It was regarded as a promising example abroad as well .43 The political crisis that unfolded from 2006 on, together with growing dis - illusionment with the governing political parties, 44 led Védegylet activists to initiate the new party which took the name Politics Can Be Different (LMP). The foundation of LMP was based on a long, carefully planned process which

42 András Bozóki, Zöld utak [Green ways], in: György Petőcz, ed, Béke sose volt. Az LMP egy története [There never was peace. A history of the LMP], Budapest 2014. 43 Cf. for example Jörg Tremmel, Parlamente und künftige Generationen. Das 4-Gewalten- Modell, Aus Politik und Zeitgeschichte, 38-39 (2014), 38-45, http://www.bpb.de/apuz/191198/ parlamente-und-kuenftige-generationen-das-4-gewalten-modell. 44 Umut Korkut, Liberalization Challenges in Hungary. Elitism, Progressivism, and Populism, Basingstoke 2012. Environmental Civil Society Organizations in Hungary 505 could not have developed without the establishment of a progressive Budapest subculture which brought together a number of alternative groups ranging from ecological and anti-consumerist circles to ones concerned with peace and human rights. The loose network behind the launch of the party (informally called the Szimpla Circle after its gathering-place in a popular Budapest pub) received input from a number of think thanks, and organized a series of public discussions pressing the need for a new political alternative. Having witnessed the rise and fall of many unsuccessful attempts to form a green party, the organ- izers were particularly careful not to damage the reputation they had carefully built up during the 2000s.45 The failure in the 2006 national elections of Élőlánc, a green party founded by the Danube Circle veteran and Védegylet co-initiator András Lányi, was a particularly raw and recent example. Beyond the need to settle generational differences between the green activists socialized in the 1980s and the generation that had emerged in the 2000s, the ideological positioning of the party in the highly polarized Hungarian party system had to be firmly established 46. Although most initiators of the group had been raised in leftist or liberal political parties or groups, it was agreed that the new party should frame its ideological offer in a way that was neither ‘left’ nor ‘right’ but which strove to synthesize political values from both sides.47 After several years of preparation, LMP was officially founded in 2009, just in time to participate in the elections to the European Parliament (EP), which were considered particularly beneficial for an electoral breakthrough because of their lower saliency. The campaign took place within a drifting party landscape which already gave hints of the landslide victory FIDESZ was to win at the forthcoming national elections. For LMP, however, the tectonic shifts taking place offered the party an opportunity to establish itself as a fresh voice in the newly forming political landscape. The campaign, which pioneered a new style of online-guerrilla activity picked up from the Obama campaign of the previous year, was regarded as a success, even though it failed to secure LMP a place in the EP. It showed that voting for the newly founded green party did not neces- sarily result in a wasted ballot paper. The ensuing campaign for the national

