EUA Board urges Hungarian government to address autonomy concerns to ensure universities’ access to EU programmes

The Board of the European University Association (EUA) deeply regrets that students and scholars will be negatively impacted by any exclusion of Hungary from EU programmes, and consequently urges the Hungarian government to take the necessary measures to rectify this situation. The steady decline in university autonomy observed in Hungary in recent years has damaged university communities in the country. This latest development is perhaps the clearest illustration yet of how this dynamic has negatively impacted institutions, their students and staff.

EUA stands ready with concrete suggestions as to how the Hungarian government might resolve this issue. The reform of university governance initiated in Hungary in 2019 has resulted in a significant divergence from European university governance norms and practices, notably concerning the configuration of the boards of trustees of public interest trusts. This seriously undermines the autonomy of Hungarian universities. Therefore, EUA strongly recommends changes that bring university governance closer to European practices. In particular, the university community should have a formal role in the selection of trustees, whose terms should also be limited in time, which is not currently the case. In addition, decision making on core academic issues should be clearly attributed to the university senate.

The EUA Board sincerely hopes that such steps will be taken as soon as possible and looks forward to the resolution of the issue and the full participation of Hungary’s universities in crucial EU programmes.

Institutional autonomy remains a key focus of EUA’s work and is particularly high on the Association’s agenda for 2023. A forthcoming update to EUA’s Autonomy Scorecard will include a specific analysis of Hungary.