What is fascinating about this critique is that it misses the larger point. All the Eastern European states that had Communist governments before, had one factor that the West always left out of the equation -- in talking about living in a Communist society. There was a stability; an assured if modest standard of living that all these societies had provided for every citizen. The West, which through various means (Radiao Free Europe, Voice of America, BBC -- just to name a fraction of the endless attempts at destabilizing these societies) promised Paradise To Come to everyone if they overthrew the system and adopted the Western political and economic regime, What has in fact happened is that reality has set in. Not only has Paradise did not arrive, but the usual corruption that is part and parcel of Capitalism, has taken hold, If a society does not have a history of some form of constitutional checks on abuses of power ,then it is only a matter of time for demagogues to rise to the top. The deep disappointments of these societies in what they were promised and what actually came to be, can only lead to results that we are seeing.
49
"... the usual corruption that is part and parcel of Capitalism..."
And part and parcel of communism, and part and parcel of humans...
20
@robert
Perhaps we should not be too sure about the strength of a history of constitutional checks.
6
@robert This has nothing to do with promises from the West. And those countries did NOT overthrow the system--it collapsed with the collapse of the Soviet Union. There was a modest standard of living for some, but not at all for anyone out of favor with the regime. The inhabitants of eastern Europe are entitled to be as disappointed as they wish with the post-communist order. But the West didn't and doesn't owe them anything.
5
Any pressure on these corrupt nations will hurt ordinary citizen first, and than everyone will join the big backlash of cruel austerity by the bossy northern countries and we will be dealing with all the stereotypes again. I remember that all to well when we were dealing with the greek economy, which was just a big patronage system on expenses of the EU. All this "austerity is evil" rally missed a point, nepotism festers on negligence and indulgence.
Also everyone hails Macron's ambitions for more integration of the bloc. But basically Macron just want's more financial redistribution without accountability.
The EU is rotting from the inside. And it's the liberals, who are in denial, that they are feeding this degradation, who shy away from accountability. It is the liberal media, which amplifies the narrative of simple arrogance and cruelty, when other nations try to meddle with the nepotism of other nations.
We need more coverage of the corruption of the elites, and especially when these elites are populists. We need more coverage how shamelessly they enrich themselves and hurt little people. We need to build up wrath among those people, who still believe they can use taxpayers money to live a pipe-dream. We need more backing if liberal politicians put up pressure.
It is time to fight back with a permanent and lasting exposure not just of the robber barons, but also of those who are in willful denial.
16
@Mathias Weitz , have you read Adults in the Room by former Greek finance minister, Yanis Varoufakis? I had checked out a pictorial graphics book written by young Germans on economics and copied to notes the organization and founding dates of various EU organizations, which led me to read Varoufaki's book. It confirmed my thoughts that the WTO founded in Geneva in 1995 and the Financial Stability Board founded in Basel in 2009 was just a way for European elites to continue to control the narrative from their neutral, secretive banking mecca, while being the ones to mainly profit from globalization. The Euro elite, like it's counterpart in the US, is to blame for the elections of populists by uninformed, easily propagandized citizens.
@Mathias Weitz And we need more accountability from
the corrupt Brussel unelected officials also. There is corruption in Brussel so lets write about that.
1
After the fall of the Soviet Union, Eastern bloc nations were not only more corrupt than they are now but they were poor and dilapidated because the Russians pretty much stole what was worth stealing and pillaged their natural resources and left them in a shambles. People were poor, hungry and unhealthy.
The EU tax dollars poured in and over the past 20 years modernize and rebuild them. The people are richer and healthier.
Now Russia wants them back....All shiny and new, wealthy, healthy and with so many more new resources to pillage. Putin managed to help put the Orban types into power to help in Russia’s reclaiming of them. He is the man to help his oligarchs reap more wealth and power.
It’s not the EU that is the problem. It’s no different than our federal government. It takes in money and tries to disperse it around to those states who need it in order to spread the wealth and keep the peace through prosperity. What’s happening in EU is no different from what’s been happening in Republican held states. Or currently what’s happening with the Trump Administration.
I’m surprise at the level of disparaging remarks again the EU.
Peace is not a bad word. The EU has helped usher the longest peacetime in Europe’s history.
34
Russia stole their resources? Not more than America stole the resources of the Western Europe. Moreover, after dissolution of USSR, it was the West who stole their resources, leaving the local people in misery. No wonder the people there do not value democracy. Why should they if it is associated with misery and disorder? Orban was considered a democrat, and was supported by the West. Under his leadership, Hungary was accepted in NATO.
3
I am living in Central Europe --- in the Czech Republic --- and can attest to a great dislike among many (perhaps most) here of the current prime minister, the billionaire Andrej Babis, and his corrupt self-dealing practices. In fact, Babis leads a minority government. Ironically, his minority two-party coalition survived a parliamentary confidence vote thanks only to the support of the Czech Communist Party. But then, Babis was an agent for the State Security Police under the communist regime. Clearly, the Czech political situation is strange, and is still recovering from decades of communism under Russian domination.
All that said, I don't think the political and economic corruption here is really any greater than it is in the USA. But I suppose it is easier to see defects (and corruption) in others than it is in one's own self, or one's own country.
46
@An American Expat
Exactly.
And it's not "communism" that produced this high amount of corruption in Eastern Europe, it's that that the entire population has been living under a dictatorship for decades.
That's why you see the exact same thing happening in Southern Europe too, during the first decades after they became a democracy - even though these were mostly right-wing dictatorships.
