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GENDER HISTORY RETROSPECTIVE IN HUNGARY AFTER 1949 been stated. Article 1 paragraph 66 posits complete legal eguality between men and women, i.e. rejects any negative gender discrimination extended to all facets of life: “The Republic of Hungary shall ensure the equality of men and women in all civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights." Thus it established and provided a unified framework for all those new elements in legal regulation, which led to the equality of women in Hungary from a legal point of view. The Family Act of 1952 (Act IV of 1952) created legal equality with respect to the role of women in the family, which presented a fundamentally new approach in family relations. “Socialist marriage is a fellowship built upon the affection between two free and equal people.”*°? Moreover, the above legal act declared the equal rights and responsibilities regarding family matters, codified the freedom in the choice of names, stressed the joint estate, defined the rights pertaining to divorce, and detailed the equal rights regarding child custody and the right of shared parenting. We cannot forget however that the primary goal of the above was to achieve complete control over the family as a legal institution. In any case, by providing the right for women to initiate divorce, the state actually made the resolution of family bonds easier.’” We need to add that simultaneously to providing these rights, the Ministry of the Interior issued regulations that resulted in the abolishing of any possibility of civil organisations. As the result of this, the Hungarian Feminist Association, existing since 1904, as well as numerous other organisations (civil reading circles and clubs, organisations independent of the state party, charity women’s associations, etc.) could not be active until the regime change." The MNDSZ [Magyar Nők Demokratikus Szövetsége, Hungarian Womens Democratic Alliance] active until 1956, as well as the MNOT [Magyar Nök Orszdgos Tanacsa, National Council of Hungarian Women] reorganised in 1957 and active until 1989 were not independent of the one-party state, as they exclusively represented the state ideology. One of the consequences was that the diverse western waves of feminism, as well as the ideologies stated therein, could not be introduced in Hungary, and emblematic writings could not get into the hands of Hungarian readers after 1945. Not to mention that these works were not even available in their original languages. 301 1949. évi XX. törvény — A Magyar Népköztársaság Alkotmánya, http://www.rev.hu/sulinet45/ szerviz/dokument/1949.evi3.htm (accessed 2 May 2020). 302 Schadt, M.: , A feltörekvő dolgozó nő" -— Nők az ötvenes években, Pécs, Pannónia Könyvek, 2003, 18. 303 Cf. ibidem. 304 Acsády, J.: Államszocializmus — nők — ellenzékiség, Társadalmi Nemek Tudománya Interdiszciplináris eFolyóirat, 8(1), 2018, 1-15, https://ojs.bibl.u-szeged.hu/index.php/tntef/article/ view/33836/32908 (accessed 21 May 2022). + 107 +
