Hungary 4.2.1

In Hungary, there is no comprehensive law on culture or art. Act CXL/1997 is often referred to as the Law on Culture, but in fact it regulates three sub-sectors only: libraries, museums and local socio-cultural activities. The other fundamental piece of cultural legislation is Act LXIV/2001 on the Protection of Cultural Heritage. After 2010, when Fidesz, the governing party gained constitutional power, the only constituting cultural policy Act of the NER was the Act on the Hungarian Arts Academy – MMA. Otherwise, a series of parliamentary acts kept modifying the earlier basic cultural laws, including ones on the archives and films. Between 2010 and 2019, no fewer than eight acts made wide ranging changes to the Cultural Heritage Act of 2001, in connection with the several stages of the fundamental overhaul of this sector.

In 2019, the Prime Minister pronounced to focus on the cultural transformation of the country, in the ideological and political sense ot the term. The Acts on the National Council for Culture and the Institutions of Cultural Strategy, as well as on the Foundation for Hungarian Culture brought about a totally new hierarchy of decision-making and of institutions. The accelerated reorganisation of the cultural arena went hand in hand with that of the institutional structures of higher education, research, and media. A large number of government decrees accompanied and specified these two parliamantery acts. However, the last couple of years have been less turbulent in terms of cultural legislation. 

The list of the existing cultural legislation:

List of laws with relevance to culture

Hungary has ratified all the relevant international conventions and is party to all treaties, but they have never exerted significant effect on processes inside the country. The monitoring of those conventions, and the ensuing reporting activities are in most case formal and superficial, which was also the case regarding the obligations of the country within the Soviet Bloc.