And of course, THE most horrible (and most expensive) example of government corruption in the last two decades in the West has been America's Iraq war ... . So even democracies can have dangerously high levels (including hundred of thousands of casualties ... ) of corruption.
But then maybe the US will only become serious about its corrupt GOP once "we the people" start to inform ourselves and understand the very mechanism of corruption, rather than continuing to cultivate the myth that somehow the problem isn't dictatorships but "communism" or "socialism" (whether "correctly" implemented or not) ... ?
How many GOP voters would still vote for the GOP once they understand that there is NO intrinsic link between "socialism" and "totalitarianism"?
The whole idea of "big government" is based on the utterly false assumption that "socialism = dictatorship".
And that then allows the GOP to betray their own voters and the Constitution time and again, once they get elected, without ever having to face any consequences of their corruption at the ballot. After all, Democrats MUST be worse ...
5
Sad to read. I watched the Hungarian Revolution in 1956 on TV. I was 13 years old. Hungarian citizens fighting Soviet Union tanks with their Molotov cocktails. Bravery on every corner of Budapest, people risking their lives to be free of Soviet domination.
It wasn't the time for them in 1956, but it came later. Democracy.
The leadership of Hungary should be ashamed of themselves. Don't they remember those who died fighting for what they have today. Freedom.
54
@cherrylog754
As usual, they don't care one way or the other, possibly except to silently thank those citizens for making their plush autocracy possible.
12
@cherrylog754 I couldn't agree more. I watched the same events on the same TV when I was sixteen. The great irony here is that the West opened its arms to Hungarians fleeing the wrath of the Soviets and their puppets, but Hungarians today have no sympathy for migrants. Gratitude, I guess
8
@Ed Cone : Hungarians have not forgotten the destruction of their country and its occupation for c.300 yrs by the Muslim Ottoman Turks. They do not wish that reenactment. Hungarians welcome refugees. They reject undocumented economic migrants by the thousands wanting to trudge through their country on their way to prosperous western European countries. Remember: Hungarians who left during the revolution, about 200,000 of them, in 1956 were refugees, not economic migrants. I was one of them.
4
I would encourage other readers to browse the websites of European news organizations -you might be lucky to find a single article on the NYT's investigative reporting and the blatant corruption in EU agricultural subsidies.
Let's be clear here. The EU's hushed response to any criticism of bureaucratic overreach, questionable "regulatory standards" that only seem to be enforced on outsiders, and other practices make it clear that they are not the cooperative partner we make them out to be.
Kudos to the NYTimes for continuing to drive the narrative - nothing will change if people do not speak up.
66
Benjamin Novak is a journalist based in Hungary, and the article he co-authored for the Times was widely disseminated in Europe. It even had a Hungarian language version. There are, moreover, numerous internet investigative news organizations and human rights organizations based in Hungary that undercover and publish detailed abuses of Orbán’s kleptocracy. The major newspapers and media outlets are controlled by the government and are not reliable sources of unbiased information about the government. Hungary and other Central and Eastern European countries are basically unknown entities in the US, and are looked upon with benign or hostile indulgence by Western Europe. Along with important findings of the permitted abuses of EU farm subsidies to these countries, the Times article was crucial in highlighting the corruption and injustice that is rampant there for American readers. But Hungarians and others are well informed of their plight. The election of a Green Party mayor of Budapest and the consolidation of opposition parties to run against Fidesz, Orbán’s ruling party is cause for hope.
42
@Jared There are constant articles in European newspapers about Orban and his corruption, along with that of Babis, the PiS Polish government, and so forth. What you write is utterly incorrect and looks like the usual anti-EU polemic coming out of people with vested interests on the other side of the Atlantic. Most EU countries have higher standards of press freedom than the US does, if not Canada. Check the Reporters without Borders indexes, for example, before publishing your wild theories about 'censorship' or 'hushing up' by the EU. It sounds completely daft.
8
@Jared I found short (!) allusions to the article in the Swiss Neue Zuercher Zeitung and the German Frankfurter Allgemeine.
1
Europe, The Truly Dark Continent, Not Africa.
Your article would be more compelling if the headline itself were geographically accurate. Czech Republic and Hungary are in Central Europe, not Eastern Europe.
3
The EU has become a giant sclerotic mafia-like organization corrupt as much as the eastern European countries. And then there are the countries, like Norway, which have voted to stay out of the EU. We have to pay the EU a fortune just to be able to trade with it, and abide by most of its rules and regulations, so in effect you are punished for not being part of the club. And don't forget its president, Jean-Claude Juncker, is the man who paved the way for Apple, Google, Amazon et al to operate in the EU without paying their share of taxes.
3
The Editorial Board, once again, has taken up the pathbreaking work of its staff and twisted it for its own biased purposes. Anyone reading the original report would have understood that it's damning indictment of the European neo-liberal project as a whole, in which the former Soviet Bloc countries are merely bit players.
2
Coincidence, coincidence! The new prime minister of Romania is also called Orban but his first name is Ludovic. Just a heads up to all NYT readers. Wow, think of how likely it is that two neighboring countries both have prime ministers with the same last name!
