The negative campaign didn't work

The six-party alliance formed for the 2022 elections had nothing positive to say, but they coordinated their negative campaign against the government parties in terms of language, thematics and time. The most frequently occurring repeated expressions and word connections point to the fact that the left carried out a discrediting campaign against Viktor Orbán and the governing parties in coordination with each other and in competition with each other. From the fall of 2021, the prime ministerial candidates running in the "primary elections" emphasized the alleged corruption, threatened a political showdown, and after the outbreak of the Russian-Ukrainian war, the so-called "Putinism" appeared. The negative campaign evident in the use of language remained ineffective, and the discrediting became counterproductive due to credibility problems: it divided the opposition voters, scared off the undecided, and mobilized the right wing.

The XXI. Század Intézet's linguistic content analysis examines the most frequently used expressions with negative associations of the prime minister candidates between September 1, 2021 and April 3, 2022. The words of the subjects of the analysis used in the campaign are italicized.

A negative campaign instead of a program

participating in the six-party coalition (Unity for Hungary) failed to formulate positive political goals in the campaign. On March 10, 2022 - four months later than promised - they presented their framework program (Only up! The program of a rising Hungary), but its details were no longer published, so they did not become known to the electorate. The common policy remained undeveloped, and on some issues (nuclear energy, "United States of Europe", voting rights of Hungarians across the border, education policy) there was a clear disagreement, which caused confusion in communication.

On the other hand, the negative, disparaging campaign intensified during the primary election and remained consistent throughout , which was most visible in the language used by the leading politicians.

The prime ministerial candidates who featured the most often used the same or similar, but identical in content, negative expressions and word connections, which indicates that the parties consulted and only agreed that the Orbán government should be discredited and overthrown. During the opposition campaign, which was always in the negative range, the most frequently repeated nouns with derogatory and threatening meanings and associations were prison , accountability , factory of , corruption , theft , propaganda and asset confiscation The Prime Minister candidates repeated these phrases, forming the linguistic backbone of the discrediting campaign.

Fall 2021 and February 24, 2022, i.e. before the outbreak of the Russian-Ukrainian war, the most used verbs lie and steal , and the "most popular" adjectives criminal, homophobic, corrupt, anti-gay and thief , used by the prime ministerial candidates they were supplemented or enhanced with word connections of similar content. Péter Márki-Zay, the leader of the list , expressions suitable for insulting certain social groups appeared, such as aberrált , brainwashed and stupid , and even quite amazingly, disabled . After the outbreak of the war, the corrupt and threatening narrative was supplemented by the so-called with Putinism, which also indicates the coordination of the negative campaign. There has been an increase words "Putin's puppet ", " Putin's friend ", " pro-Putin " and other adjectives in which the name of the Russian president appeared in a negative context. The goal was to link Viktor Orbán to Putin, so that he would be morally held accountable.

The use of negative language by the left-wing parties, the content of their communication and the change over time in what they say indicate that the discrediting campaign was coordinated and the threatening tone was created jointly.

In addition to this, it is important to point out that a kind of grandstanding competition also appeared, during which left-wing politicians bid against each other on how they would deal with the right-wing political community and cultural and economic actors.

The use of language by the Prime Minister candidates

Péter Márki-Zay ran a consistent negative campaign all along, and he did not take into account the peculiarities of political marketing: he tried to transfer the guerilla and dark PR tools of business communication into the public discourse without criticism. This did not win him new supporters, and he even confused his allies.

The winner of the primaries campaigned with strong emotional charges, used negative adjectives, used a threatening tone, and insulted individual social groups. In the confusing communication, we could observe some consistently used panels. Fidesz politicians were called criminals and thieves steal , so accountability is necessary. asset confiscation appeared , which later proved to be counterproductive: it scared away uncertain voters.

Péter Márki-Zay's constantly recurring catchphrase was the eradication of corruption also repeated the difficult-to-interpret phrase " the most corrupt government in the thousand-year history of Hungary" He also took a negative position in relation to the child protection referendum: he called the law part of homophobic , anti-gay aberrant Fidesz . All this despite the fact that he himself made anti-gay statements several times.

The Hungarian Prime Minister Péter Márki-Zay has often been called vile, evil and cowardly , and after February 24, 2022, Putin's friend, the servant of Russian interests It was particularly offensive, but at the same time suitable for instilling fear, when he repeatedly called journalists aberrant, disabled, stupid and propagandists .

The biggest scandal was caused by calling Fidesz voters stupid , rural people brainwashed and, on one occasion, mushrooms fed with manure .

But he also repeatedly insulted disabled people and women in different contexts.

Klára Dobrev's domestic political messages - like the other prime ministerial candidates - were threatening and disparaging, and after the outbreak of the war, "Putinization" was the dominant factor. Most often, he used the accountability, theft, corruption , and Orbán's oligarchs and Fidesz propaganda , which were first used in the Prime Minister-candidate debate and then in ATV's Egyenes Beszéd programs.