45 Benedek Jávor, Zöldek a sasfészekben. Az ökológiai mozgalom politikai képviseletéről [Greens in the eagle’s nest. About the political representation of the ecological movement], Magyar Narancs, 7 March 2003, http://magyarnarancs.hu/publicisztika/javor_benedek_zoldek_ a_sasfeszekben_az_okologiai_mozgalom_politikai_kepviseleterol-54766. 46 Katalin Fábián, Can Politics Be Different? The Hungarian Green Party’s Entry into Parliament in 2010, Environmental Politics 19, no. 6 (2010), 1006-1011, DOI: 10.1080/09644016. 2010.518688; Dániel Mikecz, A dinnye a héjától. A bal-jobb vita a magyar alternatív moz gal- mon belül [The melon from its skin. The left-right discussion within the Hungarian alternative movement], Politikatudományi Szemle 2 (2008), 71-97, http://www.poltudszemle.hu/ szamok/2008_2szam/2008_2_mikecz.pdf. 47 Bozóki, Zöld utak. 506 Aron Buzogány elections presented LMP as an alternative to the corrupt party system, pitting green ideas against the harsh ‘technocratic’ neoliberalism of the failing socialist- liberal coalition and the ‘national conservative’ neoliberalism of FIDESZ 48. Managing to get 7.5% of the votes cast in May 2010, LMP became the first green party to be elected to the Hungarian parliament. This success was due to several factors, of which the strategic foresight of its initiators was perhaps only a fairly minor one. It was more important that LMP could fill the gap left after the collapse of the two major parties of the democratic regime change in 1990, the conservative Hungarian Democratic Forum and the liberal Alliance of Free Democrats. At the same time, the Hungarian Socialist Party (MSZP), one of the two main pillars of the polarized Hungarian party system, had shrunk to be only a middle-sized party, while a new radical right party, Jobbik, had scored a major victory, receiving 17% of the vote.49 With clear signs that there would be a sweeping landslide victory for FIDESZ, voting for LMP may have seemed the ‘lesser evil’ for many voters who had become politically homeless 50. However, the political space left for the sixteen green MPs in the Hungar- ian Parliament (Országgyűlés) was severely restricted by the ‘revolution in the electoral booth’ which gave the FIDESZ-led coalition government a two-thirds majority. Using its constitution-changing majority, FIDESZ initiated deep- reaching political reforms of the political system, giving it an increasingly ma- joritarian character . This was cemented by the adoption of a new constitution, called the Basic Law and by a new electoral system . Confronted with the well- organized machine of the governing parties, who used fast-track procedures to adopt massive numbers of new laws, the opposition has been left with few possibilities of making its voice heard. LMP’s strategy has oscillated between policy-oriented work, for example, in the Parliamentary Committee on Sus- tainable Development with the party group leader Benedek Jávor in the chair, and media-oriented strategies, such as blocking the entrance to parliament as a protest against FIDESZ’s sweeping reforms. But the greatest challenge LMP has faced is internal conflict. The party started as a new ‘green’ force transcending the political divisions of Hungarian politics, but it has proved to be more difficult to maintain this stance in practice. Conflict within LMP revolved around developing an adequate coalition strategy for the 2014 electoral campaign. While András Schiffer, one of the founders ofVédegylet and the first chairman of the party, insisted on the importance of remaining

48 Péter Rauschenberger, A fenntartható jövő, a befogadó társadalom és a megújuló demo- krácia stratégiája. Az Lehet Más a Politika választási programja [The strategy for a sustainable future, an inclusive society and a renewed democracy. The electoral programme of politics can be different], Budapest 2010. 49 Aron Buzogány, Soziale Bewegung von rechts. Der Aufstieg der national-radikalen Jobbik-Partei in Ungarn, Südosteuropa Mitteilungen 51, no. 5-6 (2011), 38-51. 50 Bozóki, Zöld utak. Environmental Civil Society Organizations in Hungary 507 independent, a large section of LMP’s parliamentary party group wanted to join the left-wing electoral alliance Together 2014 (Együtt 2014) under the lead- ership of the former prime minister, Gordon Bajnai. This internal conflict led to the party splitting: eight green MPs, including Benedek Jávor, left LMP to found Dialogue for Hungary (Párbeszéd Magyarországért), which entered into an electoral coalition with Together 2014. The split also reflects the looming conflict between the Budapest-based membership of LMP and membership in the regions. The latter have become influential in the party structures,while the Budapest-based MPs, mostly leftist or liberal-leaning, have been shaping the party’s media presence 51. Even though LMP lost more than 100,000 voters, it managed to gain 5.26% of the votes cast at the national elections in 2014, which entitled it to send five MPs to the National Assembly (halved in size after the reforms introduced in 2010-2014). Meanwhile, Dialogue for Hungary, the faction that had walked out of the LMP to throw its lot in with the left-wing electoral alliance Together 2014, received just one mandate.