1
It is truly embarrassing to see the inability of the Times Editorial Board to grapple with the crisis in American politics. I've been reading the times for well over 50 years now, and it has become a terribly embarrassment. The Times was famously an opinion leader. Now it is mousy. The op ed staff are mainly Republican "thinkers" engaged in pointless mentations ad nauseam. Goldberg is great. Even the great Krugman cannot grapple with Trump and has become strangely weak now that we're in the World Series of Politics. It's never gonna get more important than this. Get rid of the garbage: Brooks, Stephens, Douthat, and Bruni, and hire some people who understand the breakdown of democracy, because there is a good possibility that's what's going to happen if the newspapers do not educated the populace of this hazard.
1
Trump, Hungarian Style.
1
It’s the big boys of the EU that set these policies, not the pipsqueaks of the East. Do you really blame them for taking full advantage? Just like French, Italians and others? No, you’re just bashing the easterners for rejecting the crackpot mass immigration policies. It was Angela Merkel that violated EU law, not the easterners.
6
We have two issues here, one is European corruption, the other is so-called populism, which is actually just an aversion to having immigrants overrun your country. The NYT implies a link between the two but completely fails to support it.
6
There is no mention of Brexit, of how the Europolicy of largese toward Eastern states might have played a role.
This mirrors the US where 'big government' hating Republicans in red states are subsidized by the coastal elites they hate. Mississippi takes in nearly $3 from Washington for every $1 they send there. Alabama isn't far behind. Neither is Kentucky, yet Rand Paul and Mitch McConnell campaign against big government daily. The red agricultural areas are welfare queens with 40% (!) of last year's farm income coming from federal subsidies.
We should cut off the red states and let them find out how much they really depend upon big government and we shouldn't restore funding until they say 'thank you coastal elites for bailing us out'.
1
Interesting! The Times just briefly mentioned the problem of socialist corn farmers in the US. I wish I had a gang of midwestern senators forcing the oil companies to buy my product and stick into American gasoline. Gasohol, American socialism. Republicans, raving hypocrites, like Mr. Orban.
Chutzpah has never been more en vogue, alas.
Why always explicitly and easy fingerpointing to Orban and not ,for example,to your Ukrain or Polish "friends" who are much worse?
Did you, by the way, already forget the "great democrat" Poroshenko and his rich american consultants.lawyers and lobbyists?
1
"The editorial board is a group of opinion journalists whose views are informed by expertise, research, debate and certain longstanding values. "
I challenge the EB to provide us with those 'longstanding values' without sloganeering, catch phrases and holier-than-thou hyperbole.
I would also like to know who these 'journalists' are and why are they shrouded in secrecy. Other opinion writers are not afraid to sign their name to the pieces they write.
3
Forget the arms race. It seems we are in a corruption race on both sides of the Atlantic. And it is all the same people - the same people dodging taxes and scamming taxpayers! No wonder Giuliani is spending so much time in Eastern Europe cross-pollinating corruption between two continents seeking a cut of the loot for himself and his boss.
In Joseph Heller's Catch 22 the father of Major Major Major is a farmer. He doesn't grow alfalfa. There is too much alfalfa being grown, so the US Government pays him not to grow any.
With the money he gets, he buys more land on which not to grow alfalfa. The Government gives him more money, as the acreage he patriotically leaves lying fallow has increased. Etc., etc., etc.
I think the people who dreamed up the EU farm policies were big Joseph Heller fans.
1
« Concealing data », subversion of CAP subsidy, failure to fix is worse for the union having to fend off Trump’s trade war.
If the New York Times wants to help the union write democratic exceptions to its privacy policies for international press, strong alliance with the liberal global press needs to continue.
Why is the Times spend so much time with a small European country? We have so much problems e.g. Yemen, Syria, Iraq, Iran and Hong Kong. And we have serious issues like: climate change, poverty and healthcare. So many interesting and important topics to talk about and have a debate.
I do not thinks that to many North Americans are interested in Hungarian policies regarding land.
1
Even though I despise President Trump, I like a small dose of political incorrectness, just not to be submerged in lying rants. In the case of Eastern European would be tyrants, I would be happy if the EU could find a straightforward way to let them know that if they prefer to ally with Putin's Russia, then more power to them, let them go. They do not subscribe to the values of the EU, and in fact they are disrupting to the goals of the EU. In my view the European Union would be much stronger and have an even more coherent message without these tin pot dictators. And a strong EU is very much needed in the world at this moment in history.
It’s unfortunate that EU’s “Eastern Europe” has never extended as far as Turkey, despite decades of talks and negotiations. Otherwise Erdogan would have taught them a great deal about “populist scams” by now, much more than they can learn from Orban. But then EU doesn’t need any lessons on scams, does it?
1
The EU subsidies have contributed directly to the collapse of African agriculture. A senior EU expert once told me the Lome economic partnership agreement's most damaging impact was that you could not buy Togolese bananas in Toulouse.
The question is: anyone going to do anything about this? Orban is getting away with it unless the EU does something about it!
You don't have to self-righteous here. Same thing going on in the Land of the Free. Agricultural subsidies are one of the 3 great pillars of American Society: Medicare, Social Security and Agricultural Subsidies. Defense is untouchable. So what label would you describe our system of govenance?
3
The Great Elephant in the room is: the EU in its current form and structures is no longer capable to deal with current realities.
What is needed is a radical (as in: from the bottom of the root up) reform. If such radical reform indeed takes place and can be completed, why not move EU headquarters from the Habsburg City of Brussels to the other Habsburg City, the one in Central Europe: Vienna?
It comes down to let go of the still too-powerful Western-Eurocentric view of matters.
Good analogy to American conservatives viewing government subsidies as their due.
