Passive resistance - a myth from the age of neo-absolutism?
The study investigates elements of the passive resistance of the Hungarian nobility to Hapsburg neo-absolutism in the wake of the revolution and freedom fight of 1848-49. In the first part, it is shown that Ferenc Deák, who is associated with the launching of passive resistance in mainstream historiography, never called for boycotting officeholding. Instead, he recommended political passivity for the Hungarian political elite. The third chapter details certain elements of passive resistance. It is shown that behavioural patterns associated with it were not part of a conscious policy. Instead, in the first place, they could have been automatic reactions to any kind of oppressive power; in the second place, they are to be seen as the consequence of the making of civil government and the establishment of equality before the law, which the Hungarian civil political forces could not carry out as a result of the Hapsburgs’ military intervention in 1848-49. Also, the changing of the elite during neo-absolutism was due to the changing personal requirements accompanying the making of the modern state. The study concludes that passive resistance cannot be regarded as a political movement, since it was without a programme or clearly defined mass base. Hungarian society simply had to accustom itself to the existing system of neo-absolutism, even though without identifying with it. Naturally, there were such people who had the chance to withdraw, but any lesser noblemen that refused to hold office could not afford to stay away from the state for economic reasons. In the wake of the emancipation of serfs and the establishment of the modern system of government, the old life style of the lesser nobility could not have survived under any form of government. Their exclusion was due not only to absolutism.