Participation

ENGOs as Partners

When, in 1990, the first democratic elections brought a high number of Danube Circle members into Parliament, a period followed that was characterized by close relations between politics and the environmental movement . As a result, Hungarians saw impressive progress in environmental policies during the early nineties. The Environmental Framework Law (Law LIII of 1995)—already in- corporating many basic elements of EU environmental legislation—was drafted in 1995 after several years of consultations with stakeholder organizations. The law gave ENGOs extensive participation rights and set up a tripartite body composed of representatives of industry, civil society, and science to advise the government. ENGOs delegated their representatives to take part in different governmental committees. Contacts between the environmental movement and the ministry became increasingly institutionalized during this period, with some of the leading personalities from the NGO sector being appointed to high- ranking positions within the environmental branch of governance.52

51 For a more detailed account, cf. Katalin Fábián, Can Politics Still Be Different? The Hungarian Green Party’s Return to Parliament in 2014, Environmental Politics 24, no. 2 (2015), 332-336, DOI: 10.1080/09644016.2014.1000637. 52 Erzsébet Schmuck from the National Alliance of Conservationists, the largest environmental umbrella NGO, served as deputy state secretary in charge of EU Integration during the accession period (2002‒2003) and László Haraszthy, the President of WWF Hungary, was appointed state secretary in charge of nature conservation in the following government. The ‘revolving door principle’ has also functioned in the opposite direction: for 508 Aron Buzogány

The pre-accession process for joining the EU also boosted the empowerment of civil society groups. On the one hand, ENGOs benefited from transnational and EU-level networks which supplied them with policy expertise and resources. On the other hand, the European Commission emerged as a new and forceful actor supporting civil society actors both by offering them funding and by emphasizing the need to include them in the domestic policy process. However, after EU accession the initial funding decreased. New, more competitive funding structures were established in which ENGOs had to compete with other sectors for grants from the National Civil Fund. The financing made available to Hungary from the EU Structural and Cohesion Funds offered limited opportunities for ENGOs to obtain grants, as the Environment and Infrastructure Operational Programme (2004‒2006) focused mostly on large-scale infrastruc- tural developments .53 The ENGOs that received EU funds were usually the more professionalized ones. However, even these have now run into serious liquidity problems as they try to administer cash-flow or pre-finance projects. This is often because payments have been seriously delayed. In general, accessing and dealing with EU funds has required massive administrative capacities and has further strengthened the ad hoc ‘projectification’ of civil society organizations in a way that often works against long-term organizational development. 54 Rather than provide direct funding, EU accession and membership gave ENGOs the opportunity to participate in the planning and oversight of funding sources distributed from EU funds .55 During the planning process, which also stressed the necessity of decentralization, there was some hope that this would open up the policy process and increase opportunities for different regional actors to participate. In the end, the regionalization process was replaced by example, WWF Hungary has been led by Gábor Magyar, who switched to the NGO from the top position of the Nature Conservation Office. In 2011, Katalin Rodics, a leading expert from the Ministry of Environment, lost her position after conflicts with the new coalition government, and became the leader of a Greenpeace campaign. 53 Móra, A zöldek, 119-131. 54 For more detailed accounts relating to the Europeanization of civil society in CEE member states and in the Western Balkans, cf. Aron Buzogány, Stairway to Heaven or Highway to Hell? Ambivalent Europeanization and Civil Society in Central and Eastern Europe, in: Hara Kouki / Eduardo Romanos, eds, Protest Beyond Borders, New York 2011; Adam Fagan, Foreign Donor Assistance and Environmental Capacity Building. Evidence from Serbia and Bosnia-Herzegovina, European Political Science Review 3, no. 2 (2010), 301-320, DOI: 10.1017/ S1755773910000391; Cristina E. Parau, Impaling Dracula. How EU Accession Empowered Civil Society in Romania, West European Politics 32, no. 1 (2009), 119-141, DOI: 10.2139/ssrn.1496945; Danica Fink-Hafner / Mitja Hafner-Fink / Meta Novak, Europeanisation as a Factor of National Interest Group Political-Cultural Change. The Case of Interest Groups in Slovenia, East European Politics & Societies 29, no. 1 (2015), 287-305, DOI: 10.1177/0888325414535625. 55 ágnes Bátory / Andrew Cartwright, Re‐Visiting the Partnership Principle in Cohesion Policy. The Role of Civil Society Organizations in Structural Funds Monitoring, Journal of Common Market Studies 49, no. 4 (2011), 697-717, DOI: 10.1111/j.1468-5965.2010.02159.x. Environmental Civil Society Organizations in Hungary 509 re-centralization,56 but, in some cases, collaborative relations among certain actors, particularly at the subnational level, had indeed been established .57 An example of how EU membership has affected the policy role played by ENGOs can be seen in the implementation of EU legislation. A significant amount of the (newer) EU directives dealing with environmental policy places an emphasis on the inclusion and participation of stakeholders, including ENGOs. Probably the best known example of this inclusionary policy style is the EU’s Flora-Fauna and Habitat (FFH) Directive, which creates a whole new system of biodiversity governance in the member states. 58 In what follows, I describe the adoption of this controversial directive in Hungary in some detail, as it provides an example of the dilemmas ENGOs have faced in the policy process. 59 Initially Hungarian ENGOs responded with some hesitation to the FFH Direc- tive, as it provided a somewhat weaker legal framework than the existing one, which was based on strong punitive elements and a clear definition of protected areas 60. Nevertheless, reform of nature protection governance also offered them new opportunities, which helped them overcome their scepticism 61. In 2001, four major nature protection ENGOs (CEEWEB for Biodiversity, the Hungarian Ornithological Association, the National Conservationist Alliance and WWF Hungary) established the ‘Natura 2000 Coalition’ which became the major hub of coordination, both between local level NGOs and between those active on the national level. Due to the expertise of its member organizations and the connec-

