Dog tales: second-generation joke parties on the horizon

2.1 Modern joke parties’ mocking glass

In order to understand the phenomenon of European joke parties in the changing social and political environment we must examine the changing attitudes of voters, and developments of party systems. Still, average thinking about party systems is dominated by the traditional left–right dichotomy (Lipset and Rokkan 1967). This being said, in addition to traditional, historical cleavages, a number of new fault lines have emerged in recent decades, creating new political-social debates and thus also new parties (Ford and Jennings 2020). Due to the ongoing crises since the first decade of 2000s – financial, economic, migration, COVID – have triggered radical changes in the social and political sphere (Hutter and Kriesi 2019). Both average voters and politicians, have begun to believe that traditional European parties are unable to effectively respond to the challenges therefore solutions will be born outside of the mainstream party system and the establishment. Some forces promised radical (and extremely populist) responses, breaking the dominance of traditional parties and challenging the elite that had dominated political discourse (Kitschelt 2007; Kriesi and Pappas 2015). The multiplying crisis phenomena in the 2010s led to the rise to power of parties in several European countries which, in various forms, questioned the establishment and proposed radical responses as possible solutions (Engler et al. 2019).

In parallel with these processes, a transformation has taken place that has created a new electoral attitude in post-modern consumer societies of the developed countries. This approach has also sought unusual but non-extremist, non-violent responses to existing problems. It argued that political parties had lost their traditional role, moreover that new grassroots civil society initiatives and movements were needed to act as catalysts (Katz and Mair 2009).

In Central Europe – including Hungary – many voters believe they have no opportunity to implement change, therefore they become apolitical, indifferent, passive and “no longer interested” in politics (Krastev and Holmes 2019). There are voters who are although disillusioned with the classical political parties, but still are open to support or even join new, not extreme movements: new wave green parties and the pirate parties – which were organized around specific topics such as environmental protection and universal basic income or internet freedom –, but also the joke parties. These parties’ supporters believe that politics has “left them behind” and is only concerned with social issues to maintain its own grip on power. Therefore, they initiate “issues” themselves, mainly trying to change local conditions. The fundamental difference is that while radical and extremist anti-establishment parties mostly themselves generate the problems that they later “want to solve,” even though increasing social tensions (Mudde 2007), CAPs – including satirical parties – also use populist slogans, but they do not consciously aim to incite. While extremists undermine and dismantle democratic frameworks, forcing voters into opposing camps, CAP parties encourage their followers to engage in public life, although not along the traditional, left–right-based political fault lines. CAPs also consider the opposition a part of the establishment, so try to influence the functioning of politics by taking an extra-political role. Like anti-establishment parties, joke parties also use the tools of populism, but primarily in the context of using humor to draw attention to the anomalies of the status quo or the importance of holding those in power to account (Barr 2009). This can also be found in anti-elite populism, which, while in line with the rhetoric of anti-establishment parties, is a way of highlighting the incompetence of decision-makers regardless of political affiliation (Jagers and Walgrave 2007). Anti-establishment parties are ideologically diverse, with no single worldview. They frequently use so-called thin ideologies, which, while not forming a coherent system of worldview, can convey attitudes and opinions, and therefore almost any party can adopt such ‘sub-ideologies’ (Mudde 2004; Taggart and Pirro 2021: 282).

What distinguishes joke parties from other anti-establishment political actors is that in their case humor is not a spontaneous element, but rather a constant communication tool and political goal. Humor removes the electorate from the realm of serious but ultimately meaningless reality, while at the same time shaping reality and providing a humorous context to serious issues, which helps to alleviate the gravity of important issues. In addition, political humor can serve as a genuine educational tool, as voters are more likely to absorb information due to its entertaining nature. With its unique logic, it can draw attention to political incoherence, propaganda or lack of credibility in a more tangible way (Maslo 2016).

