Last week, the Orban government sent out its ‘National Consultation’ on the issue of immigration to Hungarian citizens (you can find an English translation of it here). The professed intention of this questionnaire is to gather an accurate representation of the public’s opinion about how the government should set up its immigration policy. Here is how prime minister Viktor Orban puts the situation:
“Since Brussels has failed in handling immigration, Hungary has to follow it’s own way in responding to the threat. We will not let economic migrants endanger Hungarian people’s jobs and livelihoods”.
To anyone reading this ‘consultation’ it will become immediately clear that this campaign is a vicious piece of xenophobic propaganda. In fact, the government is not ‘consulting’ anyone. The questionnaire consciously violates all standards of good practice in opinion polls to a degree that has prompted an outcry among Hungary’s social scientists, who have written an open letter to the government:
“All in all, the National Consultation is not a public opinion poll. Although the Prime Minister’s invitation letter to citizens calls it a “consultation” that prepares the way for some policy decisions, all other appearances aim to reinforce the mistaken impression that the invitation is to a conventional public opinion survey. Yet the manipulative use of the tools and appearances of a public opinion poll by the National Consultation merely highlights the fact that genuine studies of public opinion that could help both decision makers and the public to find out public opinion about policy alternatives are in fact disappearing from the Hungarian public sphere.“
Fotó: Magócsi Márton / abcug.hu
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