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Member states of the European Union use various forms of democracy. The European Union (EU) is a sui generis supranational union of states. At a European Council Summit held in Copenhagen, Denmark, on 21 June and 22 June 1993,[2] the European Union defined the Copenhagen criteria regarding the conditions a candidate country has to fulfill to be considered eligible for accession to the European Union:
Membership criteria require that the candidate country must have achieved:
- stability of institutions guaranteeing democracy, the rule of law, human rights and respect for and protection of minorities;
- the existence of a functioning market economy as well as the capacity to cope with competitive pressure and market forces within the Union;
- the ability to take on the obligations of membership including adherence to the aims of political, economic and monetary union.[3][4]
Consequently, all member states have direct elections, nominally democratic states that are considered to be "free" or "partly free" according to the criteria of Freedom House. As of 2020, there is no expert consensus on how to classify Hungary's regime type; Freedom House considers it a hybrid regime.[5][6][7] As of 2015, all European Union member states are representative democracies; however, they do not all have the same political system, with most of the differences arising from different historical backgrounds.
Many of the states in the neighbourhood of the European Union are not considered to be "free" by the same criteria.[1] Most European states neighbouring the European Union are considered to be "free" or "partly free" by Freedom House, with the exceptions of Azerbaijan, Belarus and Russia. On the other hand, almost all of the states in North Africa and Southwest Asia that neighbour the European Union are not considered to be "free", with the exceptions of Israel and Tunisia.[1]
This colourful and wide picture of labelling shows not only the inventive imagination of scholars, but also the lack of scholarly consensus on how to characterise the contemporary regime that has emerged in Hungary
Political scientists call the Hungarian political system a hybrid regime, standing between democracy and authoritarianism, a diffusely defective democracy, and a plebiscitary leader democracy. Lately, Freedom House has labelled Hungary as a transitional or hybrid regime (based on its democracy score).
By now there is widespread agreement on the fact that Hungary is not a democracy anymore (as reflected in the conclusions of V-Dem, Freedom House and a range of global democracy barometers).
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