This paper focuses on democratic decline in established democracies, particularly those in post-Communist Eastern Europe. While the academic literature on this subject contains a multitude of theories on the reasons for democratic decline including geopolitics, social capital, economic factors, and the role of nationalism, there has been little focus on measuring the relative influence of these theorized causes within specific cases of democratic decline. My research will fill this gap by diving into the case of Hungary to explore the relative influence of the theorized causes as well as the process by which they work in practice in that case. I will utilize a small-n neopositivst approach to achieve this goal and the materials I examine include survey data from Gallup Analytics and the World Value Survey, speeches by Hungarian elites such as Prime Minister Viktor Orban, and newspaper articles, both from within Hungary and without. The exploration of this data indicates that the primary cause of democratic decline in Hungary is the rising nationalism within Hungary. This research is important because it contributes to filling a gap in the literature and has a broad applicability as rising nationalism seems to be a theme of the 21st century thus far.