In order to understand the phenomenon of joke parties it is worth clarifying the category itself. Joke parties condemn not only to the exclusivity of the Western liberal path of development, globalisation, consumer society and capitalism, but also to illiberal, hybrid, authoritarian regimes by criticising the whole mainstream political system (Diamond 2002). They do this by using satire and humor, at the same time showing irony to their followers (Paár 2016). The anti-establishment policies and messages of a particular party can be attractive to protest voters as well, as taking a stand against something can be a manifestation of negative attitudes (Engler 2020), or such as expected utility when voters abandon their most-preferred candidate, or they basically do not want to advocate the mainstream candidates expressing their dissatisfaction (Kselman and Niou 2011). As Engler writes the centrist label distinguishes CAPs from radical anti-establishment parties, furthermore, Pop-Eleches (2010) describes these parties as manifestation of protest voting. From the perspective of content and political narrative, joke parties can be seen as an elite-critical political force (Oross et al. 2018), because they criticize the existing party systems and their actors in their own particular ways. They show strong anti-establishment characteristics (Schedler 1996), and this is also reflected in their rhetoric where they interpret corruption as a collusion between leading political groups. Cas Mudde’s research (1996) say joke parties are also so-called anti-parties. These parties represent essentially less-ideological “anti-political” attitudes, they do not seek to be political in the “traditional sense” until they become part of institutionalized political decision-making. Unlike other anti-establishment forces, extremism and radical communication do not characterize the joke parties, or, if they do, it is clearly intended to break through the walls of social indifference and passivity (Pop-Eleches 2010, 231). Therefore, they are almost always critical and confrontational towards mainstream parties (Havlík and Voda 2018: 163). Although they do not claim to be and do not define themselves in this way, the joke parties can be classified as being in the centre within the traditional party system, a designation that refers to their ideological – often non-ideological – position and political engagement in the space between the left and the right (Učen et al. 2005, 29).

Joke parties, based on the organisational typology, have both the characteristics of parties and the separation of organisational units (activists, membership, electorate, execution, etc.) that are present in a party organisation as described by Katz and Mair (1993). However, these party characteristics are complemented by attributes typical of social movements, such as collective action, bottom-up organisation and participatory democratic functioning. On this basis, joke parties can best be related to the concept of movement parties described by Kitschelt (2006). Movement parties are political and social organisations that most closely resemble social movements in their strategy and organisational structure, but the parties operate according to the rules of politics, i.e. they compete in elections and try to win public offices (Almedia 2010).

Joke in their name, the mockery of other political actors and of politics as a phenomenon shape joke parties. In their case, humor and irony are formulated as a much deeper, almost ideological phenomenon, as a specific expectation. If we try to understand the communication of the joke parties through theories of humor, the cognitive-perceptual approach to humor can be helpful. The joke is rooted in the mismatch of ideas with distant meanings, the laughter or humorous medium is triggered by the recognition or resolution of this mismatch (Attardo 1994, 48; Attardo et al. 2002). However, in almost all cases there is a real critique, a coded message veiled behind the humor, therefore mainly the highly educated voters are able to decode it. We can find similarities in the formulation of humorous messages towards the political elite, as well as common points in terms of organisational structure and supporters, but each joke party has its own specificities.

2.2 Political humor

Political humor is as old as politics itself (Holm 2017). The second half of the twentieth century also saw the emergence of so-called joke parties, which similarly poked fun at political elites and political institutions (Oross et al. 2018). However, while cartoonists and humorists were essentially outsiders to the world of politics and engaged in humor without holding political office, joke parties penetrated the arena of parties and politicians. However, as most of them did not become professional politicians, political science considers them outsider parties (see Barr 2009; McDonnel and Newell 2011). They never considered themselves traditional parties and that their political strategy, activism and participation fall into the category of non-conventional (see Pitti 2018; Somma 2018).

