Margins of Nationality. External ethnic citizenship and non-discrimination

Abstract

Translation of the Bible or any other text unavoidably involves a determination about its meaning. There have been different views of meaning from ancient times up to the present, and a particularly Enlightenment and Modernist view is that the meaning of a text amounts to whatever the original author of the text intended it to be. This article analyzes the authorial-intent view of meaning in comparison with other models of literary and legal interpretation. Texts are anchors to interpretation but are subject to individualized interpretations. It is texts that are translated, not intentions. The challenge to the translator is to negotiate the meaning of a text and try to choose the most salient and appropriate interpretation as a basis for bringing the text to a new audience through translation.

Nation, Nationality, and National Identity: Uses, Misuses, and the Hungarian Case of External Ethnic Citizenship

“…41 We have seen that external ethnic citizenship is used to support the illiberal regime internally, by delivering a contingency of votes on national elections. Externally, the new citizenship policy has been used as a transport vehicle for the export of the illiberal regime, creating and maintaining loyalties, domesticating media and cultural institutions through personal and financial influence, often labelled clientelism [36,80,81]. The effects can be felt in the changing media landscape in Hungarian communities abroad, but also more widely: the block of external 'gratitude votes' that continues to inflate Fidesz support at national elections strengthen the sense that the setup in fact goes against the 'stakeholder' concept and in its effect undermines pluralism in a setting already constrained by exigencies of ethnic voting, albeit to a different degree in the various countries.…”

“…The legitimate criticism of disproportionate burdens in Hungarian naturalization procedures could have been channeled into reforming and humanizing the overall process. Instead, differentiation not only increased to the point where it is hard not to conclude that this constitutes discrimination [36], but also a new ground of discrimination is added.…”

“…35 Of all enrolled voters, close to 5 percent are non-residents. 36 Similarly to cases in Italy, Croatia and Romania, where external votes constitute a sizable portion of the votes, outside voters at some point cast decisive votes: in Hungary, the qualified majority of the governing party would have been lost in 2014 without the external votes, helping greatly the governing party. 37 A clause was introduced with the Fundamental Law (Art.…”

“…The corresponding ratio in 2018 was 216,561 out of 225,025 votes. See the results at the site of the National Election Office: https ://www.stati c.valas ztas.hu/dyn/pv14/szavo ssz/hu/levjk v.html; https ://www.valas ztas.hu/level szava zas-jegyz okony v. 36 According to the report of the National Election Office, a 'total of 8.312.264 citizens have been enrolled as voters, out of which 7.933.815 possessed a Hungarian residence and 378.449 did not.' [96: 3].…”

People, Sovereignty and Citizenship: The Ethnonational Populists’ Constitutional Vocabulary

“…These centres represent Hungary beyond its borders and implement this system of preferential naturalisation. 25 Due to this institutional support and the simplified, three-month routine administrative procedure, the rule has led to the naturalisation of more than one million people, mostly from Romania and Ukraine. All this is happening in a country where the resident citizenry had already fallen below ten million and counting.…”