Illiberalism between Development, Sovereignty, and Environmentalism

Illiberalism as a phenomenon continues to represent an attractive political alternative to the established status quo, with illiberal leaders consistently winning elections worldwide. Systematically analyzing these leaders’ time in government has become a scholarly and policy necessity as illiberal policies increasingly impact global arenas. Most research has focused on the consequences of illiberalism for domestic political processes (see, e.g., Levitsky and Ziblatt or Mounk), as well as the economic implications and political economy of illiberal governments. However, research on the impact of illiberal leaders on the international arena is equally important, and scholars, including myself, have begun investigating it. In an increasingly interconnected world, where we are ever more aware of the ecological consequences of human economic activity, expanding the study of illiberal governance to include environmental policies becomes crucial.

In previous work, I showed that illiberal leaders do not indiscriminately reject globalization. Important segments of the international arena can further illiberal agendas, increase national prestige, and even sustain the regime through access to the international financial system. I also show that illiberal leaders consolidate economic power to fulfill their promises and increase the state’s presence in the economy. This means that from the outset, there may be a lack of political will to truly address environmental problems if they come at the expense of economic activity. Additionally, illiberalism represents a concentration of economic power and a concentration around the regime. This entanglement of political and economic interests will further push environmental concerns down the agenda.

I examine these interactions in the context of the environmental policies enacted by illiberal governments in two Eastern European countries. Despite focusing on Hungary and Poland, this article’s conclusions may apply to future European illiberal governments as well.

Hungary under Fidesz

Viktor Orbán and his Fidesz party have been a staple of Hungarian politics since the country transitioned to a post-communist system. Since 2010, Hungary has been described as exhibiting a “peculiar form of populism” or a “mix of nationalism and neoliberalism.” In environmental issues, Hungary has been lagging behind many countries. The European Commission alleges that Budapest has been violating limits on particulate matter concentrations for years. The European Environment Agency found that in 2018, 13,100 premature deaths were linked to fine particulate matter in Hungary, one of the highest rates in Europe. No surprise, then, that the city of Budapest ranks among the most polluted in Europe.

The Orbán government’s environmental commitments are sacrificed when it means a win for the opposition and completely dissipate when environmental scandals directly implicate the regime. Case in point is the scandal around the Viresol factory, which is co-owned by a childhood friend and political ally of Orbán, the billionaire Lőrinc Mészáros. Viresol opened in February 2019 with a substantial state subsidy but, only a few months later, severe environmental pollution around the factory resulted in the hospitalization of several workers from a neighboring coal power plant. Investigations showed that sulfur and phosphorus gas had formed in the reservoir that the power plant and Viresol shared. Additionally, a nearby stream was contaminated, and fish began dying. The police started investigating complaints about water and air pollution in 2019. In October 2021, the prosecutor’s office closed the investigation based on expert opinions, with no punishments announced. Similarly, multiple investigations have surfaced over lake pollution caused by improper construction. However, few of these investigations have led to punishment for the parties responsible, as a leading supplier of construction materials for many of the country’s projects is the company of Viktor Orbán’s father, Győző Orbán.

The Orbán government’s environmental commitments are sacrificed when it means a win for the opposition and completely dissipate when environmental scandals directly implicate the regime.

Finally, when international institutions attempt to hold the government accountable for environmental problems, Orbán resorts to very nationalistic rhetoric. For example, before the 2021 EU summit, Orbán stated that Hungary does not accept the notion that individuals and families should bear the costs of climate action. He believes the world’s biggest polluting companies should bear the costs of the fight against climate change. He added that by taking the EU path, the fight against climate change could cost an average Hungarian family up to 20,000 forints (approximately €57) per month.

The war in Ukraine is another factor that compounds the poor environmental track record Due to their dependence on Russian energy, Western European countries and European institutions have agreed on a joint response to reduce the importance of Russian energy imports moving forward. Combined with extensive economic sanctions, the reduced energy purchases were meant to cut Moscow from access to financial resources that would fuel its war effort. While many European countries agreed to a partial energy embargo (despite the economic cost for their economies), Hungary, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic were exempt. Additionally, some have argued that while reducing Russian energy imports could benefit the war effort, the dramatic return to wood and coal stoves could undo decades of progress in environmental action. Although Hungary has an exemption and can import Russian energy, the Orbán government still passed legislation that loosened regulations on logging, sparking widespread protests.

Poland under Law and Justice

In the aftermath of the transition period, the Law and Justice Party (PiS) promoted a relatively moderate conservatism, emerging from a dissident element within the Solidarity movement. The illiberal trend in PiS governance (see also this and this) truly began following the 2015 elections, as it was the first time PiS was governing outside a coalition. Today, Poland’s environmental record is as tarnished as that of Hungary. According to multiple reports and research, Poland has some of the most polluted air in the EU, with 33 Polish cities ranked among Europe’s 50 dirtiest cities. In 2021, Poland was the second country in the EU (behind Bulgaria) in premature deaths attributable to exposure to fine particulate matter, and the country experienced 125 deaths per 100,000 inhabitants, followed by Hungary with 107.

Much of the environmental debate in Poland is bound up with the significant role that coal plays in the country, not only economically, but also in shaping national identity. Due to the importance of coal, Poland is the only EU country that has not pledged to become carbon neutral by 2050.