In her public forums, Klára Dobrev (as evidenced by her Facebook page) fondly referred to the Hungary of the many and "oligarchized" despite the fact that in the eyes of the voters, it was her family and especially her husband that raised a credibility problem.

He also followed the other Prime Minister candidates in his threatening stance, repeatedly stating that the Basic Law is unconstitutional .

In his interviews published on internet portals, there was a recurring phrase: Romania is already ahead of us and Orbán is leading the country out of the union, which was factually not true.

After losing the primary election, he moderated his media appearances, but after the outbreak of the Russian-Ukrainian war, he said on forums and in major interviews (mfor.hu) that Orbán was a puppet of Putin and a servant of Russian interests , i.e. he once again participated in the coordinated discrediting campaign.

On February 28, 2021, Momentum published the New System Change: This is how to account for the corrupt Fidesz elite! program, the party chairman mainly used its threatening vocabulary during the campaign. The main elements of the program later appeared in the communication as well: 1) joining the European Prosecutor's Office, so that Fidesz cadres do not disappear the evidence of the abuses of the past 12 years; 2) It would block the money spigots of the Fidesz moon court; 3) It would temporarily prohibit the take-off of private planes, so that they do not take stolen property abroad. The latter idea later became independent in public discourse under the name airlock.

The key concept of accountability András Fekete-Győr's communication is the so-called a lawsuit .

The president of Momentum at the time primarily used Facebook as a communication platform, where he communicated with his most frequently used expressions in a sarcastic, often threatening tone. Most frequently used epithets: homophobic, corrupt, hateful, coward. The common criminal Lőrinc Mészáros and Viktor Orbán's stream of words appeared most often in his campaign. He used dishonorable expressions primarily for the Prime Minister, who, according to him, stinks for everyone today.

Starting from January 2020, significant changes took place in Jobbik: Péter Jakab and the business circle behind him transformed the operation of the organization based on the operation of the left-wing media parties. From then on, Jobbik operated less and less like a party, all their resources were devoted to extracting as much of the online space as possible. Accordingly, the main terrain of the Jobbik campaign became Facebook. Péter Jakab's specific style of speaking was the speeches before the parliamentary agenda, which gave the party leader and faction leader his political weight. , however, he used the same terms as the other left-wing prime ministerial candidates: aberrant band of thieves, betrayal, lying, theft, greed for money .

He used similar rhetorical solutions during the big interviews: Viktor Orbán is a thieving villain who will be the captain of the prison national team. the government representatives as 133 scumbags and liars . He declared that Péter Polt was an accomplice who should be shut down for assisting in the looting of the nation. Three weeks later, on September 21, in an interview given to 24.hu, he made clear statements suggesting physical violence.

Péter Jakab literally stated: Viktor Orbán and this gang of gangsters must sit. The snake's head must be cut off.

repeated Jobbik's campaign "Thieves must pay" the younger Fidesz politicians as slobs , and the older ones as comrades . The most common accusation against them is that they lie and steal . The country is headed by a mafia government led by the köpçös . In the prime minister candidate debate, he stated that Péter Polt is an ordinary criminal who should not be replaced, but shut down. He added that today in Hungary there are yachts worth ten billion for theft. These main phrases also appeared later.

As prime minister candidate Gergely Karácsony He expressed his criticism of Viktor Orbán, Fidesz, the government or the NER more in descriptions and in an anecdotal style, avoiding easy-to-quote, bad-tempered expressions. At the same time, his Facebook page regularly contained posts consisting of negative expressions, in which corruption and lackey media .

The mayor's negative statements mainly come from random, disclaimer-like communications, but he consciously entered into the threatening rhetorical contest already in the prime minister-candidate debate held on ATV. On the latter occasion, the following ideas and statements were made: The bank accounts of Viktor Orbán's family members, friends, and business partners should be blocked; the Basic Law must be declared invalid; the tax office freezes the NER elite bank accounts. The Tiborc tax and Mészáros tax are awaiting introduction: taxation of assets worth more than half a billion forints; and he called the fiscal policy supporting families a perverse tax system . Frequently used terms after February 24, 2022: the spy bank, peacock dancer Viktor Orbán, who is Putin's deputy.

Counterproductive negative campaign

The prime minister candidates were aware that, in addition to all this, the unique character of the politician is important, so they tried to use the language creatively, and a grandstanding competition developed between them. After a while, the negative discourse multiplied, supplemented and began to behave like a semantic spiral.

The negative, threatening and disparaging campaign did not prove to be effective.

Although they kept repeating the same expressions, word connections and sentences, they were unable to dissuade Fidesz voters, and in the absence of anything positive to say, they failed to appeal to those who were uncertain. All in all, it can be said that the systematic and coordinated discrediting campaign against Viktor Orbán and the governing parties became counterproductive: the continuous attack activated Fidesz voters.

Source: xxiszazadintezet.hu

Author: Ervin Nagy – Miklós Pogrányi Lovas

(Cover image: mandiner.hu)