János Kis starts his essay ön popular sovereignty with the following: "In the Republic of Hungary all power is vested in the people, who exercise their sovereignty through elected representatives and directly," This sentence records one of the most important moral and political principles of our Constitution, But what is the essence of this principle? To answer this question we have to ask not a dictionary, but political theory. However, the last time political theory gave a meaningful interpretation of popular sovereignty was one hundred years before the French Revolution. This is what János Kis calls Classical Doctrine. Yet Classical Doctrine became dubious because of the ideological role it played in preparing terror. For this reason, the author is of the opinion that the heritage of Classical Doctrine should be reconsidered, According to him Classical Doctrine cannot be upheld, but the notion of popular sovereignty can be given an attractive and coherent interpretation. This is what he undertakes in his essay.
Zoltán Miklósi's essay examining the boundaries of political community says it is not yet settled what the basic principles of liberal political morality mean for the basic questions of politics concerning citizenship and immigration, so we usually accept the current practice which considers the question as to who is accepted into a country and given the rights granted with citizenship the discretionary power of individual states, with a few exceptions like asylum. This practice is one of the major pillars of the national state order of the world. Miklósi's essay questions the justice of this practice.
In this issue Péter Sólyom and Csaba Tordai made an interview with Gáspár Miklós Tamás, and talked about to what extent the national state can give a framework for political community today, According to Tamás after the failure of the welfare state, which can be considered the top of the development of the national state, different ethnic and regional identities were formed, which disrupt the base of solidarity in the national state. In his opinion although we cannot feel this in Hungary, it is only because Hungary is still a unified national state.
People, nation, sovereignty. In this column we asked for the opinion of several renowned researchers on the topic, of people, nation, political community, citizenship and sovereignty.
According to Iván Halász we cannot talk about a unified or even typical model of 'political community' in Europe. The central element is still citizenship, and this will probably stay like this for a long time. At the same time, the boundaries of political community have been changed in several aspects. There is an intensified search for the ways and means of how to preserve the relationship of the mother country and its emigrated citizens. But it is important not to make ethnicist approach stronger in the politics concerning citizenship.
András Gerő's writing emphasizes, that when using the term 'Hungarian' we always have to be aware of the constraint of content contextualization, We have to know what meanings the different ages gave preference to. And of course, we
- 144/145 -
also have to be aware that nothing ever disappears. It may stay hidden for a while, but it is there all the same, including the culture of Hungarian illusionism.
In Iván Zoltán Dénes's opinion people living in minorities can be as different as we are, just like their life strategies, and nobody is entitied to set them any requirements concerning their identity. The author is for the creation of conditions necessary for the free choice and formation of identity instead of the manipulations of power.
Gábor Gángó is discussing the idea that Hungarian culture formed primarily by the elite raised within the Trianon borders, finds itself a dubious situation in many ways when seeking a place within Central Europe. On the one hand the tradition of the national state gives very little help to starting communication with the nations who created their own identity against this very national state. On the other hand the Hungarian cultures of the disannexed territories differ greatly from the Hungarian culture within the Trianon borders,
Among others Nándor Bárdi is concerned with the three fields of Hungarian politics: international protection of minorities, Hungarian-Hungarian relationship, and support politics. The most is said about support politics. The concern of debates is most often the question; who and where decide about sources? As a result, does Budapest or the given region really know the aims and the situation? Who is responsible for the money of tax-paying citizens? How can they be called to account? As opposed to this, says the author, the question can be put like: how are decisions made and on what?
Judit Tóth says that the task of lawyers is to stop the further confusion of public law, and to prevent clauses of responsibility distupting law, that are not to be legally interpreted, In her opinion the much debated notion that the state, the Republic is just a form, a framework, and the nation is the body, the soul of community, can cettainly enrich the political debates on the notions of nation" but cannot justify any constitutional amendment through making the nation part of public law.
On the basis of the extensive amendment of legal material concerning minorities and the current decisions of the Constitutional Court, Balázs Majtényi and László András Pap examines the question whether an objective system of criteria for the recognition of minorities and belonging to a minority has been created. In their opinion the most problematic part of legal regulations is that the subjects of minority rights are still not identified.
In this column we present the recommendation of the General Assembly of the Council of Europe on the notion of nation, and a selection of the latest decisions of the European Court of Human Rights and the Hungarian Constitutional Court.
László András Pap and Bori Simonovits's writing sums up the experience of international research on the practice of police identity checks in Hungary. They conclude that gipsy people suffer discrimination during police identity checks in Hungary, especially as pedestrians. This discriminative procedure is
- 145/146 -
based on the seemingly rational presupposition that sees a connection between ethnic background and potential criminal deeds. This approach is widespread not only among the police, but among the population itself (including gipsy people themselves). Although the majority is aware of the arbitrary nature of identity checks, the extensive, in practice unlimited license of the police to carry out identity checks is not felt burdensome by the population, they would even wish to raise police presence and would welcome the increased check of "dubious" persons, groups (including gipsy people).
In this issue we are recommending three books. László Öllős's book Human Rights - National Rights, the freshly translated collection of essays by Jürgen Habermas, and a volume of essays on the relationship of ethnic identity and political loyalty. ■
Visszaugrás
