CEU’s billionaire founder, George Soros, believed that the region, with the university as its engine, could become a powerhouse for democracy and truly vibrant societies. In the subsequent years, CEU became a global hub, attracting about 1,400 students from more than 100 countries. When I worked there, from 2010 until 2012, it was a place of incredible promise. Students held human rights workshops, faculty led classes on extremism and nationalism, speakers from around the world came to the ’90s-era auditorium to lecture on bioethics and Ottoman history. Roma students were given opportunities to access higher education they have long been denied.[...]
It’s Hungarians and Hungary who stand to lose the most from CEU’s departure. As one of Hungary’s highest-ranked educational institutions, in 2015 alone CEU drew 9 billion forints (over $30 million) in research funds into the country and calculated in-country expenditures of over $35 million. The university just completed a multimillion-euro renovation project in the heart of Budapest’s historic downtown. While the university says it will continue some operations in Hungary, it’s clear the local economy will take a massive hit when it decamps to Vienna. [...]
It’s part of a pattern that seems to be consuming Eastern and Central Europe: In 2017, the democracy-monitoring NGO Freedom House gave Hungary the lowest ranking of the nations it monitors in Central Europe, and lowered its overall democracy scores for 18 of the 29 countries in Eastern Europe and central Asia. And it’s all a little too familiar for anyone watching from the United States, where attacks on the press, electoral suppression and xenophobia have led us into a very dark moment.
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