IN A smoky open-air bar at the back of a youth hostel in Budapest, one of Europe’s youngest political parties is hatching plans for a democratic revolution. Its leader, Andras Fekete-Gyor (pictured), a bearded, focused 28-year-old, jabs his right hand for emphasis as he lays out his plans for the party, Momentum. An audience of about 70 people, most of them young, are perched on stools and reclining on sofas, drinking beer and listening intently. For some Hungarian dreamers, this scene represents one of the most promising political developments in years.

Momentum burst onto the scene with a petition drive last winter, when it collected more than 250,000 signatures and forced the government to abandon its extravagant bid to host the 2024 Olympics. The games would simply provide an opportunity for corruption, Momentum argued. The group has since turned itself into a political party, ahead of elections in early 2018. Most of its leaders were born as communism collapsed. Many have studied abroad. They look to Emmanuel Macron, France’s young president, for inspiration (although Mr Fekete-Gyor is quick to point out that he is younger). Like Mr Macron’s party, La République En Marche!, Momentum seeks to transcend old divisions between left and right. “Whether we are closed or open, right now, that’s the big question,” Mr Fekete-Gyor says. “We are open.”

But Hungary is not France. Since 2010, when he secured a crushing supermajority in parliament, Viktor Orban, Hungary’s prime minister, has launched a systematic assault on the country’s checks and balances. Government-friendly oligarchs control much of the media. Mr Orban has overhauled the electoral system to benefit Fidesz. In 2014 the party won a two-thirds majority in parliament with less than half the vote. In the best of circumstances, for a new political party to do well in an election within a year or two would be a remarkable achievement. In Hungary it would be miraculous.

The emergence of Momentum may worsen the divisions among Hungary’s opposition. More than half a dozen left-wing and liberal parties are competing, and several will probably fail to meet the 5% threshold to enter parliament. To have any hope of defeating Mr Orban, Hungary’s liberal parties must work together, says Andras Biro-Nagy of Policy Solutions, a think-tank in Budapest.

But the leaders of Momentum, which polls below 5%, appear to believe they can manage on their own. They regard almost all Hungary’s older politicians, on both left and right, as corrupt; they want to kick out the entire political elite.

Much of their ire is directed at the Socialists, Hungary’s biggest left-wing party, who are polling below 15%. They remain tainted by years of mismanagement and perceived graft. Before Mr Orban swept to power, the Socialists led the country to the brink of bankruptcy. The then prime minister, Ferenc Gyurcsany, once hailed as a moderniser in the mould of Tony Blair, was recorded delivering an expletive-laden secret speech. To win election, he told party members, the party had “lied morning, noon and night” about the country’s finances. The speech leaked, prompting mass protests. Like Mr Blair, Mr Gyurcsany is charismatic and divisive. Unlike Mr Blair, he remains important in domestic politics: the Socialists split, and Mr Gyurcsany formed a new party, the Democratic Coalition. Some of the other liberal parties, including Momentum, despise him almost as much as they do Mr Orban.

Toning down the neo-fascism

As the liberal parties squabble, the largest opposition group remains Jobbik, an ultra-nationalist party. Once openly anti-Semitic and anti-Roma, Jobbik is trying to rebrand itself. Gone is a paramilitary unit, the Hungarian Guard, which marched around Budapest wearing fascist insignia and black vests. Jobbik MPs no longer give speeches in parliament, as they once did, discussing whether the blood libel (the myth that Jews kill Christian children for their blood) was based in fact. Instead, they talk about their commitment to the EU and the problem of low wages.

Marton Gyongyosi, a well-dressed Jobbik MP and former tax adviser, says that the party has grown up. In 2012 Mr Gyongyosi called on the government to draw up lists of Hungarian Jews who pose a national-security threat. Today he acknowledges that the party has, in the past, not been “sophisticated enough in its wording”. As Jobbik inches towards the centre, it may struggle to take its more extreme voters along.

Mr Orban, meanwhile, looks more vulnerable than he has for years. After he passed a law that threatens to close Central European University, one of Hungary’s best, some 80,000 young Hungarians protested in Budapest and other cities. There is widespread anger at corruption, lack of accountability and Vladimir Putin’s increasing influence in Hungary. Russia has given Hungary a €10bn ($11.2bn) loan to expand a nuclear power plant.

Mr Orban dismissed the protests: “It always makes one smile when one sees masses of people demonstrating because of a supposed lack of democracy,” he scoffed in a radio interview in April. “This is rather funny.” But between January and April, support for his party fell from 37% to 31%. Hungary’s liberals cannot afford to waste this opportunity. As Mr Orban escalates his repression of civil society, they may not get another one.