TÉNY/SOROS.II.

SUMMARY
FACT/SOROS II.
THE SECOND DECADE OF
THE SOROS FOUNDATION HUNGARY
1995-2004
Thisbookisanaccount,throughrecollections,studies,picturesanddocuments, of the second decade of the
Soros Foundation Hungary, a private institution which has wielded a uniquely strong influence on
public life, arts, literature, culture, research, education and health in Hungary.
Founded in the Orwellian year of 1984 by Hungarian-born American businessman George Soros with
an endowment of one million dollars, the Foundation was intended to support independent intellectual,
cultural and public initiatives that would serve the development and general democratization of
Hungary, still under Communist rule. It was an experiment that was to form the precedent for another
dozen Soros foundations throughout the region, and was in itself a striking success. Over the ensuing
twenty years, the Hungarian Foundation has spent another 150 million dollars on the most diverse
public causes and private individuals.
Thetwenty-yearlifeoftheorganizationhasbeenattendedbyacceleratingchange and a search for dynamic
balance, within and without. Its history can be broken down into four successive, and highly distinct,
periods:
I. 1984 to 1990
II. 1990 to 1994
III. 1994 to 2000
IV. 2000 to 2004
*
Thefirsttwoperiodswerecoveredinthelast“decadereport”(Tény/Soros - 1984- 1994. Balassi Kiadó,
Budapest, 1999), but for the sake of continuity and to follow the changes, it is worth summarizing them
brieflyhere.
I.
FROM THE BEGINNING TO 1990
It was in the late Kádár years, just about the time of the Gorbachov opening, that the “Hungarian
Academy of Sciences Soros Foundation Committee” was set up. From the start, it was something of a
cuckoo’s egg in the rigid, hierarchical, one-party Communist nest. The regime gave its blessing to the
experimental initiative partly as a propaganda gesture to the West and partly from simple pragmatic
considerations (general lack of funds and foreign exchange particularly in the areas of culture,
education and research). The future of the new organization remained precarious in the first two or
three years, because its struggle for publicity and autonomy set off waves of conflict in the system, as
testified by contemporary documents that survive from the Ministry of the Interior, the party
headquarters and academic circles. Nevertheless, with its immediately-popular literature and social
studies grants - which were judged on a strikingly independent basis, sometimes clashing with the
authorities - and a whole range of much-missed and innovative initiatives (like the substantial grants
for libraries, the Xerox program and a raft of foreign grants and study trips) it earned greater and
greater recognition and respect among both the intelligentsia and even reform-minded sections of the
state apparatus. A breakthrough came on the threshold of the change of system: in 1988-89, when its
popularity was at a peak, it attained the position of one of the main catalysts of the democratic
transition, with generous donations backing up the “broad opposition people’s front policy”. The honors
for this initial four or five years undoubtedly go to the founder’s personal representative Miklós
Vásárhelyi and a handful of close, dedicated colleagues. ThesuccessoftheHungarianFoundation was
undoubtedly a major factor in George Soros’ decision to launch, on what was now a well-tried pattern,
a succession of new foundations in Poland, Russia, China and then further Central-Eastern Europe
countries.