Back in the...70s, 80s, that movement to allow our states to administer federal lands within their boundaries- was, as I recall, rejected, but it was a near thing. And it never really died out completely. Now we see where it might have led (as the proponents hoped at the time).
Our system of federalism needs some updating. This EU model sounds more like our loose, early Articles of Confederation with a weak central government. Can they strengthen the EU oversight, power? Given the centuries of national identity, I’ve always had my doubts on this attempt at unity. We’ve struggled with it, fought a war over it, and our colonies had little independent history- certainly not centuries.
They need to work on a redesign. Maybe they can help us update our own problems with power sharing.
2
EU has been weakened considerably
by the ineptitude in Brussels. It is
hard to point to the success of EU
initiative. Keeping the members in
the bloc despite their violation of EU
values has rendered it ineffective. The
best that can be said about EU is
they are not butchering each other.
2
@s.khan Without the EU, President Trump would have already humiliated European countries forcing them to meet his conditions to trade with the USA, as he has done with Mexico and Canada. If he has not been able to do it with us, it is because we are united. It is so difficult to understand? Then, I agree that the EU is not perfect...are you sure your country is?
5
The EU's economy is $20 trillion. A trillion is a huge number. Corruption costs the EU $18.5 billion. A billion is way smaller than a trillion. Do the maths. Corruption does not equal a big problem in the EU. It's about the same as in the USA, according to Transparency International.
On the other hand, guaranteeing food security for 514 million people is no small success. CAP is a victim of its success. Yes. Big landowners are scamming the system, as are the small farmers. All of them. Hungary, in that regard, is a particular ''pain in the head'' for the EU. As is Slovakia, and Poland, sometimes. So what? They endured the Soviets for decades and are owed a little leeway.
Hungary is fast reaching the end of that leeway. But Poland is now more or less just another well-ordered and good-looking Western European country. The same applies to all of the Baltic states. More or less. So. To all the Steve Bannon-types predicting the EU's imminent demise: You'll be long dead and justly forgotten before the EU falls apart.
8
@Dan
The farm subsidies predated the EU and were part and parcel of government policy, be it France, Italy, or The Netherlands. Maintaining those subsidies, as the EU grew larger and larger was a key component of how the union progressed and served to shield the domestic food production from unfair competition.
And this is not an issue in Europe only; Canada has its marketing boards as well, without which the entire agricultural sector would have collapsed long ago.
2
Another law with unintended consequences. However, I challenge the NYTimes to investigate this law as a whole, including wealthier countries in the EU. The corruption is not limited to eastern Europe by any means.
Frankly, we call it corruption and condemn those enriching themselves, but fail to condemn the root cause - the appointed EU leaders that create the laws and and resulting consequences.
6
Interesting... I would exercise caution when calling leaders “illiberal” as that serves as a compliment in many populist leaders eyes. You can have an illiberal democracy, but that isn’t the problem here. The problem is the threat to democracy. “What Is Populism?” By Jan-Werner Muller is a great book on this subject. Just some thoughts on certain assumptions and language used in this article.
2
I don't think that things are that simple.
The problem in Eastern Europe is the same problem Italy, Spain, Greece and Portugal had (and to a certain extent still have).
It's actually what all young democracies have, after decades of dictatorship: the corruption and the fundamental cynicism and mistrust of even your own siblings is so deeply woven into the very fabric of society (both private and public life), that it takes DECADES before trust in politics goes up again, and with it, the willingness of ordinary citizens to vote out corrupt politicians.
And you don't even have to be a former dictatorship to suffer from this kind of problem: just look at what the GOP does to the US.
A 24/7 massive fake news propaganda machine whose main lines of the day are being systematically taken over by one political party's leaders, for two decades now, is enough to make ordinary citizens believe that ALL politicians must necessarily be corrupt. And once they believe this, they simply start voting for that particular utterly corrupt politician who's best at tweeting and yelling fake news lines during rallies.
After all that has been proven about Trump and the GOP, a whopping 90% of traditional GOP voters and 40% of this country still MASSIVELY support Trump and the GOP.
That means that the US unfortunately has no lesson to give here, and that we all better start studying how to fight cynicism and fake news in a much more effective way than what we've been doing until now..
15
@Ana Luisa Take a moment to consider why Trump is considered a step up from the focus-group driven Clintons and the progressive Left... What are we progressing to exactly?
1
Wow. This is a shockingly naive view on how the European Union works. Think of how hard it is to unite rural and urban America, then think of doing the same for 28 countries with each their own culture, language, dominant religion, openness, differing economic needs etc.
Of course the European Commission knows what is going on, but it can't send the troops into Hungary to overthrow Orban, he's their democratically elected leader and everyone else in the union has to deal with that fact. Hungary's GDP has tripled since 2000 so the long game, which is to lift up the country through EU membership and investments like it successfully has done for Spain, Portugal, ... before it, is working magnificently well. The four Visegrád countries (Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia) are a proverbial pain to the other 24 in just about every EU initiative, but it is dealt with through compromise and money as lubricant.
Ursula von der Leyen got her European Green Deal, which is deeply unpopular with the Visegrád.
It's not hard to see then where the new Commission portfolio for "Protecting the European Way of Life" is coming from and how a blind eye is turned towards the agriculture money.
Is realpolitik pretty? No. But the wheels of the European Union keep turning while the US is paralyzed.
