Contesting Money: public finance and the social limits of state power in Hungary, 1945-58
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Cambridge
Department Name: History
Abstract
Having been at the centre of academic, political, and public discussions since the financial crash of 2008, money continues to be a puzzle in the post-pandemic world today. The fiscal capacity of states has been fiercely debated both on the political left and right in the wake of soaring energy prices and a cost of living crisis. Although since March 2020 governments around the world have unwittingly embarked on a course of increased fiscal intervention in public matters, commentators of this policy continue to warn us about the detrimental effects of 'socialist' fiscal conduct. This project will contribute to this discourse through considering money as a social institution regardless of economic system types to overcome the 'market-plan' dichotomy explicit in contemporary debates. It will provide a new theoretically-grounded empirical historical case study on how, and with what repercussions, the Hungarian postwar state prioritised fiscal policy over the central bank to create a stable money, prices, and full employment in 1945-58, from the world record hyperinflation of 1945-6 to the consolidation of communist power after the 1956 revolution. In arguing for a more nuanced and social relational understanding of the currency, the project will inform historiography as well as academic and policy debates on the fiscal limits of state power in remedying present day social and ecological issues. Moreover, the study will establish a new theoretical framework to study economic and political change based on the interrelationship of the means (taxes, bonds, credits, the lottery), methods (propaganda, wage and price policy), and implications (price levels, purchasing power) of public finance.
My three interrelated aims in this project are (1) to produce a monograph based on my PhD thesis, (2) to build new networks for academic and non-academic cooperation, and (3) to disseminate my research and make impact by informing public discourse.
(1) The monograph will explore state capacity, the social limits of fiscal control, and the effects of various voluntary (loans, savings deposits, the lottery), quasi-voluntary (state-loans), and involuntary (taxes) contractual fiscal arrangements on the development of political and economic change in postwar Hungary. It will offer a social history of money both 'from above' and 'below' through five chronological stages: the establishment (1945-6) and rethinking of the currency (1946-8); funding Stalinism (1948-53); financing the people (1953-6); and the consolidation of money (1956-8). I plan to submit the manuscript to Cambridge University Press by the end of the fellowship.
(2) As well as drafting the monograph, I will establish new channels and activities to further research impact and public engagement. I will disseminate my research through presentations at two academic conferences and a specialist panel at the British Association for Slavonic & East European Studies. In addition, I will organise an international, interdisciplinary conference on the social history of money in the contemporary world. Besides early career and established scholars, I will invite representatives of British and Hungarian social science policy and research institutes to participate in a keynote and a roundtable to further international knowledge exchange by considering the ways in which historical case studies could help inform contemporary policy debates.
(3) I will publish five short articles online during the length of the fellowship in order to make my research accessible to the wider public. This will include three empirical case studies on the fiscal dimensions of historical change in postwar Europe and two theoretical outputs on the ways reconsidering money as a social institution could help us address contemporary social and ecological issues. This will be achieved in collaboration with various media outlets such as History & Policy and The Conversation in the UK and Új Egyenloség and Mérce in Hungary.
My three interrelated aims in this project are (1) to produce a monograph based on my PhD thesis, (2) to build new networks for academic and non-academic cooperation, and (3) to disseminate my research and make impact by informing public discourse.
(1) The monograph will explore state capacity, the social limits of fiscal control, and the effects of various voluntary (loans, savings deposits, the lottery), quasi-voluntary (state-loans), and involuntary (taxes) contractual fiscal arrangements on the development of political and economic change in postwar Hungary. It will offer a social history of money both 'from above' and 'below' through five chronological stages: the establishment (1945-6) and rethinking of the currency (1946-8); funding Stalinism (1948-53); financing the people (1953-6); and the consolidation of money (1956-8). I plan to submit the manuscript to Cambridge University Press by the end of the fellowship.
(2) As well as drafting the monograph, I will establish new channels and activities to further research impact and public engagement. I will disseminate my research through presentations at two academic conferences and a specialist panel at the British Association for Slavonic & East European Studies. In addition, I will organise an international, interdisciplinary conference on the social history of money in the contemporary world. Besides early career and established scholars, I will invite representatives of British and Hungarian social science policy and research institutes to participate in a keynote and a roundtable to further international knowledge exchange by considering the ways in which historical case studies could help inform contemporary policy debates.
(3) I will publish five short articles online during the length of the fellowship in order to make my research accessible to the wider public. This will include three empirical case studies on the fiscal dimensions of historical change in postwar Europe and two theoretical outputs on the ways reconsidering money as a social institution could help us address contemporary social and ecological issues. This will be achieved in collaboration with various media outlets such as History & Policy and The Conversation in the UK and Új Egyenloség and Mérce in Hungary.
