Part I — Situation overview

On 10 July 2026 the sport leadership of the new government announced the reshaping and substantially stricter monitoring of the state sport-subsidy system. According to the briefing, while preserving the success of competitive sport, in future they will examine much more strictly the transparency of the use of state subsidies; the review of the corporate-tax allowance (TAO — companies receive a corporate-tax allowance on the subsidy they grant to sport) of spectator sports has also already begun, “in order to create a fairer structure”. State secretary for sport Gábor Pósfai indicated that in future they intend to host international sporting events more cost-efficiently, along concrete revenue plans and keeping social usefulness in mind, and that ideally non-active political actors would stand at the head of the sport federations.

Concrete data lie behind the announcement. After the change of government it emerged through a freedom-of-information request that the Bethlen Gábor Fund, which manages the support of cross-border Hungarian communities, granted HUF 9.8 billion to cross-border football academies and clubs before the election — according to the documentation, in many places money was requested and received from this even for the tiniest items, office supplies and fuel. The range of subsidised items stretched from billion-forint infrastructure development through multi-million salaries all the way to scones. In parallel, the previously guaranteed HUF ten-billion media broadcasting fee paid for television broadcasts is being cut to HUF six billion. The three channels of sport financing — the TAO allowance, cross-border support and the media broadcasting fee — thus came into the spotlight at once.

In MIAK’s reading the question here is not the legitimacy of sport or of nation policy, but the verifiability of the use of public money. The support of cross-border Hungarian communities is in itself a legitimate state goal; the problem is not the goal, but the discretionary money flow that is not itemisedly accounted for and not linked to performance. When the public can only learn through a subsequent freedom-of-information request what the money from a subsidy system was spent on, the fault is systemic: the discretionary freedom was left without control. The solution is not the abolition of the subsidy, but its earmarking, public accounting and measurement by performance.

Part II — Literature foundation

The question of the transparency of subsidy allocation is old and well-mapped terrain in the literature. According to the famous formula of Robert Klitgaard (American economist, author of the classic handbook of anti-corruption policy), Corruption = Monopoly + Discretion − Accountability (C = M + D − A, 1988), the risk of abuse is greatest exactly where an allocating actor decides on public money in a monopoly position, with broad discretionary freedom, without accountability — discretionary sport subsidy satisfies all three conditions. Susan Rose-Ackerman (professor at Yale University, leading researcher of the political economy of corruption) in her work Corruption and Government (1999) shows empirically that the discretion-based allocation of scarce state grants — subsidies, licences, allowances — is systematically distorted towards well-connected beneficiaries and becomes detached from the original policy goal. The Governance Matters (1999) study of Daniel Kaufmann and his fellow researchers (the World Bank’s governance-measurement working group) showed on 150+ countries that better governance — including voice and accountability — stands in a causal relationship with better development outcomes: accountability is not a moral ornament, but a measurable efficiency factor. The detailed literature treatment — by author, with quotations — can be found in the 6.4 Literature in detail section.

Part III — MIAK’s concrete proposal

MIAK proposes three measurable measures that make the three channels of sport subsidy — direct subsidy, performance measurement and the media broadcasting fee — transparent and accountable at once.

3.1 Public, itemised sport-subsidy register (within 6 months)

The first step is a public, machine-readable sport-subsidy register that makes every state sport source — the corporate-tax allowance of spectator sports, the sport-purpose payments of the Bethlen Gábor Fund and the media broadcasting fee — available itemisedly on a single interface (beneficiary, amount, goal, deadline, delivery). This is the sport module of MIAK’s existing A1 public-money register and the G1 data-driven budget: it does not create a new institution, but makes the already existing data searchable. In Klitgaard’s C = M + D − A frame (see 6.4.1) this directly strengthens accountability (A) — the very fact that the HUF 9.8 billion cross-border sport expenditure became visible only through a subsequent freedom-of-information request proves precisely the absence of accountability. The register’s owner is the state secretariat for sport together with the data-owner institutions; queryability and anomaly-flagging (unusual item, recurring beneficiary) should be a built-in function, not a subsequent analyst task.