9
this, not Marie Lepen or Nigel Farrage, is most likely to end the EU. West European taxpayers will get fed up with the racket and either break up the EU altogether or split it up along the lines of the Euro. Eastern Europe will then be left to fester for a few generations until, perhaps one day, it is ready for actual democratic state.
Analogies between the Eastern Europe and US South are actually pretty stunning, when you think about it ...
9
@mf You sir are quite biased (and frankly, racist) to stereotype an entire region without acknowledging the unique (and highly troubled) history and complications of Eastern Europe as well as the cultural motivations of voters in the region. It is also ludicrous to lump together every country stretching from the Baltics to the Balkans in a single basket without differentiating between cultures, religions, and national identities. I myself am a 21-year-old Polish-American student who is deeply proud of my heritage and plans to someday return to my home country. Despite media claims of "fascism" arising out of the Law and Justice administration (to describe the Polish situation in particular), the government has actually done quite a lot to help ordinary people, such as introducing child subsidies to help financially-stricken families and encourage population growth amid a falling birthrate, as well as substantially increasing minimum wages. Their policies are actually more in line with the rising American left than the right, emphasizing the doctrine of Catholic Social Teaching which resonates with the majority of my countrymen. While I don't know precisely about the politics of other countries in the region (Czech Republic, Hungary, etc.) - I can assure you it's not all negative and a lot of these governments are genuinely fulfilling their promises to the people -more so than in comparison to their Western European counterparts, and (especially), the U.S. under Donald Trump.
6
CAP could be described as a vast 'kick back scheme'. That it has been 'milked' by the original founding members of the EU since its inception has been well known for many years; This explains why there appears to be little appetite in Brussels to tighten controls or reform the management of the policy in ant significant way. The way the system is taken advantage of in Eastern European countries like Hungary and the Czech Republic is a more blatant and less well refined version of what has been happening in the UK and France and Germany for many years. One way or another the largest slice of the CAP cake goes to those who need it least, the very large land owners. One in five of the biggest recipients of European farm subsidies in the UK are billionaires or millionaires. Like all powerful and wealthy individuals or corporations, money and power is used to retain and augment money and power through the lobby system which is so entrenched within western 'democratic' nations. This is one of the reasons why the 2015 report that recommended tightening of the farm subsidy rules was dismissed. even though it is glaringly obvious that such reform is long overdue.
7
If 4 of 5 subsidy recipients in the UK are not millionaires the system is not being abused since even a smallish 300 acre farm would cost several million dollars. It’s no wonder so many (I don’t) support Brexit.
Perhaps the more important focus should be on the way CAP subsidies are being used by member states. There are now calls from many different quarters for a complete reform of the way in which agricultural subsidies are spent.
The environmental damage caused by the intensive farming methods employed by large agribusiness, who are one of the main benefactors of CAP largesse, and the significant loss of fallow land as a result, have caused huge losses of up to 55% in farmland birds over the past three decades.
The loss of insects as a result of over use of pesticides is thought to have caused a dramatic fall in numbers such as the 76% fall in abundance of flying insects on German nature reserves over 27 years– which are linked to increasing pesticides and neonicotinoids in particular.
The way in which subsidies are distributed needs to be carefully reexamined to encourage more biodiversity and greater use of sustainable farming methods.
7
One culprit in the rise of authoritarian/plutocratic/kleptocratic regimes, not just in Eastern Europe, but everywhere, is the assumption that what we call development inevitably results in greater democracy. Greater “development” presumably allows more democratic peoples to ignore anti-democratic movements because the history of “development” is that it leads to democratization—it’s just a matter of time.
History is a lousy standard to use with respect to what “development” means.
1
I suppose that the origin story of agricultural subsidies includes reasonable arguments that the government, for the good of the people, has an interest in managing agricultural output, or at least avoiding shortage or oversupply. The IDEA, for all we know, might be sound.
But from the very beginning of agricultural subsidies their disbursement has been negatively influenced by special interest lobbying and, somewhat worse, outright corruption. Stories where agricultural subsidies actually did their intended job are few and far between. Many subsidies stay in effect for decades after they have shown absolute failure. The ethanol-corn subsidy still exists, although it A) did not have the desired effect, B) continues to negatively affect sound agricultural practices and C) has benefited primarily the stockholders of certain gigantic agricultural conglomerates.
Created by career politicians, agricultural subsidies are their kind of program, giving individual lawmakers federal money to please local constituents and providing a way to funnel taxpayer's dollars to big-business campaign donors.
Please, one of you smart NYT readers prove me wrong. Point out an agricultural subsidy program that actually performed its ostensible purpose with anything close to a reasonable cost.
While the NYT itself dispassionately considers whether the givers or receivers are to blame, I see a system so flawed as to have no likely positive outcome.
6
@William Romp
Thank goodness I have at long last read a comment by someone who really does know what they are talking about.Thank you.
if in a crowd -- someone walks through spraying out cash into the air .. very few if any would not snare it..
1
How is that different from the landed class that owns huge swaths of the irrigated deserts of California and other places irrigated at below cost? They violate the limits on acreage, do not far themselves and often live far away.
21
The New-York Times has done a very good job by analyzing the corruption linked to EU-farm subsidies. I believe that the EU shall and will follow up this story and act on it. On the other hand, for example, how could the European Union have intervened when family members and friends of Orban were buying up former collectivized farm land in Hungary? Maybe it would be a good start by reporting the abuses, as the Times does, trying to mobilize the electorate.
4
@robert I don't believe so. The EU is not afraid to do dirty dealings or turn a blind eye to them to protect itself from falling apart. Think about the immigrant deals with Libya and Turkey.
