(b. Fiume (now Rijeka), 26 May 1912; d. Budapest, 6 July 1989) Hungarian; Minister of the Interior 1948 – 51, First Secretary of the Hungarian Socialist Workers' Party 1956 – 88 Kádár was the illegitimate son of Borbála Csermanek, an illiterate Slovak maid, and János Kressinger, a Hungarian peasant, whom he never knew. He was brought up by foster parents in the Hungarian village of Karpoly, educated in his village school, and trained as an instrument-maker. He joined the illegal Hungarian Communist Party (HCP) in 1931, changing his name to Kádár ("Carter"), and was arrested several times in the 1930s for illegal political work. He was active in the resistance during the Second World War, becoming a member of the Central Committee of the HCP in 1942. In 1945 he entered the Party's Politburo and became Deputy Chief of Police. As Minister of the Interior (1948 – 51) he was intimately connected with the brutal Sovietization carried out by Rákosi's regime. He organized the trial of László Rajk in 1949. In April 1951 he himself was arrested and tortured by the secret police, then charged with treason and imprisoned. He was released in July 1954 when Rákosi's hold on power was weakening. Kádár initially shared in the reformist aims of Imre Nagy's government which came to power after Rákosi's fall in July 1956. On 25 October 1956 he became First Secretary of the Hungarian Socialist Workers' Party (the HCP-led coalition) and deputy premier. However, he was alarmed at the pace of change, particularly by the party's failure to control reform and the re-emergence of old "bourgeois" political parties. On the night of 1 – 2 November 1956 he secretly left Budapest and returned on 4 November 1956 with the invading Red Army.

After the suppression of the Hungarian uprising, Kádár became Prime Minister, resigning in 1958, having followed a repressive course. In his second term as premier from 1961 to 1965 he allowed a cautious liberalization, characterized by his comment on political opponents: "those who are not against us are for us". In the economic sphere Kádár followed an inconsistent policy in which he periodically tried to introduce elements of the market economy while retaining the overall structure of the economy. By the end of the 1970s his failure was apparent and Hungary had the largest per capita debt in the Soviet Bloc. In 1988 he was removed as First Secretary by a party revolt engineered by Imre Pozsgay, and given the honorific post of President, which he resigned in May 1989 as his health failed.

Hungarian statesman and premier János Kádár (born 1912) played a key role in his country's transition to a pro-Communist regime following the uprising of 1956. He was impressive in steering a middle course between total obedience to, and total independence from, the Soviet Union until the Hungarian economy faltered and he was removed from party power shortly before his death in 1989.

János Kádár (original name János Csermanik) was born on May 25, 1912, in a small Hungarian village south of Lake Balaton, the largest lake in central Europe. After attending the village school, he was apprenticed to a toolmaker and was trained as a skilled mechanic.

Under Communist Influence

Kádár began his political career at the age of 19 when he became a member of Hungary's then illegal Communist party in 1931. Said the New York Times in an article in 1956 (October 26), "It was in the harsh conditions of underground work before and during World War II that he came to political maturity." Over the next 12 years, he was arrested several times for illegal party activities. In 1942, he was admitted to the Central Committee of the party and in 1945 to the power-holding Politburo. During World War II he gained hero status for his resistance against the Germans. At one point he was captured by the Nazis, but managed to escape.

Like many other Eastern European Communists, Kádár found it difficult to come to terms with the harsh brand of communism advocated by Russian leader Josef Stalin. Although he seemed destined for high honors when he was named Hungary's minister of the interior in 1948, increasingly, he was found wanting by the Stalinists. In 1950, he was dismissed from both his government post and the party. He was imprisoned the following year and not released until 1954, in the thaw that followed Stalin's death.

Hungarian Uprising

Through the years, the Communists had steadily been gaining power in Hungary. On October 23, 1956, a demonstration led by students and intellectuals began the Hungarian revolt against communism and the presence of Soviet troops in the country. As the revolt spread, Communist leaders returned "liberal" Communist Imre Nagy to power to quell the uprising. Kádár joined the short-lived Nagy government, but deserted it when Communist troops took over the country on November 4. Supposedly, Kádár had long been in contact with Soviet leaders, and it is said that he entered the capital city of Budapest riding on a Russian tank.

A New Hungary

The new government under Premier János Kádár, under Russian auspices, was announced in 1958. He also served as premier from 1961 to 1965. Kádár pledged an "independent and sovereign" Hungary that would preserve Communist achievements of the past 12 years but also improve the living standard of the Hungarian people.

It was a tall order. The new premier did allow some limited freedom of expression, eased political spying tactics, and permitted greater political tolerance in cultural spheres. But Soviet troops remained and so did the unrest. Hungarians fought Soviet tanks with bare hands. Thousands were killed and more thousands fled their homeland.

In all important matters, Kádár supported Soviet policies. In 1968, Hungarian troops helped to suppress the revolution in Czechoslovakia (now the Czech Republic and Slovakia). As the unrest continued and ties with the Soviet Union remained, Kádár reorganized his government in an attempt to improve the failing economy. As he introduced a partial profit motive into the country, Hungary became the most properous nation in eastern Europe.

The Fall of Kádár

After years of walking a tightrope between Communist and democratic policies, Kádár could do no more. The pace of reform slowed and the economy stagnated. Finally, the Soviet Union had had enough. Kádár was removed as general secretary of the Hungarian Communist party in 1988 and given instead the largely ceremonial post of party president. Even that was taken away in May 1989 when he was also removed from the Central Committee. The man who played such a key role in Hungary's transition died two months later in Budapest, on July 6, 1989.

A secretive man who shunned social life - for instance, his wife never appeared at Budapest parties in the postwar years - Kádár was described by Time in 1956 as a man with "rough proletarian manners." An article in Life in 1957 characterized him as "dark, mysterious, and primitive."

Further Reading

Kádár's speeches and interviews were published in English as On the Road to Socialism (1965); some information on him appears in two books by Paul E. Zinner, National Communism and Popular Revolt in Eastern Europe (1956) and Revolution in Hungary (1962), and in Bennett Kovrig, The Hungarian People's Republic (1970).

For more information on Kádár János, visit Britannica.com.

(yä'nôsh kä'där) , 1912–89, Hungarian Communist leader. In 1932 he joined the then illegal Communist party and held high government and party posts from 1942, becoming home secretary in 1948, when the Communist party took control in Hungary. In 1951, Kádár was accused of pro-Titoism and imprisoned until 1954. After his release he quickly regained power, becoming a member of the party's central committee in July, 1956, and first secretary of the party (the Socialist Workers' party from Sept., 1956) in October. In the Hungarian revolution of 1956, Kádár at first aligned himself with the rebels and joined the cabinet of Imre Nagy. However, in November he formed a countergovernment with Soviet support, and Soviet troops crushed the revolt. In 1958 he tried and executed Nagy and other leaders of the revolt. Kádár resigned as premier in 1958 but resumed that post from 1961 to 1965. In 1962 he carried out a drastic purge of former Stalinists. During his rule, Kádár remained a consistent supporter of Soviet foreign policy; he supported the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968, and many Hungarians never forgave him for his role in the 1956 uprising. Yet, from the early 1960s until his ouster in 1988, Kádár's social and economic policies were, by Soviet-bloc standards, relatively liberal. Under his rule, Hungary became known as the freest and most modern of the Eastern European countries.

Bibliography

See his Socialist Construction in Hungary (tr. 1962), On the Road to Socialism (tr. 1965), and Selected Speeches and Interviews (1985); C. Gati, Hungary and the Soviet Bloc (1988).