Why has the over-all redistribution of landed property no chance in Hungary?

By

Endre Tanka, doctor of the HungarianAcademy of Sciences, assistant professor

(Fordították: dr. Bajor Rita, dr. Bőhm Judit)

The political decider knows the redistribution of landed property’s over-all – historical and present, national and international – experiences, but the professionals cope with the strategically challenges of this (Dorgai, 2004.). What’s the reason that within a reasonable time there is still no chance for the over-all redistribution of landed property?

I. It comes from landpolicy, - for which redistribution of landed property is one of the basic institutions - that the redistribution of landed property is by plenty of factors determined. Because of this redistribution of landed property’s system of aims and instruments, functions, technical-, social-, economical reach created by the quality of landpolicy. History knows two kinds of landpolicy: worth-based, which enforces public interest, and utilitarian, which refuse public interest. The last one is one-sidely and determined by objectives, nowadays it is represented by the capital’s utilisation lasted, neoliberal landpolicy (Tanka, 2004: 22-40). These two kinds of landpoliciesare also systemcreater in environmental economy.

Since 1988 our circumstances of land ruled by neoliberal land policy, which builds international agrarian capital’s new living space, and are based upon Hayek’s theory. Its function is excluding civil worth landreform, refusing the model of domestic farms and instead of that, it formed the state socialistic big farms to capital ownership’s latifundium.

Its system of institutions has some important elements, as:

  • The unrestricted farm size, which was institutionalized by land law, is just, on the user’s financial muscle depending, optional number of manufactory; with accumulating the landed property’s and leasurehold’s legal titles and with abolishing the rent of land’s cubic measure is abandonment of the maximum of acreage.
  • In farm trade eliminating of the executive power’s official and other instruments, winding up administrative control and sanction.
  • Abolishing directly or indirectly (often happened with informal legal ways) the limits of foreign acquisition of the landed property. In this process become many institutions important:
  • The land law didn’t take over the institution of the contract of association, which limits the foreign people’s leasehold, according to common law. From 1992 it could have prevented in itself the foreigner’s speculative and illegal acquisition of land. As against, gave paragraph 23 of the Hungarian law legal ground to establishment of from abroad manageable (not to fixed Hungarian settling) big farm by any kind of investor.
  • Paragraph 7 of land law don’t require, inconsistent with the contract of accession and common law, settling for foreigner’s of entrepreneurial purpose, Hungarian acquisition of landed property,but satisfied with it’s intention, moreover in case failure of intention afflict the invalid contracting foreigner with losing his land of property . In addition paragraph 3 made ways for foreigner’s legal entity’s acquisition of land of propertyalso with qualifyby foreignersone-man firm an independent undertaking. With this, the 7 years derogation (the temporarily excluding of the foreigner’s acquisition of land of property) from the EU became a fiction: length of time in itself is just symbolic (from 2008 EU could the exemption terminate), while since our membership in European Union foreign legal person ishaving the capacity to contract, contrary to the Hungarian co-operative and companies. (It is, in itself, common law infringer discrimination.) The institution is successful: nowadays – in spite of the obstacle of acquisition–rural land’s one third is legal person’s property.
  • Decisively integration under-lease is – breaking through the under-lease of landed property - the privilege of the foreigner’s financial muscle, which curtails the landowner right of disposal (mostly relating to part-ownership farms)to the benefit of the investor and, inspite of the dispersal of small-plot, insures unified. large-scale farming. Also foreigner investor’s advantage has – by right of plantation or setting-up a fish-pond, recently on the ground of animal keeping plant or upkeep fish-pond – pre-emptive lease right priority overany other leaseholder, which is also the guarantee of the prior acquisition of land.
  • The land law hasn’t enforced – in spite of the contract of accession and common law – since our membership of the European union the prohibition of marketing person’snegative discrimination in farming lease’s market: instead of guaranteeing any ground-renter the same cubic measure leasure, not only keeping up co-operative’s and company’s big farming advantages (instead of 300 hectare 2500 hectare), but with the extension of this gives another legal title. (By National Land Fund given 50 years leasure don’t count in this restriction.)
  • In the land law’s institutional system, which establishes landlordism, the legal order of pre-emption and pre-emptive lease fills the part of “central controls”, which ensures getting landed property and tenure of a land for in any land living, foreign and national, big farming proprietor of the firm with debarring local farmers.

The techniques of ordering is here the cynical using of “virtual law”: according to the law local is authorized to the prior right of emption and tenure of land, who perhaps has never been in Hungary, but with share or stock he is proprietor of the that ground-renter legal entity, which has its seat in the settlement in conformity with the farm’s position (or in 15 kilometres from the settlement’s administrative boundary). So others can that farms get, to which the latifundium’s proprietor don’t lay a claim.