RESEARCH

Ongoing and completed projects

Research carried out with digital methods — prosopography, network research.

PROJECTS

Research projects

University, institutional and individual research projects, newest first. Each project links to its own subpage for further details.

IN PROGRESS 2026 KÁDÁR ERA DISCOURSE ANALYSIS AI METHODS

Discourse, Power, Network

Analysing the political and professional discourse on the Hungarian National Theatre during the Kádár era — symbolic vs. pragmatic argumentation. The project is at once a source-based analysis and a methodological experiment: the iterative development and application of a large language model–based annotation tool to an archival corpus.

Reference (under review): Ring, Orsolya: Discourse, Power, Network — Examining Kádár-era discourses on the Hungarian National Theatre. Under review.

FORTHCOMING 2026 KÁDÁR ERA PRESS SAMIZDAT

Official and Opposition Communication in the Press of the Kádár Era (1981–1989)

Comparative analysis of the samizdat journal Beszélő and the front pages of Népszabadság: how did the official and the second public sphere frame the same political and social issues? CAP classification and text mining — with special attention to the divergent framings of human rights discourse.

Reference (forthcoming): Ring, Orsolya: Official and Opposition Communication in the Press of the Kádár Era (1981–1989): Content Analysis of Beszélő and Népszabadság. 75 Years of the Archives MA Programme — Anniversary Volume. Forthcoming.

STUDY 2024 KÁDÁR ERA SOCIAL POLICY WOMEN’S LABOUR

The Introduction of the Childcare Allowance and Its Impact on Women’s Position in the Labour Market (1967–1985)

How did the gyes (childcare allowance) emerge in 1967, and how did it transform the female labour market? A central social-policy instrument of the Kádár era examined along three critical perspectives: women’s equality, differential uptake across social groups, and labour-market consequences — through legislative analysis and statistics.

Reference: Kiss, László – Ring, Orsolya (2024): The Introduction of the Childcare Allowance and Its Impact on Women’s Position in the Labour Market between 1967 and 1985. Századok 158/5, 877–894. Full text.

STUDY 2022 KÁDÁR ERA POLITICAL ELITE NER

The ‘Faces’ of the Kádár Era — Media Representation of Politicians

Who were the most visible figures of the Kádár-era political elite in the official press? Named-entity recognition on the front pages of Népszabadság cross-referenced with formal political positions — a quantitative analysis of media representation and actual political power between 1957 and 1989/90.

Reference: Kiss, László – Ring, Orsolya (2022): The ‘Faces’ of the Kádár Era. The Media Representation of Hungarian Politicians between 1957 and 1989/90. Politikatudományi Szemle 31/4, 78–102. DOI: 10.30718/POLTUD.HU.2022.4.78

BOOK CHAPTER 2021 KÁDÁR ERA CAP COMPARATIVE

Agenda Dynamics in Socialist Autocracy (1957–1989)

How can policy agendas be interpreted in an autocratic, single-party regime? A quantitative reconstruction of three decades of Kádár-era policy dynamics within the Comparative Agendas Project framework — reform waves, shifting priorities and institutional transformations, in an international comparative volume.

Reference: Ring, Orsolya – Kiss, László (2021): Agenda Dynamics in Socialist Autocracy (1957–1989). In: Policy Agendas in Autocracy, and Hybrid Regimes. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan. 165–205. ISBN 978-3-030-73223-3. DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-73223-3_7

STUDY 2020 KÁDÁR ERA TEXT MINING TOPIC MODELLING

Agricultural Policy Challenges and Lawmaking in the Early Kádár Era

The second wave of collectivisation in Hungary, examined through database analysis and topic modelling. The legislative output of the early Kádár era is analysed asking how power discourse and rural transformation are reflected in normative texts — illustrating both the possibilities and the limits of digital collections and text mining.

Reference: Ring, Orsolya – Kiss, László (2020): Agricultural Policy Challenges and Lawmaking in the Early Kádár Era: Text Analysis and Text Mining of Historical Sources. Digitális Bölcsészet 3, 37–61. DOI: 10.31400/dh-hun.2020.3.1030

STUDY 2020 RÁKOSI ERA PROSOPOGRAPHY SOCIAL MOBILITY

Female Cadres in the Rákosi Era

Who were the women who appeared on the 1955 jurisdiction lists of MDP functionaries? Prosopographic analysis of 202 women among the 1,870 listed cadres — social trajectories, mobility paths and career profiles within an Andorka-style framework, complemented by spousal-pair analysis.

Reference: Ring, Orsolya – Kiss, László – Turnai, Anna (2020): Female Cadres in the Rákosi Era. Századok 154/1, 107–134. Full text.

STUDY 2018 CHURCH HISTORY PROSOPOGRAPHY EDUCATION HISTORY

Diocesan-Supported Pupils at the Pannonhalma Benedictine Gymnasium (1955–1972)

Who were the fourteen-year-old boys who began their studies at the Pannonhalma Benedictine Gymnasium with diocesan support during the party-state period? A prosopographic-sociological case study reconstructing the collective biography of 142 students — drawing on the Pannonhalma Archabbey Archive and applying the Andorka and Ferge frameworks.

Reference: Ring, Orsolya: Diocesan-Supported Pupils at the Pannonhalma Benedictine Gymnasium between 1955 and 1972. In: Dénesi, Tamás – Boros, Zoltán (eds.): Benedictines in Hungary in the Period of the Party-State Dictatorship II. Pannonhalma: Pannonhalmi Főapátsági Levéltár, 2018. 147–163. (Studia ex Archivo Sancti Martini edita; II.) ISBN 9786155576095.