Questions of integrity

Abstract

Many have rightly criticized the Commission for failing to robustly defend the EU’s founding values from academic freedom, to media freedom, to judicial independence, to the rights of refugees or the LGBT community. In these discussions, the Commission’s failure to take action against another form of discrimination is generally ignored: discrimination against national minorities. Looking at the example of Hungarian communities in other member states, this post highlights the Commission’s asymmetric idea about the EU’s founding values and its appalling failure to defend ethnic/national minorities against discrimination. This is in stark contrast with the fact that the protection of and respect for minorities is a founding value of the EU, ranked equally to democracy, rule of law and human dignity.