56 Aron Buzogány / Umut Korkut, Administrative Reform and Regional Development Discourses in Hungary. Europeanisation Going NUTS?, EuropeAsia Studies 65, no. 8 (2013), 1555-1577, DOI: 10.1080/09668136.2013.833015. 57 László Bruszt / Balázs Vedres, Associating, Mobilizing, Politicizing. Local Developmental Agency From Without, Theory and Society 42, no. 1 (2013), 1-23, DOI: 10.1007/s11186-012-9183-7; Viktor Glied, Civil szervezetek szerepe a környezeti ügyekben a dél-dunántúli régióban [The role of NGOs in environmental matters in the southern Transdanubian region],Civil Szemle 4, no. 4 (2009), 67-90, http://www.civilszemle.hu/downloads/cikkek/2009/21szam_2009_4_ Glied_69-80.pdf. 58 Felix Rauschmayer / Sybille van den Hove / Thomas Koetz, Participation in EU Biodiversity Governance. How Far Beyond Rhetoric?, Environment and Planning C: Government and Policy 27, no. 1 (2009), 42-58, DOI: 10.1068/c0703j. 59 Buzogány, Hungary. The Tricky Path of Building Environmental Governance, 123- 147; Joanna Cent / Cordula Mertens / Krzysztof Niedziałkowski, Roles and Impacts of Non- Governmental Organizations in Natura 2000 Implementation in Hungary and Poland, Environmental Conservation 40, no. 2 (2013), 119-128, DOI: 10.1017/S0376892912000380; József Mocsári, Missing Details Behind the Big Picture. The Delayed Implementation of the Habitats Directive in Hungary, Budapest 2004. 60 David Ellison, Hungary. From ‘Policy Taker’ to Policymaker, in: Eleanor Zeff / Ellen B. Pirro, eds, European Union and the Member States, Boulder/CO 2004, 315-341. 61 Gábor Scheiring, ed, Belezöldülünk? Zöldek az EU-ról. A magyar EU csatlakozás várható hatásai a hazai demokratikus jogokra, jólétre és környezetvédelemre [Getting green? Greens about the impact of EU accession on democratic rights, welfare, and environmental policy], Budapest 2004 . 510 Aron Buzogány tions it had with Brussels, the Coalition emerged as a ‘broker’ between different state institutions and civil society. Policy-oriented ENGOs carried out important tasks to make the Natura 2000 network work. Addressing the lack of knowledge relating to the implementation of Natura 2000 within public administration, CEEWEB launched a training programme for the relevant officials. Likewise, the Hungarian National Alliance of Conservationists offered legal training for judges on the new biodiversity legislation, which was largely unknown within the judicial branch due to its novelty. Similarly, the public interest law organization EMLA provided detailed legal analysis on the implementation of EU biodiversity law as well as case studies and position papers . Not only did the state administration benefit from the specific expertise of ENGOs; they could also use them to acquire additional funding, since the EU was encouraging ‘joint-venture projects’ that included both state and civil society actors . Based on an agreement with the Nature Conservation Authority, the Natura 2000 Coalition was charged with the organization of an awareness-raising campaign for landowners, land users, hunters, and fishermen.62 However, the inclusion of environmental NGOs to increase the legitimacy of the Natura 2000 Network came too late. When the government postponed compensation payments for landowners, the Natura 2000 Coalition found itself in the uneasy position of being associated with ill-designed governmental policies, and this undermined its credibility .63 Confronted with growing inconsistencies in the government’s behaviour once the pressure from the European Commission had ceased (following accession), and faced with the continuous weakening of environmental institutions, biodiversity NGOs became increasingly critical of the government and switched towards more conflictive strategies.

