Informal Exercise of Power: Undermining Democracy Under the EU’s Radar in Hungary and Poland

Hungary and Poland have seen the most widespread erosion of democracy in the European Union since Fidesz and Law and Justice started their authoritarian remaking in 2010 and 2015, respectively. Despite the EU’s introduction of various doctrinal innovations, it could not force these regimes to comply with the core values of the EU. While the literature has focused on the formal violation of the rule of law, the links between informal power and the limited constraining role of the EU have remained undertheorized. This article aims to fill the gap by studying the informal exercise power of the Fidesz and PiS governments that helped them to create an uneven political playing field. Connecting the literature on hybrid authoritarian regimes and informality, it will be shown through three main domains how the Hungarian and Polish governments (1) distributed informal political-economic decision-making power informally throughout clientelist corruption, (2) captured the media through loyal oligarchs/allies, and (3) employed electoral clientelism to tilt the electoral playing field in their favor. While the study proposes a theoretical framework related to the Hungarian and Polish examples, it is also a warning for the EU to take the informal exercise of power seriously.