3.2 Performance-based, conditional financing with a clawback (recovery) mechanism (within 12 months)

The second measure is the earmarking of the subsidy and its linking to performance. Every substantive sport subsidy should be tied to a predefined, measurable target indicator (youth-team headcount, competition result, facility utilisation, social usefulness), and for the larger items an independent cost-benefit analysis should be mandatory. If the recipient does not deliver the undertaken goal, a proportionate part of the source can be reclaimed (clawback) — this carries over to sport MIAK’s G9 strategic industrial policy performance-based, time-limited, publicly audited subsidy logic, as well as the clawback (recovery) mechanism of the A8 accountability frame. The measurement of impact is ensured by the G20 ex-post impact assessment (Drucker audit — after 12-18 months, the comparison of the expected and the actual result). Rose-Ackerman’s analysis (see 6.4.2) proves precisely that without a target indicator and ex-post control the subsidy becomes detached from the policy goal; the responsible party is the relevant ministry and the State Audit Office (ÁSZ) as ex-post controller. The goal is not the punishment of sport, but that public money should go where the measurable result is greatest.

3.3 Criteria-based media-broadcasting-fee and cross-border subsidy frame (within 12-18 months)

The third measure is the making rule-based of the two highest-risk channels — the media broadcasting fee and cross-border sport subsidy. Cutting the guaranteed media broadcasting fee from ten to HUF six billion is in itself an expenditure reduction; according to MIAK the essence is not the amount, but the rule of distribution: the broadcasting fee and the sport-purpose media expenditure should be decided along public, predefined criteria, in a documented procedure, as prescribed by the KU2 media-pluralism monitoring (transparency of the distribution of government media spending) and the KU5 open, non-discretionary culture financing. In cross-border support the legitimate nation-policy goal can be retained in such a way that every payment is accompanied by a tender criterion, itemised accounting and an ex-post report — so that the subsidy does not disappear among the uncontrollable items ranging “from office supplies to scones”. The responsible party is the manager of the Bethlen Gábor Fund and the state secretariat for sport, with a result evaluated annually according to Kaufmann’s accountability yardstick (see 6.4.3).

The three proposals are bound together by a single principle: public money is in the right place if it is earmarked, publicly accounted for and measurable by performance. In the language of the Klitgaard formula, all three steps narrow discretion (D) and widen accountability (A) — they punish neither sport nor cross-border communities, but make the system verifiable.

Part IV — Expected impacts and risks

Dimension Expected impact Risk
Economy / public money The subsidy is tied to measurable usefulness; non-delivering items can be reclaimed; the saving from the media-broadcasting-fee cut can be directed to a transparent goal The clawback and the reporting obligation impose an administrative burden on the smaller clubs and academies
Society / sport Leisure and school sport, as well as the sport of people with disabilities, can gain a more visible priority; trust in sport financing grows Sudden strictness may cause a loss of funds in the short term even for some functioning programmes
Nation policy The legitimate goal of cross-border support is preserved, but in an itemisedly accounted-for and criteria-based frame The interpretation of the “tightening” as a political weapon — as if the goal were the cutting back of the subsidy, not transparency
Public administration A uniform, machine-readable register reduces the subsequent freedom-of-information burden and the detection time of anomalies If the register is not real-time or is incomplete, it creates only a semblance of transparency

The main question to weigh is the balance between transparency and administrative burden. The itemised accounting of the subsidy and performance measurement work if a simplified, proportionate accounting applies to the smallest beneficiaries (bureaucracy should not crowd out genuine youth-team work), while the control remains strong for the large, billion-forint items. The system tips towards the risk side if the tightening becomes an end in itself — if the measurement is used to legitimise the simple cutting back of the subsidy or the political replacement of the beneficiaries, rather than to improve the efficiency of public money. MIAK’s yardstick throughout is measurable, public accounting, not the size of the expenditure.

Part V — Measurability and summary

5.1 What is worth tracking? (suggested performance indicators)

The success of the proposal is worth tracking along the following, suggested performance indicators (KPIs, that is, measures from which in 6-24 months the direction can be seen):

  • The share of sport subsidies with a public, itemised data sheet > 90% within the total state sport source by 2027 (from the current state that can be forced only through a freedom-of-information request);
  • The share of subsidies tied to a target indicator > 80% for the substantive (above-threshold) items;
  • The actual application of the clawback (recovery) mechanism: the documented, public handling of non-delivering items — neither 0% (a rule existing on paper, never used), nor disproportionately high;
  • The coverage of the itemised, public accounting of cross-border sport subsidy = 100% relative to the amount paid out.

These are suggested yardsticks, not government commitments — MIAK has no decision-making power, the goal is to ensure public traceability.

