Academic freedom is the foundation of the academic profession. Without academic freedom, there can be no free search for natural and social truths, and there is no free scientific discourse. The absence of academic freedom also limits scientific progress. In addition to the freedom to research, academic freedom also includes the freedom to choose the content and methods of teaching (freedom to teach), to communicate knowledge as experts and to shape and comment on the conditions of teaching and research (AAUP 1940, Unesco 1997). Academic freedom is not unlimited, however, since these freedoms are only valid within the accepted (ethical, methodological, etc.) standards of the academic community.

Researching academic freedom has become a hot topic again in the last decade. This is reflected in the growing number of articles and books about academic freedom (e.g. Kinzelbach 2020; Ignatieff - Roch 2017; Hao – Zabielski 2020; Lackey 2018).  

One of the reasons is the rise of authoritarian political regimes and the expansion of higher education in such states. In those states, the primary constraint on academic freedom is political repression (Hao 2020), which is reflected in publications such as the annual reports of Free to Think.

However, the issue of academic freedom is now also relevant in liberal democracies. In these countries, academic freedom has long been taken for granted as a freedom that goes hand in hand with institutional autonomy. However, it has now become constrained by the increasingly widespread academic capitalism (Hao 2020) and different forms of political correctness (e.g. see the abundance of discussions about free speech, trigger warnings, safe spaces, no-platforming and microaggressions; Lackey 2018). In the context of managerialism, it has also become apparent that academic freedom can shrink even in universities with high institutional autonomy. Self-censorship and silencing of academics have even become an issue in countries such as Finland (Valiverronen - Saikkonen 2020). In addition, other actors also seek to limit academic freedom. For example, business (e.g. distorting scientific discourses on climate change or smoking) or even restrictive efforts from within academia (Delborne 2016). 

In this paper, we examine the situation of academic freedom in Hungary, an ‘in-between’ country. Hungary is not only geographically and geopolitically an ‘in-between’ country (between East and West, between developed and developing countries), but also politically due to the illiberal policies pursued by the Hungarian government in the last decade. As a result, Hungary has been often seen as a hybrid system between liberal democracies and dictatorial regimes (Bozóki – Hegedűs 2017; Csaky 2020). How does academic freedom evolve in such an’ in-between’ situation? What kind of higher education and science policy characterizes a country whose leadership is building an illiberal state? We believe that by demonstrating the development of academic freedom, we can also provide an insight into the priorities and strategies of a government that calls itself illiberal. 

We present the circumstances and evolution of academic freedom in Hungary by exploring the following three research questions: 1) How does the regulatory framework conceptualize academic freedom, and what guarantees does it provide to protect academic freedom in Hungary? How has this changed over time? 2) To what extent do public higher education and research institutions' governance and decision-making model help or hinder academic freedom? How has this changed over time? 3) What typically limits or supports academic freedom in Hungary? Where do tensions arise in the context of academic freedom? What are the weaknesses and risk elements of the current regulatory framework and institutional environment? We answered these questions by using different data collection methods. We analyzed legal regulations describing and affecting academic freedom. We also collected cases of infringements of academic freedom to look for patterns. Some cases stem from the media, where they gained significant publicity. Other cases came from interviews. We conducted 31 interviews mainly among academics working in social sciences and humanities, but some of them in other disciplines. Interviewees were identified through snowball sampling, and they came from 9 different institutions covering the major public academic institutions in Hungary. The interviews did not aim for a representative sample but to assess recurring patterns of infringements (if any) and to understand the individual, organizational and system-level mechanisms behind such patterns. The interviews lasted on average about one hour and were conducted in Hungarian. They were mostly conducted online, after which they were transcribed verbatim. All respondents received information about the aims of the study, were informed that participation was voluntary, and that interviews were confidential because of the sensitive nature of the study.

Regarding the legal protection of academic freedom, we concluded that there is a partial erosion of legislative guarantees leading to a situation where the respect or violation of academic freedom depends on the whim of decision-makers at policy and institutional levels. At the institutional level, we concluded that the role of academic communities in decision making has been reduced. The financial and strategic decisions have been taken over by new bodies (boards of trustees, governing boards) or agents (e.g. chancellors); and the government has a decisive influence on their composition or selection. The accountability of and control over the new, government-mandated governing bodies are weak – in particular, to and by the academic community they are mandated to govern. This is not necessarily a violation of academic freedom per se, but the procedural and organizational guarantees that hitherto had ensured it are no longer in place. Therefore, the problem at the systemic level is not the systematic restriction of academic freedom but the inability of the current legal environment and governance model to prevent its infringement. At the individual level, a majority of the interviewees felt that there is no systematic or institutionalized effort at the sectoral or institutional level to openly restrict academic freedom in Hungary. However, in the social sciences and humanities, especially in the case of high-intensity public discourses (gender, migration, LGBTQ, etc.), the phenomenon of self-censorship, conformity and adjusting is already present and is amplified by systemic factors. These factors include, for example, increased insecurity, dependency and vulnerability of academics (e.g. losing of public servant status); difficulties in accessing the research data; the discouragement to discuss controversial topics; the discouragement to express expert opinion in the public arena in some topics (such as migration, gender etc.).

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