Balancing between the career and position-based systems. Some aspects of recent developments in civil service legislation in Hungary

Abstract

This article analyses some aspects of the wavering course the Hungarian civil service is taking between the career and position-based systems. Since the turn of the new millennium a number of new measures have been introduced in civil service legislation. These reforms have pushed the employment system of the civil service in two directions simultaneously. While some of the new elements have aimed at dismantling what had been a quite typical career-based system, others have further entrenched it. These very frequent, detailed, but less than consistent amendments to the civil service legislation have resulted in a climate of uncertainty. It remains to be seen which tendency will prevail in the coming years.