Liberal Magazine Smears MCC Brussels for Doing Its Job

In Brussels, where lobbying is as common as coffee meetings, the latest moral panic centers on the Mathias Corvinus Collegium (MCC). A recent article by the liberal Hungarian publication HVG portrays the think tank’s Brussels office as a sinister agent of influence—for doing precisely what every other policy institute in the city does: engaging with politicians, publishing research, and contributing to public debate.

According to HVG, MCC Brussels “lobbies through pro-Russian meetings, pseudo-scientific papers, and influencer marketing.” Yet the evidence presented amounts to little more than ordinary professional activity: open events, published reports, and recorded meetings with Members of the European Parliament. Thousands of organizations—from Greenpeace to corporate consultancies—operate the same way. The only difference is the ideology.

That distinction matters. When progressive NGOs funded by the EU or German ministries campaign for climate policies or social reforms, they are celebrated as “civil society.” When conservative institutions do the same, they are accused of “foreign interference.” Transparency International, which mentored the author of the HVG piece, has itself received millions in EU and Soros-linked funding. But that detail never makes it into the “investigations.”

The labeling of MCC as “pro-Russian” is perhaps the most telling symptom of today’s Brussels discourse. The accusation is not based on evidence of funding, coordination, or messaging—only on the fact that one of the many politicians MCC has met happens to hold controversial views on Moscow. By that logic, any dialogue with dissenting voices could be branded as ideological contamination.

In truth, MCC’s Brussels office follows the same model as its Western counterparts: it conducts research, organizes debates, and invites students and experts to discuss the future of Europe. Its main “fault” is to approach those questions from a conservative, national, and pro-sovereignty perspective—one that values tradition, family, and free expression over the bureaucratic centralization and postmodern dogmas so fashionable in EU institutions.

The most revealing line in HVG’s article comes at its conclusion: “MCC Brussels is not doing anything unusual for a think tank.” Precisely. After pages of insinuations, even the critics are forced to admit that MCC’s activities are entirely normal. The difference is not what MCC does, but what it believes.

That, ultimately, is the heart of the matter. In today’s Brussels, where diversity of opinion is often less tolerated than diversity of slogans, a conservative think tank that questions prevailing orthodoxies can quickly become a target. The smear campaign against MCC reveals not a scandal, but the discomfort of a political class that cannot imagine intellectual independence existing outside its ideological boundaries.

MCC Brussels is doing what every serious policy institute should: researching, debating, and engaging with the political institutions that shape Europe’s future. The fact that this has been turned into a “story” says more about the insecurities of the Brussels establishment than about MCC itself. In a climate where conformity is rewarded and criticism punished, the presence of an alternative voice should not be feared—it should be welcomed.