In addition, political humor has both legitimising and delegitimising powers with respect to political institutions and participation (Innocenti and Miller 2016). However, these powers can be used in different ways. According to Webb (1981) there is radical political humor, which, firstly, mocks and degrades symbols and ideas that are considered unquestionable by a particular community. Secondly, it helps to understand and accept institutional or value changes, especially for those who do not support the change, by showing the disadvantages of traditional value structures. Thirdly, radical political humor emerges from social change, highlighting the political implications of all institutions.

In their famous book The Social Construction of Reality: A Treatise in the Sociology of Knowledge Berger and Luckmann (1966) portrayed the interaction within social groups and individual persons create concepts of the actions of each other. Beyond their general knowledge based on their primary socialization people learn to differentiate reality by degrees of familiarity. These elements mean a specific knowledge for them through subuniverses, special skills, the language and signs what play a significant role in their social reality. The social world is a comprehensive and particular reality that confronts the individual in an analogous way to the reality of the natural world. When individuals face reality, are able to understand language and codes beyond simple communication, then they become able to decode the more complicated – in our case – humorous, satirical, grotesque, ironic messages. For the joke parties, the symbolic universes and narratives of the existing systems do not legitimize their operation, but mean the massive opposite, questioning the interpretation of ruling power, even if this explains traditions or values. This symbolic universe appears in a different way in the case of joke parties and their campaigns, for them it manifests itself in normality.

In the case of joke parties, content analysis is often a more complex process than with other parties because their texts consist of humorous content in which the actual messages are often latent and not explicitly expressed. Therefore, the texts need to be deciphered in order to understand their implications. For this reason, traditional theories of communication are not necessarily appropriate for analysis. Wilson and Sperber's (2004 [1986]) theory of relevance is much more appropriate than traditional decoding communication theories. However, according to their theory, there are subtasks to be performed when interpreting content, which are as follows:

a. Constructing an appropriate hypothesis about explicit content (explicatures) via decoding, disambiguation, reference resolution, and other pragmatic enrichment processes.

b. Constructing an appropriate hypothesis about the intended contextual assumptions (implicated premises).

c. Constructing an appropriate hypothesis about the intended contextual implications (implicated conclusions). (Wilson and Sperber 2004, 615).

Most humorous or humorously intended political advertisements fall under the incongruity (resolution) theory of humor, which is categorized within the cognitive-perceptual approach (Sanz 2013, quoted by Larkin-Galiñanes 2017). Its essence lies in the false pairing of unrelated, distant concepts in a logical relationship (Attardo 1994, 48). What makes a political advertisement humorous is precisely the fact that the recipient recognizes this incompatibility and can resolve it internally. To do this, they have to decode the message itself and also be aware of what it reflects. Thus, in the case of most humorous political advertising, the recipient must be aware of the format of a traditional political ad or message.

3.1 MKKP

The story of the Hungarian Two-Tailed Dog Party – founded in 2006 – is really special because it is the only Central European joke party that, according to opinion polls, will cross the 5 % parliamentary threshold and it was the most popular opposition party among the under-40s in Hungary in 2023.^[2] The party has representatives in several municipalities, the MKKP has a deputy mayor in one Budapest district and has a chance of sending MEPs to the European Parliament in June 2024. In the national elections held in 2022 MKKP achieved 3.3 % and therefore did not get into parliament. What is even more important than the party’s political potential, however, is its street and urban renewal activities, i.e. the unannounced, secret renovation, cleaning and construction of urban monuments and infrastructure, filling potholes, painting benches or building bus stops. These kinds of activities are called urban guerrilla actions. Although these are small-scale community actions, they make the daily lives of residents better and happier. In addition to political goals, the joke party also provides a community experience that gives many people the opportunity to take action and do useful work for the local community.

While the name of the Two-Tailed Dog Party refers to an inverted, satirical reality, as there is no such thing as a two-tailed dog, the party’s fight against corruption is very real. MKKP representatives constantly bring suspected cases of corruption to the public’s attention, forcing the relevant political leaders and authorities to act against the graft. Famous slogans like “eternal life” and “free beer” appeared for the first time, but also wall stickers such as “an empty lot has been built here for 18 years” (Bucs 2011, 16).

