A Conversation about Freeing the Captured Media in Hungary: The First Steps

Authors

  • József Makai Kodolányi János University, Hungary
  • Jelena Kleut Independent Researcher, Serbia

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.60678/qybk6g80

Keywords:

Hungary, media capture, press freedom

Abstract

On 12 April 2026, Viktor Orbán and his party, Fidesz, lost the parliamentary elections to the Tisza party, led by Péter Magyar. During its 16-year period of governing Hungary, Fidesz created a media ecosystem frequently cited in media capture scholarship as a prime example of the firm grip that vested economic and political interests can exert over the media. As this special issue on “Media Capture in the Western Balkans and Beyond” was already well underway when the elections took place, this interview with József Makai, a journalist and lecturer, offers a first glimpse into the changes introduced by the newly elected Magyar government. Conducted in written form in mid-July 2026, the interview considers the first 50 days of activities aimed at dismantling the structures of media capture.

Author Biographies

  • József Makai, Kodolányi János University, Hungary

    József Makai is a contributor to the newspaper Átlátszó (atlatszo.hu) and a lecturer at Kodolányi János University. Born in Subotica, Vojvodina, he began his career in journalism at the weekly 7 Nap. He has lived in Budapest since the siege and fall of Vukovar in 1991. He was editor-in-chief of the weeklies Magyar Narancs and 168 Óra, as well as of the online editorial team of state radio; deputy editor-in-chief at Pesti Hírlap; columnist at Magyar Hírlap; and desk editor at origo.hu. He has reported from Rwanda, Zaire, Somaliland, Israel, Gaza and the West Bank, Iraq, and Afghanistan. Since the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022, he has worked primarily in Ukraine. He is the author of a collection of texts in Hungarian titled The Day We Declared War on the Cayman Islands about Hungary and the Balkans. He received the Paul Lendvai Award for his reporting from Ukraine.

  • Jelena Kleut, Independent Researcher, Serbia

    Dr. Jelena Kleut is an independent scholar and activist. She worked in the Department of Media Studies at the Faculty of Philosophy, University of Novi Sad (Serbia), for 20 years, after which she was dismissed in 2026 in an act of political retaliation for her vocal support for the anti-regime student movement. She is serving as a governing body member for the European Communication Research and Education Association (ECREA) and Chair of the ECREA Audience and Reception Studies Section. She authored two scholarly books in Serbian, and her scholarly work has been published in New Media and Society, Discourse and Society, International Journal of Communi-cation, Journalism Practice, and others. Her research interests include audiences and journalism in new media contexts, with a particular focus on the Western Balkans.

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Published

14-07-2026

Issue

Vol. 16 No. 1 (2026)

Section

Special Section: Media Capture in the Western Balkans and Beyond

License

Copyright (c) 2026 József Makai, Jelena Kleut

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

How to Cite

Makai, J., & Kleut, J. (2026). A Conversation about Freeing the Captured Media in Hungary: The First Steps. Global Media Journal - German Edition, 16(1). https://doi.org/10.60678/qybk6g80