The scope of this paper covers five years between 2018–2023, looking at a starting point when both right-wing governments in Hungary and Poland were already well-established (in power since 2010 in the case of Hungary and 2015 in the case of Poland), and it ends when the PiS government in Poland was replaced in 2023. Hungary and Poland bear symbolic and territorial, as well as economic relevance in the Central European region. This study defines Central Europe (CE) geographically as the region between the West, which includes Germany and Austria on its eastern flanks, and the East, as understood through Huntington’s perspective1. In contemporary terms, this is delineated by the eastern borders of Poland and Slovakia. CE encompasses the countries that were part of the Eastern Bloc and regained their independence around 1989, both politically and economically. These nations now align with the western hemisphere, being members of the European Union (EU), North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), and other western institutions.