Orbán at Budapest Eurasia Forum: Europe must adapt to Eurasian shift or face decline

After the global financial crisis of 2008-2009, “it became clear that the West’s system of political and economic self-correction does not work,” Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said at the Budapest Eurasia Forum, adding that “new centres are emerging in the world, especially in Asia … as a result of which modernity is no longer an attribute of the West.”

Speaking at the National Bank of Hungary’s Eurasia Forum in Budapest on Thursday, Orbán said the first years after the political regime change of 1989 had been dominated by the ideal of the Western self-correction system which was believed to “guarantee our strategic security in the long run”. But in 2008-2009 it became obvious that “the financial crisis was in fact a logical consequence of deep changes in the global economy radically impacting geopolitical relations,” the prime minister said. That is why, Orbán added, Hungary’s focus has partly shifted to the East.

Hungary ‘must be sharp, swift, smart’

Hungary must be “sharp, smart and swift”, open to the world and “must constantly think on its feet to grasp the right moment for necessary decisions”, Orbán said. “Timing is the main thing in politics … politics is the realm of practical implementation, and that hinges on timing,” Orbán said. “For a country the size of Hungary, missing the right time could be lethal.”

“A country the size of Hungary can’t be slow, dumb or boring, it cannot be a follower or rely on others’ understanding or interpretation … if it wants to live at the standards we want and live up to traditions like our 1,000-year history, it must be sharp, swift and smart, open to the world…” he said.

Europe ‘losing out on world changes’

Europe is losing out on the changes in the world, and “it could remain that way in the long run unless it finds its place in its relationship with Asia,” the PM said. “If it is true that the next century belongs to Eurasia, we must notice that Europe can’t find its place in that system,” Orbán said. He said some Western leaders failed to see Eurasia’s importance, while others “see it but don’t like it”.

He said the European elite was set up to protect the status quo, which could lead to blocs forming in trade, the economy and politics. Unless Europe can pivot to an approach promoting connectivity, its status as the loser in the new processes could be cemented, he said. “Europe must understand that it is part of Eurasia and use that to its advantage, as that is the only way to be competitive with other power hubs in the world,” he said.

Current changes ‘reversal rather than restructuring’

“What is happening nowadays is reversal rather than restructuring,” Orbán said, adding that “Europe and Asia in fact are an integral unit”.

Europe and Asia are not divided by geographical borders and historically, they have formed “a natural economic unit, complementing each other”, Orbán said. “Regions where civilisation, culture and economy thrived the most lived side by side here,” Orbán added.

Eurasia, as a natural economic unit, was hindered in past centuries by the focus of world trade shifting to the seas, and in the resulting dominance of Western civilisation, he said, adding that the trend removed a balance between civilisations to the West’s benefit. A third hindrance, Orbán said, was the Western elite’s decision after the Cold War “not to restore an organic Eurasian unity but to westernise the whole world”.

“We all feel that this attitude, this Western strategy, including Europe’s, is invalid and futile; something has ended here,” he said.