When informal norms fail – how EU leaders lost their patience with Viktor Orbán

EU leaders will consider key issues such as financing Ukraine, future enlargement and the next EU budget at the beginning of 2026. But could Hungary’s Viktor Orbán derail the discussions?

In a new article for the LSE European Politics and Policy (EUROPP) Blog, Dr Mareike Kleine and Lucas Schramm show that whether the European Council will tolerate obstructive behaviour depends not on EU treaty rules, but on how politically costly it becomes for leaders domestically.

Dr Kleine is the Jean Monnet Chair of our project Global Perspectives on Europe (GLOPE) co-funded by the European Union’s Erasmus+ Programme.