5.2 Summary

The key message is simple: the reshaping of sport subsidy is successful if in the end every forint is earmarked, publicly accounted for and measurable by performance — and not if only the roster of beneficiaries changes. MIAK asks the decision-maker to realise the tightening not as the curtailing of the subsidy, but as the narrowing of discretion and the widening of accountability; and it asks the public to hold the yardstick to account not on the size of the expenditure, but on the itemised accounting. This proposal follows directly from two MIAK foundational values: from transparency — because the path of public money must be made verifiable in order for it to be debatable at all whether it goes to the right place — and from accountability — because even a legitimate goal (competitive sport, nation policy) does not absolve the user from itemised accounting. Without these two, “stricter monitoring” remains mere rhetoric.

Part VI — Justifications and further sources

6.1 Press framing by spectrum

The topic appeared in several bands of the political spectrum, typically with differing emphases. The economic press (Portfolio) focused on the content of the government announcement: the review of the TAO system, the more cost-efficient hosting of international sporting events along revenue plans, the depoliticisation of the sport federations and the broader community use of sport facilities — that is, the policy frame of the reform, without an evaluative judgement. The left-liberal investigative band (444.hu) turned attention to the past: through a freedom-of-information request it uncovered the individual sport subsidies of the Bethlen Gábor Fund, and placed at the centre the money flow extending even to the tiniest items (office supplies, fuel) — here the framing is that of the lack of control of the earlier system. The public-affairs weekly band (HVG) brought a similar, item-level approach: with the arc “from billion-forint development through multi-million salaries to scones” it emphasised the scattered and disproportionate nature of the subsidy. Népszava (reference at title level only) approached from the media-broadcasting-fee side: it wrote about the cut of the guaranteed ten-billion fee to six billion and the question of broadcasting rights. The pro-government, conservative band did not raise the topic into prominent focus on this day — on this part of the spectrum the reshaping of sport financing did not run as a standalone, evaluative article. From MIAK’s perspective the essence is the common denominator of the bands: each probes the traceability of the path of public money, only in a different time frame.

6.2 Facts and data

Item Value Source
State subsidy to cross-border football clubs (before the election) HUF 9.8 billion 444.hu, 11 July 2026 (Bethlen Gábor Fund, freedom-of-information request)
Guaranteed media broadcasting fee (previous) HUF 10 billion Népszava, July 2026
Guaranteed media broadcasting fee (new) HUF 6 billion Népszava, July 2026
Announcement of the reshaping of the sport-subsidy system 10 July 2026 Portfolio, 10 July 2026
Hungary WGI 2024 — control of corruption −0.17 World Bank WGI 2024
Hungary WGI 2024 — government effectiveness +0.42 World Bank WGI 2024

According to the World Bank’s governance indicators (WGI 2024), Hungary performs below the EU average in the control of corruption (−0.17), while its government effectiveness (+0.42) is in the positive range — this duality supports exactly MIAK’s diagnosis: it is not the implementation capacity that is missing, but the control of the allocation. Itemised, public accounting acts directly on the control-of-corruption dimension.

6.3 Policy aspects

The topic touches three MIAK policy areas:

  • Transparency and anti-corruption policy (programme points) — the public-money register, the tracking of subsidies and the accountability frame are the backbone of the proposal;
  • Economy (background material and programme points) — the data-driven budget, the performance-based, conditional subsidy and the ex-post impact assessment are the efficiency side;
  • Culture (programme points) — the media broadcasting fee and non-discretionary, criteria-based financing are the media-market and cultural aspect.

6.4 Literature in detail

6.4.1 Robert Klitgaard: Controlling Corruption

Klitgaard’s classic handbook describes corruption not as a moral but as a structural-incentive phenomenon: according to the C = M + D − A formula, the risk of abuse is the product of the monopoly position (M) and the discretionary freedom (D), divided by accountability (A). According to the work’s principal-agent model, the allocating actor “judges corruptly” where its discretion is large and the probability of getting caught is small; rent-seeking — when actors obtain income not through productive activity but through acquiring a monopoly position — is precisely the product of uncontrolled, monopolistic allocation. In the case of Hungarian sport subsidy this means: as long as a narrow circle decides on billions in a monopoly position, with broad discretionary freedom, without ex-post accounting, the system is structurally risky — not depending on the good or bad faith of the actors. MIAK’s proposal restores exactly this formula, by narrowing D (criteria-based allocation) and widening A (public, itemised accounting).