ENGOs as Watchdogs

The implementation of the Natura 2000 network also provides abundant examples of the watchdog role played by ENGOs and illustrates how the European multi-level system affects policy-making at the national level. Switching from a cooperative to a more conflictive role, the Natura 2000 Coalition was able to use its leverage over the government, threatening to complain to the European Commission and to initiate domestic legal action against the government if the deadline to designate Natura 2000 sites was not complied with. When environ-

62 Brigitta Bozsó / Dénes Nagy, Natura 2000 Civil szemmel. áttekintés a Natura 2000 mun- ka csoport eddigi munkájáról [Natura 2000 seen by NGOs. Overview of the work of the Natura 2000 working group], Budapest 2005; Ine Neven / Fred Kistenkas, Eurosites Insights. Image, Implementation, Interpretation, and Intregration of Natura 2000 in European Perspective, Wageningen 2005. 63 Natura 2000. Késik a támogatás [Natura 2000. Compensation delayed], Nepszabadsag, 7 October 2006, http://nol.hu/cikk/420049/. Environmental Civil Society Organizations in Hungary 511 mental commissioner Margot Wallström visited Budapest in 2004, the Coalition used the European Commission to ‘shame’ the Hungarian government for not having officially announced the list of designated Natura 2000 areas. Indeed, during the whole pre-accession process, the EU Commission followed the implementation of the Natura 2000 network closely and intervened repeatedly, putting the legal drafting and interministerial negotiations back on track. This was done both formally and informally, by pointing out shortcomings in the legislation and by threatening to withhold funding from the Structural Funds after accession. Brussels also repeatedly reminded the Hungarian authorities that they should include civil society in the planning process, and, at different meetings, seized various opportunities to highlight the shortcomings of the designation process. In the meantime, the Natura 2000 network had become a household name due to the furore surrounding the largest environmental conflict Hungary has witnessed since the late 1980s. During the country’s EU accession, local protest broke out around the deployment of a NATO radar locator on Zengő Hill, which is in a natural preserve in southern Hungary.64 The coalition of protest groups, Civilians for Zengő (Civilek a Zengőért), raised both health and environmental concerns against the deployment of the radar; and a second line of criticism was directed at the way the Ministry of Defence had by-passed the local community in its decision-making.65 The preserve was under protection because of the presence of a rare species, the plant called Banatian peony . However, with EU accession, Zengő Hill became part of the Natura 2000 network and the Ba- natian peony was added to the list of EU-wide protected plants . This allowed the activists to link their protest to EU norms.66 When the construction of the locator started in 2004, it was met with intense and partially violent protests