In terms of socio-economic criteria Hungarian joke party is popular in Budapest and in large municipalities. It is no coincidence that the activists are basically urban guerrillas carrying out urban reconstruction and renovation actions, which is the most prominent street activity of MKKP to date. What is really special about this party is that the MKKP activists (“passivists”) constantly organize urban renewal actions: painting benches, constructing bus stops, renovating pavements or shopping for elderly people during the epidemic. In order to reach out better results MKKP started to operate as a party but meanwhile building on its local organizations, exactly halfway between the movement and the party (Metz and Várnagy 2021). The party leadership justifies this by saying that while the political work of the Hungarian opposition usually consists of organising press conferences and issuing statements in protest, meanwhile MKKP delivers sanitary products and equipment to hospitals. It also fits in with this pattern that, according to their own claim, there is no other party like MKKP. It is called a joke party, but only because its messages are usually sent in a humorous, comic form. Otherwise, they carry out activities typical of NGOs when they do community work.

MKKP became well-known in 2015, when the Hungarian government carried out an anti-immigration communication and campaign during the migration crisis. MKKP seeks to overcome the deep ideological gap between the binary Hungarian party system, when it points out the hypocritical, disingenuous behaviour of the political sides. Since MKKP is not bound by rigid ideological determinisms, they can easily rise above civilizational, cultural antagonisms. It is worth mentioning that MKKP was the only Hungarian party that was able to run a counter-campaign against the government’s anti-migration campaign. Hundreds of billboards were placed across the country, responding to the government’s “fake facts” and controversial narrative in a humorous and satirical way (Szegedi 2021a).

As a result of the counter-campaign MKKP became measurable for polling companies. Later the party has focused on the development of their organisation, for that they used community building tools and due to this progression party’s activity rather started to concentrate on the practical community work like renovation of public places and sidewalks. In the case of both MKKP and Die PARTEI, the organisations are grassroots democratic at the local level and activists have a say in collective decisions (Szegedi 2022).

In 2019 MKKP won three seats in local councils and the position of deputy mayor in the IX district of Budapest (NVI 2019) and the MKKP candidates received over 10 % in almost every district in Budapest. This brought about a general change of image, with MKKP having to take a stand on serious issues. For this reason the leader of MKKP Gergely Kovács said, the focus of the work of local councillors shifted to anti-corruption and investigative work. “At the council meetings, which are endlessly boring and nobody watches them, nobody cares, and I started to make jokes and say funny things to the 20 people who were sitting there in a deadlock. That was really not fine. Then I realised that it was much more fun to watch public procurement procedures or property sales, or even how the municipality was putting out tenders.”^[3] In some cases the joke party sounds the issue of corruption on national level, for instance at the Hungarian parliamentary elections in 2022, when they made a new transparency program for the public procurement procedure. They function by using the traditional methods of politics in public offices, but for the public audience they utilize jokes, mockeries and other rhetoric “weapons” of the joke parties.

Strongly anti-elite and anti-corruption slogans appeared in the rhetoric of MKKP, both in the 2015 and subsequent poster campaigns, and also during the 2018 election campaign: “The water company could smuggle LSD into the drinking water at any time,” and in the 2018 elections the campaign slogan “More of everything, less of nothing” was used. Although MKKP mostly criticizes the ruling parties, he also keeps distance from the opposition (Farkas 2018). As their decision-making mechanism takes place at both national and local level considering a participatory democratic basis, involving members and supporters, the party’s decisions can be considered fully legitimate.

Hartleb (2015) describes anti-establishment parties as more hostile towards their political opponents. Similar behaviour can be observed in the case of MKKP towards other parties. MKKP has received several invitations from opposition parties to join the coalition in 2022, but it has refused each time. In interviews, party leaders have confirmed that they will not join the opposition coalition because of ideological and pragmatic differences: “Based on their past […] based on their representatives [we cannot cooperate with them], [our ideological problem] is that it is difficult to cooperate with the Nazis (referring to the former far-right party Jobbik).”^[4] Given the fact that MKKP’s relations with mainstream parties are conflictual rather than consensual, and that its primary goal is not to gain public office and political posts through negotiations, but to gain as many votes as possible, we can assume that the party’s potential for cooperation is very low.

