“It is up to us what the new world order will be like,” Says PM’s Political Director

The change in the world order is a historic opportunity for Hungary, which has come out badly from every change for 100 years, but now “it is up to us” what the new world will be like, the Prime Minister’s Political Director said at the Hungarian Atlantic Council conference in Budapest on Thursday.

Balázs Orbán emphasized that the world has moved from a neoliberal world order to a new, multipolar order. Unpredictability and creative chaos will define the new world, everything is in constant motion, and we must constantly adapt to changing situations.

Hungarian diplomacy is also adopting a new “posture,” the essence of which is “Hungary first,”

he stated.

This new world, this new way of thinking is incomprehensible and meaningless to the liberal approach of the past, but it is no longer the liberal approach that is needed to look at changes through the glasses of the new world order. With the election of Donald Trump, the United States has already joined the ranks of states that want to change the status quo, the existing liberal world order. The defenders of the former liberal world order have been pushed back to Europe, stressed Balázs Orbán.

In his speech, the political director highlighted a number of anomalies arising from the internal contradictions of the neoliberal world order. One of these was the neoliberal approach’s failure to recognize the link between economic performance and the nation. In his view, it allowed industry to decline in the developed countries and production to relocate to other parts of the world, because it believed that the future lay in services and that industry was obsolete.

However, in a fragmenting world, industry is necessary, and this is not just an economic issue, but also a sovereignty issue.

This is why Hungary has increased its industrial production by 20 percent since 2010, he noted.

The politician added that liberal foreign policy was based on values and intentions, and did not deal with the consequences and effectiveness of these. This is the reason for the Arab Spring or the war in Ukraine, he stated. Balázs Orbán said that this foreign policy has weakened the West and strengthened its opponents, adding that moral considerations are important, but interests must also be taken into account. Donald Trump is now aligning principles with interests, not the other way around. This also means that the state cannot be weak just because it follows liberal principles, warned Mr. Orbán.

The Prime Minister’s political director pointed out that

by identifying with the liberal world order, the EU leadership has pretended that it is the most developed region in the world, even though its economic role in the world is steadily declining and it can no longer assert its interests.

Among the contradictions of the liberal world order, he also mentioned migration, which undermines the functioning of the state and society. Liberal ideology has failed in this area too, not managing to defend the community and the nation, he added.

Moreover, he mentioned that at the end of the Cold War, Europe believed that history had ended, that liberal ideology had won and that it no longer needed to defend itself, and its military power was drastically weakened. Europe outsourced its own defense, partly to its overseas allies and partly to international law. However, those who entrust their defense to others leave it to others to decide, Orbán warned.

Trust in international institutions has also been weakened, he said. They normally protect the status quo, but when there is change, they should manage the transition. However, if they become detached from reality, their legitimacy is weakened. Furthermore, the capacity for development and innovation in Europe has been reduced. China has twice as many patents a year as the next nine countries, the politician observed.

Western politics is helpless, it is denying the problems, and the answer to the crisis of liberalism is more liberalism,

he stated.

The Prime Minister’s political director said Hungary’s interest was in a strong Europe, but the obstacle to this was the narrow-minded elite in Brussels.

We need a Europe of nations, because federalism is leading the continent into ever greater trouble. Hungarian foreign policy must be based on national interests and realities,

Orbán emphasized.

He stressed that Hungary supports the strengthening of Europe’s military defense capabilities, but says no to arming Ukraine. In this context, he also stressed that the government is against Ukraine’s accession to the EU; peace and economic recovery are needed first. Ukraine’s membership of the EU makes the EU’s economic and military objectives impossible. NATO cannot act outside the borders of the alliance, Europe is not prepared for this, neither militarily nor economically, he argued.

Only those with a strategy can succeed, and sovereignty is not an obstacle but a condition for international relations. There is no alternative to connectivity, to interconnectedness, and this can be Hungary’s contribution to the stability of the world order,

stated the Prime Minister’s political director.

Via MTI, Featured photo via MTI/Lakatos Péter