Much of the environmental debate in Poland is bound up with the significant role that coal plays in the country, not only economically, but also in shaping national identity. Not only is coal referred to as “black gold” in Poland, but it is also seen as a patriotic alternative to Russian gas. PiS won the 2015 elections on a promise to keep coal mines operational. When he took office in December 2017, Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki used one of his first speeches to proclaim that coal was the basis of the Polish energy sector and later announced plans to build two new coal mines. Coal generates approximately 80 percent of Poland’s electricity, and many households rely on it to keep warm during the winter. Due to the importance of coal, Poland is the only EU country that has not pledged to become carbon neutral by 2050. However, as air quality has declined, the government’s position has also included more policies addressing it. For example, in 2018, the government announced it would spend $8.8 billion by 2028 to combat smog. That is also when PiS established a Clear Air Program to eliminate 3 million coal furnaces by 2030. The Russian invasion of Ukraine put this issue back at the top of the agenda. PiS politicians reprised the cause of coal by arguing that “the inhabitants were sentenced to gas, and the current situation clearly shows that by currently using gas, we are largely supporting the Russian Federation in military operations against Ukraine.”

At the international level, the EU and PiS have clashed on several occasions over carbon emissions. For example, in 2021, before a European Council summit in Brussels, Kaczyński described some of the EU’s environmental policies as “madness” based on “unproven theories.” In remarks to the right-wing newspaper Gazeta Polska, Kaczyński added that “it cannot be said that Europe, which emits 8% of gases, changes the climate” and that recent “Russian action concerning gas” has made the European Commission’s target of reducing carbon emissions by 55% by 2030 “look ridiculous.”

Pollution is another significant point of disagreement not only with the EU but also with neighboring countries. When Poland attempted to expand the Turów lignite mine on the border with the Czech Republic, the Czech side raised concerns that the expansion would lower the groundwater quality and that the procedure for issuing mining permits was not transparent. In 2021, Czech officials filed a lawsuit with the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU). Although Poland was ordered to suspend mining immediately, when Warsaw did not comply, the country was subjected to penalties of €500,000 per day. The issue was resolved in February 2022 when Poland paid over 500 million złoty (approximately €115 million) and agreed to construct an embankment to protect Czech residents from pollution caused by the Turów mine. PiS statements presented the conflict’s ending as a “huge success,” arguing that “Poland did not give in to blackmail.”

Other international environmental scandals related to Polish pollution involve the state of rivers and forests. Between July and August 2022, half of the wildlife in the Odra River died due to contamination with golden algae and high salinity. No organized actions by state services were taken until mid-August. The Prime Minister fired the President of Polish Waters and the Chief Inspector of Environmental Protection, claiming that the catastrophe was due to the slow response of these institutions. The situation repeated itself in 2023 when German media sounded the alarm over the elevated water temperatures in the Odra, which created conditions for the development of golden algae. According to Die Zeit, the high temperatures, the lack of rainfall, and the concentrated release of saline water from Polish open-pit mines created ideal conditions for algae. Forests have been impacted through PiS legislation that places the management of forests as the “exclusive responsibility of individual European Union member states,” in contradiction to European law. The CJEU questioned the validity of this approach to forests, as multiple complaints from civil society organizations claimed that this provision allowed the state and private individuals to cut down trees easily. For example, in 2017, the mass deforestation of the Białowieża forest was only halted after an intervention by the CJEU.  

Conclusion

This work focuses on the link between illiberal governance and the environmental policies adopted by these types of governments. The two case studies examined these leaders’ preference for prioritizing economic development over environmental concerns. While some lip service might be paid to the need for clean air, lakes, and forests, economic activity is prioritized when actual policies are implemented. The issue of the environment becomes an additional lightning rod when demands for action come from international bodies that illiberal leaders perceive as meddling in matters that should only be the purview of the sovereign state. The examples used in this essay are quintessential to the trend of illiberal leaders deprioritizing the environment and are even more apparent when we realize that these countries, as part of the EU, have access to environmental improvement funds that countries in other regions do not. Yet, Hungary and Poland consistently score worse across Central European countries in many of the major environmental dimensions tracked. Regarding air pollution-induced deaths, Slovakia, Slovenia, and the Czech Republic score significantly better.²

Important questions remain. The lessons of the case studies suggest corruption should be more closely examined regarding its association with illiberal governments and their environmental impact. Moreover, how does institutional erosion, as evidenced by corruption, impact the policies of illiberal leaders? More work is needed to disentangle these important relationships. Future work on this topic should include more case studies from various geographical settings and development levels, and cross-national quantitative analysis.

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Paula Ganga is an Assistant Professor of Political Economy at Duke Kunshan University. She focused on economic development, populist policymaking, and state-driven technological development from a comparative perspective. For more information on her ongoing work and recent publications, please see www.paulaganga.com

1. Since 2019, the office of the mayor of Budapest has been occupied by Gergely Karácsony, a rising political star who, in 2020, was considering a primary challenge against Orbán. ↩︎
2. Expanding the comparison to the former Communist countries now members of the EU, the Baltic states blow Hungary and Poland out of the water. However, Romania and Bulgaria are the only countries that score lower than Hungary and Poland. For more information, see the data from the European Environment Agency, “Premature deaths due to exposure to fine particulate matter in Europe,” Published on December 10, 2024. Accessed on April 14, 2025. https://www.eea.europa.eu/en/analysis/indicators/health-impacts-of-exposure-to#:~:text=Despite%20the%20ongoing%20improvement%2C%20in,were%20253%2C000%20in%20the%20EU ↩︎

Image: “Bełchatów Lignite Coal Mine,” by Phil MacDonald licensed under CC Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International.