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EU: Gáspar Miklós Tamás: ”This is post-fascism”

10 October 2015

Gáspár Miklós Tamás (b. 1948) is one of Hungary’s most prominent intellectuals and an important political voice in Europe. Trained as a philosopher and author of numerous books and articles, he was a leading dissident in the 1980s. Today he calls himself a Marxist and is very critical of Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and his nationalist ideas:

"You have written about what you call “post-fascism”. Do you still think that concept is useful to understand what we are seeing in Europe now?

I have been vindicated, unfortunately. So yes, this is what we have [in Hungary, editors’ remark], this is postfascism. It has all the democratic trappings, there is no need for a formal dictatorship. We have a minority media world, where people as myself can talk with no consequence for them – because it doesn’t reach more than 5 to 10 percent of the population...."

If we look at Europe, what currents are the dominating ones right now, in your opinion?

".. The right is on the march. And I think the refugee crisis will result in a much nastier Europe than we had a year ago. That’s already the case."

If we change the perspective to the refugees. When they refuse to accept these borders and fences and keep on going, do you see that as a political act, in some way?

A little, yes. They instinctively realize that they have rights independent of citizenship. And that’s very important. Very important! And in my opinion they are right in that. Rights are either universal or they are not rights. Because rights that are not universal are called privileges. There’s a difference. To realize that, you don’t need to be Marxist. It’s enough to be a Kantian. It’s absolutely disgraceful how people think of rights in terms of privileges..."

See: Gáspar Miklós Tamás: ”This is post-fascism”

And see: What is Post-fascism? (Open Democracy, link) by Gaspar Miklos Tamas