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Hungary Ideology
The HSWP, as a party created under the influence of the
CPSU,
generally adhered to Soviet concept of Marxism-Leninism,
which
regarded as the essence of socialism to be state ownership
of the
means of production, controlled by a dictatorship acting
in the
name of the working class. Hungarian ideologists echoed
their
Soviet mentors. For example, Gyorgy Aczel, until mid-1988
a
member of the Politburo, stated that "a society can be
called
socialist when a new political system and mechanism come
into
being on the basis of new conditions of ownership."
According to Hungarian Marxist-Leninists, the welfare
of the
working class constituted the historical goal of the
party.
However, since 1956 the HSWP has sought to represent the
interests of all Hungarians and has devoted greater
resources to
promoting the spiritual and material progress of the whole
society. The party also has come to acknowledge that "a
perfect,
complete Marxism does not, cannot, and will never exist"
and
therefore has rejected the notion of a set of eternally
valid
ideological premises emanating from Moscow. Rather, since
the
late 1950's the HSWP has sought to adapt general
Marxist-Leninist
ideas to Hungarian conditions. In the late 1980s, the
party
considered the country's socialist development to be in a
transition between the stage of intermediate economic
development
and the stage of "developed socialism." Developed
socialism
promised the intensive development of the economy,
emphasizing
the qualitative improvement in working conditions and the
standard of living, as well as the liberalization of the
political system to encourage incipient pluralism and
popular
political participation.
Data as of September 1989
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