The Role of Social Institutions in Attitude Formation Knowledge Construction Regarding the Migration Crisis in Hungary

Absztrakt (kivonat)

The aim of this thesis is to explore attitudes and opinions concerning immigrants triggered by the refugee crisis in 2015, Hungary. The paper is dealing with questions regarding the possible drives behind the acts of the government, discussing key concepts such as biopolitics, securitization and moral panics. After a short discourse on the interconnectedness of the media and the state in Eastern European countries, some gaps still seem to exist in terms of the causal factors behind knowledge production, this thesis seeks to find some clarification. This research attempts to reveal the role of the state and the media as key social institutions in shaping the attitude of inhabitants. To be able to answer the above mentioned questions, a pilot study has been conducted in a small village at the North-East of Hungary. Concerning the nature of the research question, individual deep-interviews seemed to be the best to explore people’s ideas in detail. The main findings reveal, that even though social institutions are definitely able to shape people’s attitudes, the same social factor result in different outcomes. A matrix of other social factors, especially personal biography of an individual seems to have significance.