3.2 Die PARTEI

The German political party “Die Partei für Arbeit, Rechtsstaat, Tierschutz, Elitenförderung und basisdemokratische Initiative” (The Party for Labor, Rule of Law, Animal Welfare, Elite Promotion, and Grassroots Democratic Initiative [Die PARTEI]), was founded in 2004 by the editorial team of the satirical magazine Titanic (Neu 2018). However, they did not achieve significant success until the 2010s. In the 2005 elections, they garnered 0.0 % of the vote with 6,923 votes (Statistisches Bundesamt 2005). Their popularity gradually increased, and in 2014, they gained a European Parliament seat with 0.63 % of the vote, thanks to Germany’s unique regulations that lack a parliamentary threshold (Bundeswahlleiter 2014).

In the 2019 EP elections, they achieved 2.4 % of the vote that resulted two seats (Bundeswahlleiter 2014). What is even more remarkable is that they reached 9 % among first-time voters, surpassing the SPD and FDP (Brady 2019). However, Die PARTEI’s success is primarily concentrated in less significant elections (or second-order elections Reif and Schmitt 1980), as they consistently underperform in state or national elections. As Thomas Poguntke explained “Die PARTEI could do well in some local council elections, but I don’t see them suddenly being the big challenger in Germany’s 2021 federal elections. […] For some voters, the EU elections aren’t ‘prime elections,’ so it’s easier for them to vote less seriously” (quoted by Brady 2019).

Their election results suggest that they are particularly popular among the young, the urban, and the highly educated voters (Szegedi 2021b). Their party organization has also continuously expanded, with 38,000 members in 2019, compared to 14,158 in 2014 (Brady 2019). Additionally, they have a youth organization called “hintnerjugend” referring to the youth movement of the Nazi Party in Germany (Mashiach 2019).

Their relative popularity is primarily attributed to their extensive use of social media (Olterman 2017) and attention-grabbing actions, such as when they released a 90-s blurred sex video as a political advertisement during the election campaign (Reuters 2013). Another example is when they displayed the slogan “a Nazi could be hanging here” on posters^[5] (Knight 2017) (Table 1).

4.1 Die PARTEI

Text analysis: The poster shows the names of relevant German parties, followed by the denial of their most important self-definitions. The main incongruity over here is the appearance of Die PARTEI, which claims that it is not funny. The crucial difference is that while the other parties interpret the loss of identity negatively, the Die PARTEI does not. Being unfunny in politics is a positive attribute and Die PARTEI repositions itself by considering itself exclusively serious (Oltermann 2017).

Implicit premises: The implicit premise is that every German party has no identity and is dishonest about itself, and only the Die PARTEI should be taken seriously and its claims accepted.

Implied conclusion: The entire political elite is dishonest and discredited, and only the Die PARTEI is the true electoral alternative (Figure 2).

Figure 2:

MKKP poster about other parties. “Topics of hate campaigns by other parties: Muslims, foreign Hungarians, LGBTQ+, Romas, women, Jews, homeless, poor people, Gyurcsány Ferenc, science, culture.” Source: https://www.instagram.com/p/CZFiNNyMTtR/ (retrieved: 11 08 2023).

4.2 MKKP

Text analysis: The MKKP compares the four main Hungarian political blocs: Fidesz, Opposition Cooperation, Our Homeland Movement and the MKKP itself on the basis of which is conducting a “hate campaign” against various social groups. According to the poster, Fidesz is not waging a hate campaign against Hungarians from beyond the borders and Roma, but against all other groups. Our Homeland Movement only avoids a hate campaign against Hungarians from beyond the borders, while the united opposition conducts a hate campaign against them and certain groups of women. On the other hand the MKKP is not a partner in hate campaigns against anyone.

