További részletek itt.

A kutatás ismertetése/Summary of Research:

The thesis is aimed at grasping a particular problem of European Union eastern enlargement: the interpretation of minority rights protection as accession conditionality and its effects in Hungary. In the light of violent ethnic conflicts surfacing in former communist countries (especially in former Yugoslavia and the former Soviet Union) among other international organisations, the European Union was also concerned on the situation of minorities in the new applicant countries of the Central and Eastern European region. In 1993 the EU articulated the requirement of protecting minorities as a pre-condition of accession for Central and Eastern European states. The political conditionality applied by the EU in the enlargement process, however was rather ambiguous: the EU did not set up a clear-cut normative requirements for candidate states in this field, which opened space for divergent, changing interpretations on the fulfilment of minority protection criterion. First of all, in EU law, in the acquis there cannot be found any reference to the rights of minorities, secondly during the enlargement process EU bodies have not applied international minority protection standards in a coherent way either.

In the first part, after describing the theoretical context of enlargement and conditionality, the thesis makes an attempt to explore the Union’s minority rights protection conditionality in the context of general international documents and treaties on minority rights. The second part of the thesis explored in more detail the similarities and differences between Hungarian minority policy and legislation, international standards on minority rights and the position articulated by EU bodies during the accession period.

Hungary offers a unique case in this regard: Hungarian law gives a comprehensive structure for minority rights protection (including cultural autonomy) and Hungarian governments usually portrayed themselves as committed promoters of minority rights. Though, minority groups living in Hungary are largely assimilated and represent (except for the Roma) very small and dispersed communities, Hungarian political interest in minority issues is often explained by the country’s foreign policy endeavours in advocating the claims and rights of large number of ethnic-Hungarian minorities living in neighbouring countries.

This dual interest in minority issues, characterising Hungarian politics after 1989 offered a unique picture in analysing the impact of EU accession on domestic minority policies. The thesis analyses, primarily from a legal point of view, the most important documents issued by the different bodies of the EU (the European Commission and the European Parliament in particular) on minority issues related to Hungary and the legal and political developments in Hungarian minority policy during the period of EU accession (between 1998-2004). The research extended to both domestic minority policy and Hungary’s policy towards Hungarian minorities living abroad. In this context, the research reveals that EU bodies and the Hungarian government were equally trapped by their own political and normative traditions and preferences which time-to-time caused legal and political collision between the parties in interpreting the fulfilment of the EU accession criteria. The European Union was powerful in raising minority issues on the international and domestic political agenda (as the case of the “Status Law” and the concerns on the situation of the Roma show), however it was rather unsuccessful in offering and inciting effective and lasting solutions for these problems. Analysing legislative and policy developments related to minorities in Hungary in the period of EU accession, can prove, that despite the surfacing differences between EU Commission, the European Parliament and the Hungarian governments on interpreting minority rights protection, EU accession had some impact on the adoption of a separate anti-discrimination law and on the modification of the “Status Law” (a preferential law for Hungarians living abroad).

Moreover, as an effect of eastern enlargement, the European Union and its main bodies started to pay more attention to the situation of minorities both in third countries and in EU member states.