In memoriam György Enyedi (1930–2012)


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In memoriam György Enyedi (1930–2012)

Professor György Enyedi, aged 82, 
member and former vice-president of 
the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, 
distinguished scholar of the commu-
nity of geographers passed away on 10 
September 2012. György Enyedi was 
one of the most infl uential Hungarian 
geographers of the last half a century. 
He has been the voice and the face of 
Hungarian geography in the worldwide 
community of geographers for many 
decades due to the quality of his own 
work, but also on his untiring eff orts at 
maintaining wide-range of international 
academic contacts.

Born in Budapest on 28th of 
August 1930, he graduated from the 
Budapest University of Economics in 
1953. He was one of those few students 
in economics who could specialise in 
economic geography and regional de-
velopment. Aft er graduating he got a 
lecturer position at his university which 
was followed by a post at the University 
of Agriculture in Gödöllő where he was 
assistant professor until 1960. In the fi rst 
part of his academic career his scientifi c 

interest focused mostly on regional problems of Hungarian and world agriculture. In 
1960 he became researcher of the Geographical Research Institute, Hungarian Academy of 
Sciences, where he was appointed Deputy Director in 1962. With the change his research 
gained a new dimension in that socio-economic issues of the development of rural areas 
became the centre of his interest. His studies revealed many of the negative consequences 
of state-socialist modernisation in the Hungarian sett lement system and more specifi cally 
in rural areas. 

He was always an ‘integral’ geographer who followed and integrated the results of 
other social sciences. This helped him to become the ‘father’ of Hungarian regional science 
in the 1980s. In this capacity he founded an interdisciplinary research institute specialised 
in regional science, the Centre for Regional Studies, Hungarian Academy of Sciences in 
1984. He was the director of the institute until 1991. Working together with economists, 
sociologists, geographers, lawyers and representatives of other disciplines he proved again 
his extraordinary capacities and skills in team building. During the last two decades his 
scientifi c interest turned towards the socio-spatial aspects of urbanisation and urban de-
velopment at the global and local scale. 

Enyedi’s intellectual legacy extends well beyond geography also through his writ-
ings. During his academic career he was the author of nearly 700 scientifi c publications, 
authored and edited 45 books, among them Hungary – an economic geography. Boulder, 



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Westview (1976); The eff ect of modern agriculture on rural development. New York, Pergamon 
(1982); Environmental policies in East and West. London, Taylor Graham (1987); Budapest – a 
Central European Capital. London, Belhaven, (1992, with Viktória Szirmai); Social changes and 
urban restructuring in Central Europe. Budapest, Akadémiai Kiadó (1998). He was editor-in-
chief of the Series Geography of World Agriculture (9 Volumes between 1972 and1984). 
He founded the journal Tér és Társadalom (Space and Society) in 1987 and he has been the 
chairman of its editorial board ever since. He acted as editor in chief of the journal Magyar 
Tudomány (Hungarian Science) and he was honorary editor-in-chief of our journal, the 
Hungarian Geographical Bulletin. He left  his imprint on the academic literature of human 
geography and regional science forever. 

György Enyedi played an outstanding role in connecting Hungarian geography 
with the international mainstream of our discipline. In 1966 he spent a year in Berkeley 
(US) with the scholarship of the Ford Foundation. Between 1972 and 1984 he was chairman 
of the Commission of Rural Development of the International Geographical Union (IGU). 
He organised and att ended several international conferences and published great number 
of papers in top quality scientifi c journals. This was the period when his work became 
internationally known and renowned. In 1984 the Union’s General Assembly elected him 
– against the candidate nominated by the Hungarian National Committ ee – Vice President 
of the IGU and he served two terms until 1992. In August 2008 at the 31st Congress of the 
International Geographical Union in Tunis he received the highest recognition by the IGU 
the Laureat d’Honneur. During his creative and successful career he built wide range of 
scientifi c contacts in geography and beyond all around the world, and he helped and en-
couraged his younger colleagues for international collaborations. Both as a colleague and 
as a mentor he has touched the professional lives of many geographers across the world. 
He was always able to see the forest even when engaged in among the trees, in this respect 
he became the ideal for many of us. 

Enyedi’s wide-ranging scientifi c work and accomplishment received a lot of rec-
ognitions and awards at home and abroad. He became corresponding member of the 
Hungarian Academy of Sciences in 1982 and full member in 1990. He was Vice-President 
of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences between 1999 and 2002. He became member of 
the Academia Europaea in London in 1990. Enyedi was elected Honorary Member of the 
Finnish Geographical Society (1978), the Polish Geographical Society (1981), the French 
Geographical Society (1982), the Royal Geographical Society, London (1983), the Hungarian 
Geographical Society (1985), and the Croatian Geographical Society (1995).

Professor Enyedi lived most of his life throughout the exciting but otherwise trou-
blesome 20th century, with world war, revolutions, oppression and systemic changes. What 
helped him to cope with all the diffi  culties in his professional and personal life was his ex-
traordinary sense of humour. He was always able to cheer up his surrounding, even in the 
middle of the most boring committ ee meetings. Despite his infl uential positions he never 
behaved pompous and self-important manner. Typical of him, we were never allowed to ad-
dress him Professor, or even György, but simply Gyurka, what was his well-known nickname 
among Hungarian geographers and social scientist independently from age or position. 

The Hungarian human geography lost its outstanding representative who gained 
worldwide acknowledgements and who formed the view of generations of Hungarian 
geographers. With his work Professor Enyedi made an indelible contribution to the develop-
ment of Hungarian human geography and the international recognition of our discipline. 
We geographers lost an extraordinary colleague and a great friend.

Zoltán Kovács