Hungary: Where Does Opinion End and Obligation Begin? — What the Supreme Court’s Teachers’ Case Sends as a Message to Employers
A recent decision of the Hungarian Supreme Court addresses a set of fundamental questions familiar to every employer: how far does an employee’s freedom of expression extend within an employment relationship?
As part of a coordinated series of actions focused on the nationwide protest about the devastating state of public education, several teachers, after giving prior notice, did not report for work and missed a couple of dozen teaching hours. The teachers labelled their action as “civil disobedience.” After issuing written warnings, the school district office terminated their employment relationship with immediate effect. The teachers argued that their conduct fell within the protection of freedom of expression and that the termination, in fact, constituted retaliation for their political views. However, the Supreme Court found the employer’s decision lawful.
The Court acknowledged that the teachers’ action was an expression of a political opinion; however, the employer’s termination was not a sanction for expressing that opinion, but rather an application of legal consequences for the repeated and deliberate breach of conduct: the absence from work. The Supreme Court held that civil disobedience is not a legal category in the Hungarian legal system, and certainly not in labour law. The Supreme Court made it clear that the only legally protected instrument for employees to enforce demands relating to working conditions, remuneration, or employment is to engage in strike action. Any other refusal to perform work “for other reasons” entails labour-law consequences. It is at this point that the limits of freedom of expression become sharply defined. The Supreme Court emphasised that freedom of expression is not an absolute right, and that it operates within inherently narrower limits in the world of work. The decision reinforces the earlier case law that an employee’s opinion does not automatically enjoy constitutional protection when the manner of its expression conflicts with the fundamental obligations arising from the employment relationship.
The Supreme Court emphasized that an employment relationship—and especially a public employment relationship—is not one of legal equality between the parties. The hierarchical nature of the relationship necessarily restricts the employee’s autonomy of action, including how and by what means they may express their opinion during working time and while performing work. The Supreme Court’s finding is that the employer did not suppress the teachers’ opinion, but chose between legal alternatives, one of which was termination with immediate effect.
The Supreme Court deliberately refrained from evaluating the social or moral value of the claimants’ actions. It expressly states that a labour dispute is not the appropriate forum for deciding whether efforts undertaken in the public interest were “right” or “justified.” The dispute concerns solely whether, within the framework of the existing employment relationship, the employer lawfully applied the sanction available under labour law.
From the decision, a general lesson emerges. Freedom of expression in the workplace is deemed an important value, but its protection is not unlimited. This is particularly true where the expression of opinion takes the form of refusing performance, and where the employer has communicated clear expectations in advance, followed by an available legal consequence. When the above criteria are met, courts tend to prioritise the stability of labour relations over abstract fundamental rights-related arguments. The judgement shows the boundaries of workplace freedom of expression: the point at which opinion is no longer mere speech, but becomes action that creates operational risk—and where the law ultimately says: this is where protection ends, and obligation begins.