64 Szabina Kerényi / Máté Szabó, Transnational Influences on Patterns of Mobilisation Within Environmental Movements in Hungary, Environmental Politics 15, no. 5 (2006), 803-820, DOI: 10.1080/09644010600937249; Dániel Mikecz, Zengő-konfliktus a napisajtóban. A civil mozgalmi és kormányzati frame-ek elemzése [The Zengő conflict in the daily press. An interpretation of the civic movements’ and government’s frames], Médiakutató 8, no. 2 (2007), 37-45, http://www.mediakutato.hu/cikk/2007_02_nyar/ 03_zengo_konfliktus; Gábor Scheiring, A környezetvédelem repolitizálódása. ökopolitikai értelmezési keretek dinamikája a Zengő- mozgalomban [Repolitization of Environmentalism. Dynamics of Ecopolitical Interpretation Frames in the Zengő Movement], Szociológiai Szemle 18, no. 2 (2008), 111-130, http://www. szociologia.hu/dynamic/SzocSzemle_2008_2_111_130_ScheiringG.pdf. 65 Márton Vay, ed, Zengő. Ökológia, politika és társadalmi mozgalmak a Zengő- konfliktusban [Zengő. Ecology, politics and social movements in the Zengő conflict], Budapest 2005 . 66 For similar examples in the region, cf. Julia Szulecka / Kacper Szulecki, Analysing the Rospuda River Controversy in Poland . Rhetoric, Environmental Activism, and the Influence of the European Union,East European Politics 29, no. 4 (2013), 397-419, DOI: 10.1080/ 21599165.2013.836701; Enikő Baga / Aron Buzogány, Lives and Treasures. The Global Political Economy of Gold Mining and Local Responses from Romania, in: Gisela Welz / Franziska 512 Aron Buzogány around the site. Local NGOs were joined by Budapest-based activists from Greenpeace and Védegylet. What initially seemed to be a local conflict grew into a national (even international) one and became one of the rare cases where the otherwise highly polarized political elites joined forces. 67 Faced with political and legal conflicts, the government eventually retracted its original plans and decided to relocate the radar to the nearby Tubes Peak. After EU accession, the Natura 2000 process became subject to political conflicts when stakeholders previously not included in the implementation process emerged as veto players. At the same time, the European Commission decided to take legal action against Hungary, based on a complaint filed by a small ENGO, the Trans-Tisza Conservationists’ Association (Tiszántúli Természetvédők Társu lata). This complaint, which was sent to the Petition Committee of the European Parliament, concerned a hardwood forest that was added to the Natura 2000 network but was depleted as a result of illegal logging.68 After several years’ conflict between different ministerial branches, all acting under the growing double pressure of ENGOs and the European Union, partial compliance with the directive was reached after side-payments had been made to agricultural stakeholders. Obviously, the different roles played by ENGOs—being watchdogs and at the same time partners of the state—were not easy to balance. Reports filed by the ENGOs to the European Commission regarding gaps in the implementation process soured relationships with the environmental authorities, and this reached a peak when the European Commission started to initiate legal action against Hungary based on these reports. As a result, ENGOs have come to see informal contact with the Commission as the most promising way forward, and they may also rely on personal contacts inside the Commission’s bureaucracy . Other potential options, such as filing official complaints to the EU Commis - sion, are lengthy, costly, and only viable if there is a major partner backing the case—perhaps an EU-level ENGO or an umbrella organization, such as the European Environmental Bureau. More than a decade after EU enlargement, only a limited number of Hungarian ENGOs have the capacity to participate regularly and be directly active in multi-level lobbying. 69

Sperling / Eva Maria Blum, eds, Negotiating Environmental Conflicts. Local Communities, Global Policies, Frankfurt/M. 2012, 43-63. 67 Kerényi / Szabó, Transnational Influences on Patterns of Mobilisation. 68 European Parliament, Committee on Petitions, Petition 1328/2007 by Zsak Ferenc Tibor (Hungarian), on Protection of Environment in Hungary, 10 June 2011, http://www.europarl. europa.eu/meetdocs/2009_2014/documents/peti/cm/870/870218/870218en.pdf. 69 Zsolt Boda / Gábor Scheiring, Zöld közpolitika-befolyásolás az Európai Unióban [Green influence on politics in the European Union], Politikatudományi Szemle no. 4 (2006), 41-61, http://www.poltudszemle.hu/szamok/2006_4szam/ 2006_4_boda.pdf; Fonyó / Tomay, A magyarországi zöldszervezetek a politikai döntéshozatalban, 155-183. Environmental Civil Society Organizations in Hungary 513 Conclusion

