“Hungarians are openly speaking of ‘regime change’: the complete transformation of their society. The historic election results show that regime change has finally begun. But regime change is not a moment, it is a process, and it will take time to deliver it.”
Dr Marietta van der Tol is one of four researchers invited to reflect on the significance of the recent Hungarian elections, in a new feature article for the University of Cambridge news channel. Van der Tol’s research seeks to illustrate how religious ideas are being harnessed to support constitutional change.
A specialist in the comparative study of politics, law and religion, Van der Tol has been scrutinising events in Hungary as part of her current research project, Imagining Sacred Lands: the ‘Russian World’, ‘Hungarian World’, and ‘Holy Serbia’. This builds on her previous book, Constitutional Intolerance: The Fashioning of the Other in Europe’s Constitutional Repertoires (CUP 2025), which was recently shortlisted for the 2026 ICON·S book prize (International Society for Public Law).