The Challenges of COVID-19 Pandemic in Large Hungarian Municipalities – A Short Overview of the Legal Background

t Hungarian municipal system has been significantly impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. The urban governance has been impacted by the COVID-indicated reforms. The transformation has had two, opposite trends. On the one hand, the Hungarian administrative system became more centralised during the last year: municipal revenues and task performance has been partly centralised. The Hungarian municipal system has been concentrated, as well. The role of the second-tier government, the counties (megye), has been strengthened. On the other hand, the municipalities could be interpreted as a ‘trash can’ of the Hungarian public administration: they received new, mainly unpopular competences on the restrictions related to the pandemic. Several new benefits and services have been introduced by the large Hungarian municipalities, but it has had several limitations, for example, the urban municipalities have been the primary target of the central government (financial) reductions. Although these changes have been related to the current epidemic situation, it seems, that the ‘legislative background’ of the pandemic offered an opportunity to the central government to pass significant reform