Environmental policy-making is an aspect intimately woven into the radical changes that have occurred since 1989 in the political, economic and social fabric of SEE transition societies. The present article offers an overview of the development of the Hungarian environmental movement in these two and a half decades. The focus is on the internal and external dimensions of representation and participation. I argue that changes in political opportunities developed in parallel with a change in repertoires of action employed by different ENGOs. During much of the 1990s and 2000s, the underlying tendency was towards advocacy-oriented activism and the advanced use of public relations to mobilize individuals. From the mid-2000s, however, there was a swing-back resulting in the development of a second generation of ENGOs which adopted new styles of activism. This eventually led to the successful launching of the green party, the LMP. From the late 2000s on, state-society relations became more conflictive again—they returned to the historically well-trodden path of mutual suspicion between representatives of the state and civil society. In the sphere of Hungar- ian environmental policy, the last few years have been particularly marked by a cutting back of the institutional framework governing this policy field and by more adversarial state-society relations. Governmental reforms have led to the Ministry of the Environment being absorbed into the Ministry of Agriculture as a sub-branch and to a weakening of the position of the Ombudsman for Future Generations. Relations between environmental civil society and government have become particularly tense since 2014, when the Hungarian government started investigations into allegations of financial irregularities by the Ökotárs Foundation (Ökotárs Alapítvány), the NGO responsible for distributing funding for Hungarian ENGOs donated by Norway. Ökotárs has also been accused of fa- vouring movements and parties (including the LMP) critical of the government. The case is still pending, but has been condemned as an example of a politically motivated crack-down on civil society in a manner unheard of since 1989. 70 More generally, surveying the development of state-society relations in the Hungarian environmental sector, this article explores the changes in repertoires of action that have occurred in the Hungarian environmental movement. A key explanation of such changes is to be found in the way various social movements have adapted to new challenges and opportunity structures. Changes have been prompted by the structure of political competition, by the possibility of trad- ing expertise (or legitimacy) for funding, and by larger societal trends. When, for two decades, the political marketplace was closed to new party entrants by

70 áron Varga, Orbán’s Government in an Endless War Against ‘Hungary’s Enemies’, Heinrich Böll Stiftung, 1 July 2014, https://www.boell.de/en/2014/07/01/orbans-government- in-an-endless-war-against-hungarys-enemies . 514 Aron Buzogány high restrictive hurdles, a collapse of the whole party system provided the opportunity to launch a green party successfully. This development would have been impossible if there had not been a lengthy process of consolidation in the ENGO sector, which was then able to provide a secure backing for the new party. Despite such success, the access of civil society groups to policy-making has fluctuated during the last decades. The participation of ENGOs in the policy process was relatively intense during the early 1990s, but the institutionalization of state actors has made cooperation less likely—particularly since economic interests have become so influential in determining policy goals. The emergence of new levels of hierarchy—the European level in this case—has also contributed to change in action repertoires, largely by offering additional vantage points for ENGOs, such as emphasizing the participatory norm, which can then be applied at the domestic level. However, participatory policy-making is increasingly being accompanied by more contentious roles some civil society actors are taking up. As the multiple strategies adapted by the Hungarian ENGOs show, the differentiation of movements enables different strategies to be tried both in representation and in participation in tandem with each other .

CoRRESPoNdiNG AuThoR Aron Buzogány Free University Berlin, Otto Suhr Institute of Political Science, Department of Political and Social Sciences, Chair of German Politics, Ihnestraße 22, 14195 Berlin. Email: [email protected]