📖 Source: Robert Klitgaard: Controlling Corruption (1988)

6.4.2 Susan Rose-Ackerman: Corruption and Government

In her comprehensive analysis of the economics of corruption, Rose-Ackerman shows that when the state allocates scarce goods — subsidies, licences, preferential credits, allowances — through official judgement instead of a market price, the discretionary decision is systematically distorted towards well-connected beneficiaries and becomes detached from the original policy goal. Her examples — the deflection of import licences, subsidised housing, the allocation of irrigation water — all show that the “nominally eligible” beneficiary is not necessarily the one the programme was meant for. Hungarian cross-border sport subsidy is a textbook case in this frame: the source assigned to a legitimate goal (youth teams, community building), in the absence of a target indicator and ex-post control, was fragmented into items — according to the descriptions, office supplies, fuel — where the connection between use and declared goal cannot be verified. The proposal’s target indicators and the clawback exclude precisely this distortion.

📖 Source: Susan Rose-Ackerman: Corruption and Government — Causes, Consequences, and Reform (1999)

6.4.3 Kaufmann–Kraay–Zoido-Lobatón: Governance Matters

The foundational study of the World Bank’s research group condenses 300+ governance indicators into six aggregate measures (among them voice and accountability, government effectiveness and control of corruption), and examines their relationship with development outcomes on 150+ countries. According to the authors’ finding, the research “provides new empirical evidence of a strong causal relationship running from better governance to better development outcomes”. This is the conceptual basis of the MIAK proposal: accountability is not an end-in-itself administration, but comes with measurably better results. Translated to sport financing: public, itemised accounting does not hinder the success of sport, but — according to the logic of governance measurement — is precisely the precondition of the more efficient use of the source.

📖 Source: Kaufmann–Kraay–Zoido-Lobatón: Governance Matters (World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 2196, 1999)

6.5 International comparison

The operative patterns of the theoretical theses of the books also work in several countries. The precedents of MIAK’s public-money register programme point — the Brazilian Portal da Transparência and the Slovak contract register (e-Zmluvy) — show that itemised, public disclosure measurably reduced public-procurement and subsidy prices (in Slovakia by 5-8% in the transparent categories). In sport-specific financing, performance-linked, conditional subsidy (a model akin to MIAK’s strategic industrial-policy logic) is an established form of public financing tied to youth-team and result indicators in numerous EU member states. The common lesson: transparency and performance measurement do not slow down but discipline allocation.

Transparency and anti-corruption policy

  • A1 — Public-money dashboard
  • A2 — Public-procurement transparency
  • A8 — Cohesion-policy accountability (clawback (recovery) mechanism)

Economy

  • G1 — Data-driven budget
  • G9 — Strategic industrial policy (conditional, performance-based subsidy)
  • G20 — Economic-policy impact-assessment system (Drucker audit)
  • G21 — Systematic review of state expenditure

Culture

  • KU2 — Media-pluralism monitoring
  • KU5 — Cultural participation index and open culture financing

Proposed new programme point: Sport-financing transparency frame (earmarked, itemisedly accounted-for, performance-based sport subsidy with a public register) — for the Culture and the Transparency and anti-corruption policy area.

6.7 Source register

Press sources (MIAK press monitor, 12 July 2026 — top 10 topics, topic 9):

Knowledge-base references (literature):

  • 📖 Robert Klitgaard: Controlling Corruption (1988)
  • 📖 Susan Rose-Ackerman: Corruption and Government — Causes, Consequences, and Reform (1999)
  • 📖 Kaufmann–Kraay–Zoido-Lobatón: Governance Matters (World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 2196, 1999)

Note: in the blog’s visible text the local file path of the books does not appear — only the author and the title. The file path is an internal matter of the generation process, not the reader’s.

MIAK internal materials:

  • MIAK policy area: Transparency and anti-corruption policy (programme points; programme point ID: A1, A8)
  • MIAK policy area: Economy (programme points; programme point ID: G9, G20)
  • MIAK policy area: Culture (programme points; programme point ID: KU2, KU5)
  • MIAK press monitor, 12 July 2026 — topic 9, score: 66/100

Additional public data sources:

  • World Bank Worldwide Governance Indicators (WGI) 2024 — control of corruption, government effectiveness
  • ÁSZ sport-financing reports; the register of the corporate-tax allowance (TAO) of spectator sports

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