The GDP of Hungary has tripled since it joined the EU, but social and cultural change cannot be forced.
It will take a few generations before corruption, xenophobia, homophobia etc. in these countries drops to the level of most of the EU.
Clearly, this paper had found its Devil Incarnate--Viktor Orban! But perhaps the main reason that the EU doesn't stand "behind reformers like Mr. Angyan" and rejects "efforts to make the subsidy system more accountable and transparent" is that well-placed individuals in western EU countries also game the system just as hard as their eastern EU confederates. So I suggest a follow-up article about the French method of playing the EU agricultural budget.
24
@Lotzapappa Well said!
3
Don’t be thinking that the Common Agricultural Policy is a linchpin of European equality. Historically, it has been used, for scant example, to plough fields of potatoes back into the earth or to harbour lakes of wine and mountains of butter warehoused just to artificially buoy prices of those commodities. Where surpluses have occurred, rather than dispatch the excess to needy families or stricken regions around the world, the surplus is destroyed or stored to be released when the price is right.
Enter the supermarket chains: various well known outlets have been manipulating food prices so that they continually spiral upwards by limiting supply, creating even greater surpluses and waste to the direct cost of the consumer.
Orban is a bounder, but he sees the corruption in the system, emulates it, and perpetuates it. Unfortunately, he is just one of many Euro-opportunists that abuse the spirit of the EU.
8
@Marcus Brant
Just what is the "spirit of the EU"? I see an undemocratic bureaucracy that serves the banks, big business, political elites and the wealthy at the expense of browner southern members, immigrants, the poor, minorities and progressives.
1
Irrespective of the sources of power-tradition, charisma, ideology, or popilism-entrenched ruling elite without institutional checks and accountability will always use state power and public resources for self enrichment that is sustained through the culture of corruption around. This holds true of the erstwhile East European corrupt socialist regimes, as also of the current crop of the populist demagogues like Viktor Orborn or their likes in other parts of the world. The mega agriculture subsidy scams of billions of dollars are simply the symptoms of the malaise afflicting the nations and the transnational entities like the Brussels politico-economic and bureaucrartic elite controlled EU.
6
Please note that the Czech Republic is in Central, not Eastern Europe. The difference is more than just geographic.
25
Same goes for Hungary.
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@Darian Arky I agree, Slovakia detto.
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@Darian Arky so is Hungary.
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From the tone and content of this editorial, it sounds as though the authors would like Hungary expelled from the EU. But what would that do? Sever young people's connections with other cultures and countries, isolate and impoverish Hungary, reduce educational and employment opportunities for Hungarians, force Hungary into dependence on another power, and make it more difficult for Western Europeans and others to visit and learn about Hungary (and learn Hungarian, a worthwhile undertaking). Yes, it is important to expose corruption. But also recognize that Viktor Orbán is not Hungary and that there is far more to the situation here than these authors suggest.
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I note that neither this editorial opinion nor the study by Selam Gebrekidan, Matt Apuzzo and Benjamin Novak on corruption in "Eastern Europe" imputes the farm subsidy scam to Poland and its ruling Law and Justice Party. This is as it should be: too often commentators carelessly assume what is true of Hungary will also apply to Poland. You are to be commended for making the distinction.
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Simply put, eastern Europe is and has been (since before World War II) a fascist belt running through the continent. To have expected more from it than that was unrealistic. Those nations should probably not have been admitted to the European Union in the first place. And now, the Union is reaping what it has sown. If it can't force countries like Poland and Hungary to abide by its rules, it should politely kick them out, if it wishes to be ripped off no longer by them.
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This article doesn’t mention Poland, and for good reason. Eastern Europe, same as Western Europe, is a very diverse place. Just because both Poland and Hungary are in Eastern Europe doesn’t mean you can attribute Hungary’s transgressions to Poland.
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@Ed Cone All Europeans belong in the European Union.The E.U. exist to guaranty peace,cooperation,sovereingty and defend the interest of Europeans.
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Force them to abide by the rules, you stay? Merkel’s immigration fiasco was in direct violation of the Dublin Regulation. She also violated the prohibition on bailouts and QE.
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Clever actions have consequences. The Neocon Iraqi invasion destroyed the Middle East, displace millions of people - many of whom have landed in Europe and created social and economic unease. Second, the 2008 Great Recession still reverberates across Europe and the world: jobs are scarce and insecure. At least these two events have created a ripe platform for fascists like Orban to ascend using/ abusing populist anger - as was done in the 20th Century. There are instances when “moral outrage” sound hollow, specially as our very own institutions are being decimated by Trump, yet Trump is supported for a second term by same dirty money that caused the Recession and are behind the racialization of immigrants. Talk about relativity.
“Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it. Those who do not remember their past are condemned to repeat their mistakes.”
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No, the mass migration began after Sarkozy, Cameron and Hillary blew up Libya.
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Elizabeth II, the Queen of England, is a major land-owner. She too is eligible and receives EU agricultural subsidies. No wonder the Tories are so keen on Brexit! As the original article and the editorial states, the EU is making a point in respecting the sovereignty of member states. Consequently all major decisions have to be unanimous. If a subsidy application meets the criteria and is formally submitted, it will be accepted. The corruption in authoritarian leaning Hungary, Poland et aliis has been investigated, reported and debated for years. Finland currently holds the Presidency of the Council of the European Union and endorsed the motion to make the subsidies dependent on the advancement of democratic values. Unfortunately only a watered-down resolution tying the money to anti-corruption efforts was made. The EU is an economic block, not a political entity. Hungary, probably the worst offender, is also portraying itself as the defender of white Christian values and therefore has not accepted a single refugee. Reminds me of Mahatma Gandhi's remark: "I like your Christ. Not so much your Christians. They are so unlike Christ."
