But coverage has been improving. There’s a lot more information out there about the changes now underway in Hungary and with more information, we’re seeing better, more thoughtful coverage. It takes time, though. However off-base the mainstream coverage of a particular topic may be, once the story is established it tends to suck all the oxygen out of the room and other facts, stubborn but less popular, struggle for air.

It also takes good reporting. It means the correspondent has to be ready to seek out a number of sources and perhaps stand athwart the rest of the journalistic herd to take a different look at the topic. Let me show you what I mean.

Homelessness. It’s been one of the most frequent tag lines in international coverage of Hungary over the last few months. The vast majority followed the story line about the so-called ‘criminalization’ of the homeless in Hungary.

But The Economist, almost alone among the mainstream media, had a different take on the topic. In “How to Help the Homeless,” The Economist’s correspondent, Adam LeBor, took a step back from the other coverage of the subject, to have look at how “the government,” as the subtitle says, “is grappling with a very visible problem.”

Contrary to nearly every other article we’ve seen, The Economist’s piece leads with a paragraph about the very real public health and security concerns that are a part of this difficult issue. Yes, it concerns human rights and the problem of poverty, but it’s also about “public order, security, health and cultural values”.

Homelessness in Hungary has been swept under the carpet for years. But it has only recently become a topic of international conversation since the government introduced measures to outlaw “habitual living” in certain areas of cities (areas, according to the law, which are to be determined by the municipal councils). On one hand, the measure is not any harsher on the homeless than the widespread practice of banning urban camping in certain European and US cities, but importantly, it also opens a debate about the quantity and quality of shelters for homeless to spend the night and social programs for reintegration into society. On that subject, here’s a list.

As I have noted before, I am glad to see the discussion on homelessness finally shifting to a debate about the effectiveness of these programs, finally if slowly acknowledging the fact that bans on habitual living in certain public spaces are common to many cities. That’s a much smarter debate, one worth having.

This article by Adam LeBor is far from uncritical of the government, and I wouldn’t agree on every point. But somebody had the journalistic courage to take a hard look at a hard topic, and the result is that we are all confronted with a much smarter debate.

Source: A Blog About Hungary

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