POPULIST SLOGANS IN THE 2022 ELECTION CAMPAIGN: THE CASE OF HUNGARY

Abstract

The growing role of populist slogans indicates the gradual loss of attrac- tiveness of liberal and post-liberal decisions in politics, economics and culture, and especially in the ideological field. World experience shows that the populist movement intensified at a time when countries were ex- periencing turning points in their history.

With drastic socio-economic shifts, especially when the old principles have been broken and new ones have not yet been clearly outlined, popu- list figures are entering the political arena, offering quick and easy solu- tions. Moreover, the experience of populists is based on everyday, direct per- ception of the world and its problems, simplified ideas about causation and relations of public life, populism offers correspondingly easier, often rebellious ways out of difficult situations. And this seems like an attrac- tive solution to supposedly socio-economic problems, but delving into the deep dimension of understanding populism, it becomes clear that it is only a means of gaining power and trying to keep it longer. Therefore, populism in the context of the elections in Hungary in 2022 illustrates the practical aspects of populism and the collapse of the values of post- liberalism.