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In all fairness, eastern Europe did not invent the "blame the EU"-game. The leaders of the western member countries know how to play that card very well. And they are often happy to do it, which is very bad for the EU. I would hope that stops, in all member countries. We need a stronger EU, not one that is falsley made accountable for problems caused on the national level.
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@Mark B The EU courted and took in the East European countries looking for more clout and more work for the hordes of civil servants it employs in Brussels. These countries have little in common with the original partners (the Hapsburgs understood this and wisely kept Hungary separate).
Yet the 'originals' refuse to accept this fact and just in the last few days, the delusional President of France bemoans the loss of commonality as though there ever has never been one.
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@Georges Actually Britain pushed the hardest of all members to expand the EU into the East, and they are hardly fans of bureaucratic Brussels.
If anything, the added members have made it harder to govern the EU.
The US pushed behind the scenes too, as it served all of the West geopolitically to drag these countries away definitively from Russia's influence.
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Eastern Europe is not Europe. It is Eastern Europe. Big difference, primarily in terms of political values and heritage. Western European politicians naively and condescendingly overestimate their ability to mold Eastern Europeans into Western Europeans. But imagine what a boiling cauldron of instability a poor Eastern Europe outside the EU would be. The EU courageously chose the better of two evils when embracing them. And there is no telling how it will end, in spite of all the enthusiastic speculation by commentators. Farm subsidies are a sensitive issue for the EU because they are one of the most contentious aspects in the western part of the union as well, with a strong millionaire farm lobby continuously thwarting any attempt to reform their cash cow.
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"Perhaps even more galling is that the European Union knows all this (= corruption), but prefers not to see or hear about the corruption for fear of upsetting the precarious bonds that hold the union together."
"But the European Union’s see-no-evil approach to the misuse of billions in taxpayer funds is an unnecessary, patronizing and self-defeating concession to the new members."
This seems like an open invitation to take advantage of the system. If the EU stares this corruption in the face and then decides to look the other way or close its eyes, then one can hardly blame the thief. They are just playing the system that allows them to do so and seemingly invites them to do so.
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What seems to be obvious is that the EU should stop helping countries that don't adjust to the rules of the game . The EU is a bureaucratic liberal club led by non democratic technocratic elites. There is a democratic deficit in Europe, but , that is what the club is about. It is a non democratic entity raise to prevent 'other types' of non democracies to raise. That is what it should be doing and it is not.
A bureaucratic non democratic liberal Union should stand against illiberal democracies such as that of Hungary and Poland. No more than that
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This article doesn’t mention Poland a single time, for good reason.
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A good measure of tolerable amount of government corruption is about 10%. Not for individuals but for what a state can tolerate without collapsing. Europe has a "left behind" populace just like the USA. While the elite marches on to a bright and shinny city those "left behind" get waylaid by populist. Historically we had a POTUS that gave the vote to the common man but set back the Industrial Revolution between a quarter and half century for fear of industrialization, giving industrialist too much power, creating a centralized bank and giving up our rural ways for crime ridden cities filled with undisirable immigrants some of which were Catholics.
What I don't understand is the elites recent attacks on the farmers of Europe and the USA. Is corrution to preveliant to tolerate.There has been a farm problem since before the Industrial Revolution. Is it a matter of fairness or are we trying to reelect Trump? Pitting rural folk against city folk is going to win an election for whom?
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The problem is the EU is just a shadow government filled with failed politicians.
They have admitted countries whose culture is far different than the founding countries of France and Germany.
There is no economic need for the Western bloc to cater to the new Eastern European members except for cheaper labor for Western industries to exploit.
The whole system will eventually collapse like the Tower of Babel.
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@Edward B. Blau But there sure is a strategical and geopolitical need to include eastern Europe.
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@Edward B. Blau
"There is no economic need for the Western bloc to cater to the new Eastern European members"
Not really.
Actually there is a huge economic need for the Western bloc for those countries.
Take Hungary. The vast majority of supermarket and other types of chains are Western conglomerates. The products they sell, from butter to body wash, are made in those Western countries. Even most of the information on the products is in a language other than Hungarian. On many products there is a tiny sticker, on which there is, in mouseprint, the minimum information required by law to be in Hungarian.
EU regulations enable the well financed and rich Western conglomerates and agricultural entities to control the market, since the local producers do not have the capital to compete.
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According to "Sale of the Century", Russia did the same thing after the fall of Communism. Resources were sold to the oligarchs in the name of freedom.
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That Eastern Europe is riddled with corruption is nothing new or surprising. It is the EU's indifference to how its budget is being squandered is that is appalling. This points to deep rot in Brussels and explains some of the disillusionment that led to the Brexit vote.
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@George, in Adults in the Room by Yanis Varoufakis, he presents in the appendix that UK had extreme rates of austerity while most of the bail out to UK went to making good the risky loans their banks chose to make.
@George Well stated, George. Anyone of good will should want the EU to succeed, but it probably needs to divest itself of the parasite states of eastern Europe, like it or not.
Jared:
I wonder in how many eastern bloc countries in Europe are the news media owned by the political parties?
