What constitutes a “reset”? The question arises now, as Hungary returns to the European fold. Viktor Orban is on his way out. Peter Magyar’s Tisza party has won a supermajority, securing 138 out of 199 seats in the country’s parliament. According to ECFR polling, 91% of the party’s voters want the new government to change the Hungarian approach towards the EU. So, as the incoming prime minister presses the reset button, the rest of Europe needs to work out what should happen now he has done so.

For Magyar, the priority is to release EU funds frozen due to Orban’s abuses of Hungary’s institutions. This presents the EU with two big questions. How ready should it be to release the funds linked to democracy and the rule of law? And how assertively should it use this moment to encourage the government in Budapest—after years of Orbanist kow-towing to Russian, Chinese and, lately, American interests—towards a wider, geopolitical realignment with the sovereign European interest? The answer, in short, is to combine a warm embrace of the Magyar government with a steely sense of the EU’s leverage.

Brussels hold‘em (or release‘em)

The EU has held back some €10bn in covid-19 recovery funds until Hungary reaches 27 “milestones”, mostly concerning judicial independence and the prevention of corruption and cronyism. The new government must complete this by the end of August to claim the money before the Recovery and Resilience........

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