György Lengyel
Two Waves of Professionalization in the Hungarian Economic Elite

Professionalization has two diverse meanings. In the broader sense, professionalization denotes becoming more competent, using more efficient and elaborated social processes. In the narrower sense, it means the development of the special intellectual professions.

The paper examines the extent to which professionalization can apply to Hungarian economic leaders in both senses of the word. In other words, to what extent has the Hungarian economic elite become more professional over the 20th century, and to what extent has their work become a profession? It will be examined what recruitment and education, what interest-asserting modes and what attitudes characterized each generation of economic managers. Political history, the changes of systems, the dynamics of war and peace economy massively determined the course of professionalization in Hungary. The first wave of professionalization largely coincided with the first half of the 20th century, the second wave with its second half. In both waves, two generations, of leaders can be differentiated: the founders and heirs in the first, and the generations of worker managers and cadre-managers in the second.

It concludes that in the narrower sense, a lame professionalization, or specialization can be found. Meritocratic and credential values were involved in the recruitment of leaders in both periods, but they were combined with opposite criteria of origin and loyalty.
 

István Harcsa -Imre Kovách-Iván Szelényi
The Post-Socialist Transformational Crisis in the Agriculture and in the Rural Society

After a decade of recession and with the fall of state socialism one hoped a fast regeneration of agriculture.

The last five years were not moving Hungarian agriculture out of long period of slow growth. They were instead pushing it into a painful crisis of transformation, which devastated the whole economy, but its impact on agriculture was particularly damaging. While private property and market gained more importance this is not quite a "Capitalist Market Economy" based on complex new property rights.
 

Máté Szabó
Conflict, Mobilization and Protest (1990-1994)

The mobilization and protest of social movements is not a new phenomena in Hungary, There were social mobilizations and protests also in the time of crisis of the Kádár-regime. In the new democracy the movements and conflict potentials has been changed and restructured. In a pluralist democracy, there is no political space for the civil right "opposition" of the communist systems, with its "second, samizdat publicity". Despite of this fact, there are still civil right movements acting against racism, and other forms of injuries against civil rights, like Amnesty International, Raoul Wallenberg Association, the "Democratic Charter". Former onposition groups are institutionalized in the new Hungarian democracy in the organizational forms of political parties.

The older generation of the Hungarian opposition, from the seventies established the party called "Alliance of the Free Democrats". The younger generation of the opposition, from the eighties founded the party called "Alliance of the Young Democrats". Especially the younger generation of the Hungarian opposition has been supported in its political protest by the ecology and peace movements, and it was rooted in the movement for the self-government of the student hostels. All these movements, ecology, peace and students have rather specific functions in the new democracy, and they are less relevant for the political mobilization today.

New conflicts of the new political system raised new mobilizations and protests. The "taxi driver blockade" in the October of 1990 was a nation-wide protest movement against the drastic raise of the fuel prizes, organized by the professional transporters, especially by the taxi drivers, but also enjoyed a broader social support against social consequences of the marketization. The taxi drivers orgánized blockades throughout the country and paralysed the transport system of Hungary for three days, until a compromise has been reached. Since 1991, the so called "Democratic Charter" an umbrella organization of different citizen's groups and organizations organize public protest against anti-democratic tendencies (racism, government control of the media) on a mass scale. This organization has bees supported also by some of the political parties of the opposition.

In 1992-1993 an association called "Society of People Under the Living Standard" organized nationwide campaigns against the general introduction of VAT and the "unsocial" character of governments economic policy. This movement is exhausted after the introduction of VAT, but despite this fact the conflict and protest potential of socially disadvantaged groups in Hungary is still there. The "media war", the conflict about the governmental control over public medias raised political protests of both sides; first the pro-governmental "national radicals", after the government's interventionist policy in the medias thc: liberal organizations protested against the media policy with demonstrations, subscriptions, rallies. The profest potential of agrarian interest organizations and of trade unions is also there in Hungary.

New characteristics of political protest compared with the Kádár regime are, that public, legal mobilization and protest are allowed. Before, the regime tried to hinder networking, publicity protest and international relations of protest organizations. Now in the framework of freedom of association and gathering, legal and public networking, resource mobilization and political protest are widely accepted phenomena's and used form of action. Beyond the framework of the legal protests, demands for civil disobedience has been articulated by different groups. Violent and illegal forms of political protest are rare in Hungary, violent conflicts with the police on demonstrations are marginal in the last four years.
 

Gabriella, Kiss Dalminé
Work and Free Time

The subject is the diminishing of the work-paradigm as the basis of the industrial society and as the "model of normality" and its influence on the interpretation of leisure.

Up to this time interpretation of leisure have been closely connected with interpretations of work throughout the'modern' and 'modernity' periods. Those changes in the work-paradigm which might be brought over the postmodern era will radically modify the basis of leisure theories, since these changes will put these theories into novel perspectives. In everyday life, as well as in theoretical inquiries, the leisure problem tends to appear in contexts not connected to work.
 

Fruzsina Albert -Beáta Dávid
Characteristics of the Network of Relations of Foreign Students Studying in Hungary

The objective of our paper is to describe the network of relationships of foreign students studying in our country and to give an explanation to some of its characteristics. The sample consisting of one hundred male students of the Semmelweis University of Medical Sciences, was further divided into five groups of ethnic origin so that comparisons could be made. Our basic hypothesis, according to which the foreign student groups, studying in Hungary are characterised by being closed and segregated, was proved. However, our other assumption that the number and quality of the Hungarian contacts of the subgroups would be markedly differentiated by their cultural and ethnic differences, could not be verified. The surprising result of our survey is that contacts among members of the different subgroups are extremely modest.
 

Andrea Szabó-László Szabó
Relationship Between Views on Living Standards and Incomes

Based on the dala of the 1992 wave of the Hungarian Household Panel, prepared by the Budapest University of Economics and the Informatics Association of Social Sciences, the paper tries to find an answer to the question what factors determine satisfaction with living standards after the systemic change.

The actual financial situation and the income are less decisive. Though a bigger income and better financial conditions result in bigger satisfaction, yet the extent of satisfaction does not follow the pace of the rate of income indices. Subjective opinion, psychological attitudes - particularly the career covered and the image of the future - influence the sense of satisfaction to a far greater extent than the financial conditions and incomes.

After the systemic change partly there is relative satisfaction in the Hungarian society, and partly there is relative deprivation, but in different proportions in each stratum, yet the proportion of those who are satisfied, who pull towards the centre and the dissatisfied is significant.

Those middle strata which are sliding down, who lose their income position, are not increasingly dissatisfied. The authors draw the conclusion that the satisfied elements of the middle strata choose those to be their reference group who are already in a deprived situation.