THE CO-OPTATION OF CIVIL SOCIETY IN EASTERN EUROPE: THE CASES OF HUNGARY AND POLAND

Abstract

The article is devoted to the analysis of the interaction between the state and civil society in Eastern Europe, using the cases of Hungary (2010–2026) and Poland (2015–2023). Co-optation is defined as a deliberate strategy employed by a country’s ruling elite aimed at establishing a controlled civil society through the use of legal restrictions, administrative and informal pressure, influence over funding, control of the media, and information campaigns. It is noted that co-optation is fundamentally based on dividing civil society actors into desirable, acceptable, and undesirable groups, each of which is subject to different rules of engagement within the political system.
The study finds that the cases of Hungary and Poland share a common set of co-optation instruments, including the use of right-wing populist and nationalist ideology, the establishment of state institutions to centralize influence over civil society funding, and restrictions on undesirable actors’ access to decision-making and consultation processes. At the same time, the two cases differ in the extent to which these co-optation instruments have been implemented, as well as in the principle underlying the division of actors into desirable, acceptable, and undesirable groups. In the case of Hungary, this division is primarily based on an actor’s loyalty to the ruling elite and its economic interests, whereas in the case of Poland, ideological conformity serves as the dominant criterion, making an actor desirable even in the absence of direct links to the economic interests of the ruling elite.
The differences in the implementation of co-optation strategies in these two cases are explained by variations in the internal organization of the ruling elite. In Hungary between 2010 and 2026, the ruling elite was represented by an organized kleptocratic group characterized predominantly by informal ties, whereas in Poland between 2015 and 2023, it was represented by a conservative-authoritarian group that relied primarily on formal institutional ties.