THE FUTURE OF THE PAST, OR POLICY OF MEMORY OF HUNGARY: BETWEEN NATIONAL AND UNIVERSAL

Abstract

The memorial strategies of political actors are related to the strategic course chosen by the political factor, the desired historical image of the socio-political community, and the degree of internal diversity of memory vectors in the context of multicomponent societies. The largest wave of EU enlargement in 2004 not only included Eastern European countries in the Union but also led to radical changes in the position of ensuring pan-European unity when it came to taking into account the historical past of the new members. The EU's post-World War II memory policy framework required new commemorative practices and emphasis to prevent memorial conflicts. A condition for ensuring internal unity within the EU is the gradual weakening of internal symbolic boundaries, especially national ones. This is what has become the most difficult for Eastern European nation- states, which have found themselves in a situation of two different vectors: on the one hand, they continue to develop modern-type national doctrines when the nation defines itself within the historical lands, where national identities are being shaped on the basis of the ethnopolitical interests of the titular nations and their historical narratives; on the other hand, pan-European postmodern processes involve the recognition of universal values and common strategies. An example of an ambivalent memorial policy is Hungary, which is trying to solve various socio-political problems with the help of commemorative practices: remaining in the EU supranational space and constructing a nationally oriented memorial strategy. Finding a balance between these vectors is seen as a condition for the effective development of the national community. Thus, the purpose of this article is to determine the relationship between the new format of Hungary's national doctrine and the commemorative political technologies implemented by the state. The memory policy in Hungary is examined in the context of the changing role of commemoration in global politics and the peculiarities of the formation of the institutional environment of memory policy are identified. The author concludes that Hungary's contemporary memorial policy is developing in the format of organizing a socio-political space for dialogue between the state and related diasporas abroad.