Hungarian Review of Sociology

The long-term social impacts of COVID-19: The case of home office

2025-09-29T11:46:00+00:00

The COVID-19 pandemic has transformed social and economic structures in Hungary to an unprecedented extent, with a radical shift of work from the conventional workplace to the home environment of workers. The present research examines the dynamics of the expansion of home office, its long-term persistence and social inequalities during the COVID-19 pandemic and in 2025 by analysing representative samples from Hungary. The results show that the COVID-19 pandemic has had a significant and lasting impact on the prevalence and nature of home-based work. Although the proportion of people working from home declined after the pandemic and did not reach previous levels, the form of work has changed and shifted increasingly towards hybrid arrangements. The present study has confirmed that the availability and prevalence of home office reflects certain social inequalities, notably in terms of occupation, level of education, gender and age.

Performative activism: the relevance and representation of the concept in contemporary Hungarian fan discourses

2025-09-29T11:46:00+00:00

The political dimensions of popular culture are a major research area, particularly in terms of the public engagement of artists and the political attitudes of fan communities. Our study analyzes the relevance of the concept of performative activism and its representation in contemporary Hungarian fan discourses, using the example of the band Carson Coma. As part of our qualitative research, we conducted two focus group interviews, two semi-structured individual interviews, and two paired interviews with youth aged 17 to 25. Our findings indicate that in fan discourses regarding Carson Coma, the issue of political engagement is closely linked to the question of authenticity. Participants primarily interpret the preservation of authenticity through personal involvement and consistent public presence, while critiques of performative activism mainly focus on the marketability of public statements and the lack of genuine risk-taking. Our results align with research emphasizing the mobilizing power of popular culture while also providing a more nuanced perspective by highlighting the tension between authenticity and market-driven logic. The example of Carson Coma suggests that political engagement in popular culture can be both a mobilising force and an object of criticism, depending on the extent to which audiences perceive it as sincere and consistent.

A way to measure the career trajectories of people in migration: the career benefit indicator

2025-09-29T11:46:00+00:00

This paper describes the steps in the development of a career mobility indicator designed to examine the career mobility of Hungarian-born workers in Austria and Germany. The paper presents a further development of a previously published career utility indicator by the authors, which allows for a more accurate measurement of the career arc of migrant workers. The authors show that the career utility indicator can be used to analyse the career utility of Hungarian migrant workers in general, i.e. the use of qualifications and work experience acquired in Hungary in the labour market of the host country. The aim of this paper is to show that the indicator can be used to distinguish between groups of migrants with different career benefits, and thus to identify and compare career-winning and career-losing groups of workers and demographics. The article uses the career payoff indicator to illustrate that a larger proportion of Hungarian workers of different ages, sexes and at different times of arrival in Germany and Austria suffer career losses.

Coping strategies for financial problems

2025-09-29T11:46:00+00:00

The purpose of the study is to reveal the role of demographic factors in the strategies for managing financial problems, based on the data of the OECD’s 2022 financial culture survey in Hungary. The focus of the analysis was age, gender, type of residence, income and differences between regions. The research used multivariate statistical methods such as canonical correlation analysis and Ridge regression to identify relationships between demographic factors and financial behavior. The results showed that region and age are the most significant determining factors in the choice of financial strategies, while education and income have a smaller impact. Budapest residents showed higher financial awareness and more diversified strategies, compared to the more traditional approach of rural residents. Based on the results, it is recommended to develop targeted financial education programs that take into account demographic and regional differences, thereby supporting the increase of financial stability.

Causes and dynamics of affective anti-Semitism

2025-09-29T11:46:00+00:00

In this article, we conducted a questionnaire survey in October 2023 on a nationally representative sample of 1000 people, using a personal interview to investigate the mental map of the Hungarian adult population’s positive and negative feelings towards Jews. We found that a crucial stage on the path to affective anti-Semitism/its opposite, sympathy with Jews, is whether respondents consider it possible or impossible to distinguish Jews from non-Jews. Philo-Semites consider Jews and non-Jews indistinguishable, as opposed to anti-Semites who deny it. Stages on the philo-Semites’ path of sympathy for Jews include a self-critical politics of memory, a rejection of conflict between Jews and non-Jews, and a denial that Jews are more loyal to Israel than to Hungary. The path to antipathy towards Jews (affective anti-Semitism) leads through all the other dimensions of anti-Semitism, based on despairing of the Jews loyalty to Hungary. The emotional rejection of Jews, however, is not directly linked to either primary, cognitive anti-Semitism or to secondary anti-Semitism, which downplays the significance of the Holocaust: the acceptance of the tenets of exclusionary antisemitism is a prerequisite for holding negative emotional attitudes toward Jews.

Neoliberalizmus, autoriter neoliberalizmus és a #MeToo: A szexuális zaklatás és az áldozatiság diszkurzív konstrukciói Magyarországon

2025-09-29T11:46:00+00:00

A tanulmány azt vizsgálja, hogy a neoliberális ideológia – különösen az egyéni felelősség, a cselekvőképesség és a piaci logika hangsúlyozása – hogyan formálja a szexuális zaklatással kapcsolatos nyilvános diskurzusokat a Marton László színházi rendezőhöz köthető magyarországi #MeToo-ügyben. A neoliberális áldozatelméletre építve és a kritikai diskurzuselemzés módszerét alkalmazva a kutatás a szexuális zaklatás és az áldozatiság konstrukciójára, valamint a neoliberális ideológia ebben játszott szerepére összpontosít, különös figyelmet fordítva a cselekvőképesség és felelősség kérdésére a zaklatás előtt, közben és után. Emellett azt is elemzi, hogy miként hat a magyarországi autoriter neoliberalizmus kontextusa ezekre a diskurzusokra. Az eredmények azt mutatják, hogy a neoliberális racionalitás, a női cselekvőképesség és a személyes felelősség központi szerepet játszanak mind az anti-#MeToo, mind a #MeToo diskurzusban. Az „érdemtelen áldozatiság” szoros kapcsolatban áll a bukott neoliberális ágens diszkurzív identitáskonstrukciójával, ahol az áldozat passzivitása, valamint a múlt és a jelenbéli cselekvései egyaránt problematizálódnak. Ezzel szemben a #MeToo-t támogató diskurzusok a az áldozati viselkedés megmagyarázására és normalizálására törekednek, amelyet olykor szintén neoliberális érvelésre alapoznak. Végül egy harmadik diskurzustípus is kirajzolódik, amely a #MeToo-t politikai célokra instrumentalizálja és kifejezetten a magyarországi autoriter neoliberális politikai kontextushoz köthető.