ABSTRACT
In accordance with the results of the 1990 elections and the ensuing agreement between the largest governing party, the Hungarian Democratic Forum (HDF), and the largest opposition party, the Alliance of Free Democrats (AFD), parliament operated in a stable manner, and even became the major actor in the political transition in Hungary. The MPs elected the leading organs and authorities of the House and established permanent and temporary committees. The Rules of the House established appropriate rights and duties for party factions to enable the effective operation of a multiparty parliament.1 However, in some ways the Rules of the House were not fully developed and sometimes they did not serve the effective functioning of parliamentary work. There were also problems concerning the behaviour of MPs towards rational debates and agreements, and, as Attila Ágh has noted, because a large part of government work was also performed in parliament, there was ‘no time left for much more important draft acts to be passed which really govern the life of the country and the entire transformation’.2