Implied premises: With that, MKKP implies the similarity among the major election blocs. The campaign poster suggests that there is no real difference between the major parties; they only differ in terms of which social group they “hate.”

Implied conclusion: Consequently, the implied conclusion of the poster is that MKKP is unique within the Hungarian party system because they do not seek political advantage from hatred. In other words, while other parties attempt to gain popularity through hate and fear (Figure 3).

Figure 3:

Die PARTEI poster about migration. “For a beach where we would lie well and gladly” – This poster looks like a CDU poster being removed to reveal the Die PARTEI poster as a replacement. Source: https://www.dnn.de/lokales/dresden/wahlplakat-von-die-partei-sorgt-fuer-aufregung-in-dresden-FUSKZR6SDO7YUT4DZKGL5JA7T4.html (retrieved: 11 08 2023).

4.3 Migration

4.4 MKKP

The migration crisis that spilled over to Hungary in 2015, the EU rule of law mechanism, the government-initiated campaigns (against migrants, George Soros, “Brussels”) and the deep dive of opposition parties created a situation in which it was difficult to distinguish the actual messages of the relevant parties from jokes. This is what Gergely Kovács, the head of the MKKP, refers to when he says that even the big parties make promises they cannot keep: “They talk about each other, they berate each other, they serve the needs of those who want to hear why it is possible to hate someone in the country.”^[6] The incongruity theory came out strongly during the 2015 counter-billboard campaign, as MKKP billboard posters had the same imagery, background, font and colours as the government’s anti-migrant posters, but with an entirely different message (Figure 4).

Figure 4:

Political posters from 2015 (Source: Authors). Government message in English: “If you come to Hungary, you can not take the jobs of Hungarian people.”

MKKP in they countercampaign used the following messages as respond: “Sorry about our prime minister!” or “If you’re Hungary’s Prime Minister, you have to respect our laws!” (Nagy 2019). MKKP also responded to the government’s anti-migration campaign with posters featuring a quote from Hungary’s first king, St Stephen: “For a country of one single language and one set of customs is weak and vulnerable.” This presupposes a deeper, more complex understanding of reality on the part of the electorate, as it makes a historical, political reference to criticize the government’s refugee policy. This also requires those who understand the message to be more highly educated and able to decode the implicit reference in the quote (Figure 5).

Figure 5:

MKKP billboard about the migration. “I was hungry and you gave me something to eat; I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink; I was a stranger and you took me in”. Source: https://img0.hvg.hu/image.aspx?id=31893a19-7cf5-47c3-b55f-80d694f9e008&view=7fcefbf8-ac48-4ee6-aef5-32203afa118c (retrieved: 11 08 2023).

Text analysis: With this poster, the MKKP juxtaposes the government’s anti-immigration rhetoric with a biblical quote: “For I was hungry, and you gave me food; I was thirsty, and you gave me drink; I was a stranger, and you took me in” (Nagy 2019). The quote is a passage from the Gospel of Matthew and is clearly directed towards helping the less fortunate. The poster’s incongruity lies in the fact that it uses a biblical message to argue for support for migrants and against the government’s position. This creates an irreconcilability because the Hungarian government identifies itself as Christian, theoretically making it incompatible to oppose its ideology with a biblical quote. This duality is what adds to the humor of the poster. The text Matthew 25:35 occupies a prominent place in the image, making it clear to all observers that they have encountered a biblical quote.

Implied premises: Perhaps more important is what the poster only suggests, namely, the implied premises. Arguing against the government based on its own ideological background suggests the duplicity of decision-makers. It implies that the Christian character is merely superficial and is driven more by governance techniques and the goal of maximizing votes than by genuine religious conviction.

Implied conclusion: With this poster, the MKKP provides a broader implied conclusion, asserting that the government not only lies on the issue of migration but also does not tell the truth on more extensive issues.