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Hungary Democratic Centralism
According to the Party Rules, the "HSWP is built on the
principle of democratic centralism." In theory, democratic
centralism calls for the democratic election of all
members of
leading organs by secret ballot, subordination of lower
party
organs to higher party organs, and the obligation of the
leading
organs to report regularly on their activities to their
party
organization.
In practice, intraparty democracy functioned within
narrowly
circumscribed limits set by party leaders, who were the
only
officials able to change party policies. In addition, when
the
party made a decision, members possessed only the
information
provided to them by the party hierarchy. Based on that
information, the leadership expected the rank and file to
endorse
its decisions. Delegates sent to meetings at the next
highest
level were, in fact, chosen by the leaders they ostensibly
elected. Moreover, the central party apparatus controlled
personnel appointments and ensured that only "trustworthy"
members were appointed to positions of authority.
In the late 1980s, party leaders have acknowledged
problems
with this form of decision making. For example, a party
document
argued that "if democracy is narrowed down, then issues
are
solved only by the leadership and a group of experts."
This
document maintained that greater participation of the rank
and
file would ensure wider responsibility and decisions of
higher
quality.
Indeed, in 1988 the party loosened some of democratic
centralism's traditional precepts. For example, in June
1988 the
Budapest party committee chose among two
candidates--Mihaly Jasso
and Pal Ivanyi--for the position of first secretary of the
Budapest party committee. An eight-person nominating
committee
selected the candidates based on consultations with party
committee members, department heads, district first
secretaries,
and other activists. In the first two votes, neither
candidate
received the required 50 percent plus one of the valid
votes. On
the third vote, Jasso received a majority. Later in 1988,
the
party loosened other strictures, thus allowing party
members to
join organizations, movements, and associations considered
by the
party to be its "potential or actual allies."
In July 1988, more evidence appeared that the party was
loosening the norms of democratic centralism. The Central
Committee approved a resolution reducing the party's
nomenklatura authority over a number of party,
government,
and economic positions. In 1973 approximately 1,700 such
positions existed, of which more than 800 could be filled
by
Central Committee secretaries
(see Party Structure
, this
ch.). In
1985 the Central Committee reduced the number of such
positions
to 1,241. A Central Committee resolution of July 13-14,
1988,
further lowered the number of these positions to 435.
However, in
1988 Istvan Petrovszki, the head of the Central
Committee's Party
and Mass Organizations Department, reported that the party
would
not completely halt the practice of recommending personnel
for
key positions. When these appointments concerned staff in
such
bodies as the National Assembly, the PPF, and the National
Council of Trade Unions, each of which had the right to
nominate
and elect its own officials, the party would make
recommendations. However, if these organizations selected
their
own nominees, the party would oppose the selection,
according to
Petrovszki, only if it questioned the person's "political
reliability."
Despite some changes in the procedures of democratic
centralism, in the late 1980s participation in decision
making
remained low in the HSWP. Party studies continued to show
that
the level of activity and the quality of party work among
the
rank and file were poor. Individuals or, at most, small
committees selected nominees for party offices. Indeed,
Sandor
Lakos, editor in chief of Partelet (Party Life),
wrote in
the late 1980s that the most important question facing the
party
was how to create greater party democracy.
Data as of September 1989
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