Dear certainty, I would say, in Poland and Hungary at the very least; but also the case in little Estonia.
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@Linda
Most news media in Poland are completely independent of government (PIS party) or owned by foreign consortia (Germany).
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You forgot to mention Hungary and Poland governments really help the families and the poor. Debts are forgiven and there are payments for each child in the family. They really take care of their citizens, it’s the actually what governments supposed to do. Germany , for example, somehow worry more about migrants than its own citizens. The Same in the USA . Something is really broken here
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@Maxx Why should debts be forgiven? If a debt is incurred, it should be repaid. And if these nations are taking such good care of their citizens, why are so many of them immigrating to the West? And why do studies show that Germany this past year is the most admired of all nations? If conditions are as bad in Germany as you say, why are no Germans relocating to eastern Europe?
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Unless the economic situation of the condition of the loan don't allow the people to pay the loan back.
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@Maxx I fully support your comment. Polish government while demonized by the western media, introduced one year long maternity leave for all mothers, and a significant money credit for every child. The government also keeps helping retired people by making many key medicines free for them. There is a good reason why they won recent election by double-digit majority.
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I commend The New York Times for its investigation. It is not surprising to read that East European right-wing populists use the European Union both as their personal coffer and punching bag. It is disheartening, though, to realize that the EU feels the need to be both to appease East Europe's right-wing extremists. Hopefully, the Times's investigation will prompt Brussels to change course.
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This corruption, similar to what President Trump is trying expose and weed out in Ukraine, highlights the strong push for nationalism in Europe. Combined with open borders, unfettered immigration and a host of other ills caused by globalism the people of Europe like their counterparts in America embrace a policy of each nation determining what is good for their country and fellow countrymen.
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@John Gilday The only corruption president trump has exposed to date is that of his own administration. And you actually believe he's trying to weed out corruption in Ukraine, a country he's probably never heard of till he occupied the white house?
The world becoming more blatantly corrupt and irrational....
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And yet the Times Ed Board STILL won’t acknowledge why Brexit passed and is even more popular now. It’s not immigration, it’s the wholesale corruption endemic to the EU.
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Hypocrisy Inc. -- not to mention ingratitude: In 1989, Viktor Orbán got a scholarship from the Soros Foundation to study political science at Pembroke College, Oxford.
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@Ellen Freilich
Oh, my. So "gratitude" for a scholarship from a Wall Street billionaire should determine what a country's government does or doesn't. Tell me about "feudalism".
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The EU doesn't seem bothered by the subsidies.
The subsidy recipients like the subsidies, of course.
So why exactly is the NYT so upset? Why should Americans in general be upset?
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@John, because if you haven't noticed, the republican "populists" here are trying to pull off the same with the help of their Russian and US oligarchs.
The Times expose was a massive indictment of Eastern European oligarchic corruption and moral rot and the the European Union's tacit blessing of the socioeconomic justice of 0.1% Welfare Queen programs
No wonder Trump is attracted to it like a fly to excrement.
We need to keep shining a light on dark power and corruption.
Sunlight and good journalism are brilliant disinfectants against Greed Over People.
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@Socrates You overestimate the level of caring about corruption by people in countries like Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Slovakia.
Their economies have grown very rapidly, but it will take a long time for cultural and social enlightenment to follow. They've come a long way already.
I think the EU's way of trusting the change process and avoiding to antagonize their leaders too much is far better than the confrontational approach the Times seems to suggest.
1
This is a huge problem for the EU. If they cannot find a way to turn off the agricultural money spigot to the pseudo-populists, the EU will not survive.
The budget is one tool they might be able to use because it does not require a unanimous vote. Let's hope they use it -- for the sake of the EU.
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@Democracy / Plutocracy By taking last week's corruption article and re-featuring it today in an editorial board piece, the New York Times is doing Putin's work of showing how rotten and bad all of the West is.
And of course everyone outside of the EU has been continuously declaring the EU and eurozone dead since 2007. Within the EU, only Britain wants to leave. The Visegrád countries might differ in opinion with the other 24, but they do not want to leave.
What is truly dead is the understanding of how compromise and sometimes ugly back room deals are the way to unite vastly different countries. Perhaps Democrats and Republicans should try it, instead of trying to insult and rule over each other.
One of the largest if not the largest recipient of EU agricultural subsidies is the House of Windsor in the UK. I have a feeling that if Viktor Orban was an ideological globalist and not an opponent of open borders , the Times Editorial Board would care less about his agricultural EU earnings. What is the remedy proposed here? Have someone in Brussels decide which farmer in Hungary gets how much land and subsidy? Punish countries whose governments criticize the EU by cutting the subsidies to “bad” countries. Last time I checked all the countries mentioned here have free and fair elections. The citizens can vote out those leaders and redistribute or renationalize the land as they see fit. The EU approach is correct that some matters need to be worked out at the national level without interference.
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@MG
I have a feeling your feeling is based on not paying attention to the editorial or the associated articles. The Times is not denouncing the House of Windsor because that House is not sequestering EU funds for the purpose of eliminating democracy. Is that clear enough?
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@MG you said it Sir!! Today it is fashionable to bash Hungary, Poland, Slovakia and the Czech Republic in the liberal media. But we forget one thing : Orban and other leaders were elected with majorities. They are accountable
to their own people who elected them.
I find it strange that we applaud free elections as long we agree and like the outcome. But if we disagree with their policies we call them autocrats. C'est dommage!
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