Scholarly attention has started to shift from democratization and democratic consolidation
to trends of democratic deconsolidation, backsliding, regression, and erosion. This
article examines Hungary as a deviant and exemplary case for understanding de-democratization.
The starting point is the literature on defective democracy, which provides a unified
framework of analysis for the causes and the outcomes of democratization. However,
as the case of Hungary shows, de-democratization is not simply the mirror of democratization.
In Hungary, both the outcome and the process of de-democratization defy expectations.
The democratic defects do not conform to any of the standard types, instead resembling
a diffusely defective democracy. Moreover, existing explanations fail to account for
their emergence. The case of Hungary indicates that our knowledge of democratization
may be a poor guide to understanding de-democratization.