Historical predecessors and current geographical possibilities of ethnic based territorial autonomies in the Carpathian Basin


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Hungarian Geographical Bulletin 62 (1) (2013) 3–46.

Historical predecessors and current geographical possibilities 
of ethnic based territorial autonomies 

in the Carpathian Basin

Károly KOCSIS1

Abstract

Despite the ethnic cleansings, deportations, forced assimilation, homogenization and partly 
due to the immigration of foreign-born population there is hardly any country in Europe 
which could be called ethnically homogeneous. This is particularly true in the case of the 
small „nation-states” of the Carpathian Basin (Hungary, Slovakia, Ukraine, Romania, Serbia 
etc). So, starting from the fact, that in ethnically diverse regions the territorial autonomies 
are one of the most eff ective tools of minority protection and confl ict solution, and are 
safeguards for ensuring the cultural survival and protection of collective rights of national 
minorities, this paper tries to outline the geographic background of existing (and missing) 
territorial autonomies in Europe (1st part) and, in more details, the historical predecessors 
and the geographical possibilities of ethnic based territorial autonomies in the Carpathian 
Basin (2nd part). Although the emphasis is largely laid on the contemporary situation, 
there are important sections devoted to the historical development of the ethnic based 
territorial autonomies in this geographic work as well.

Keywords: ethnic based territorial autonomy, ethnic geography, administrative division, 
Carpathian Basin, Europe

Introduction

The ideal of the builders of the 19th century nation states, the idea of ’one state – one 
nation’ has not come into existence in hardly any of the European states despite the 
ethnic cleansings, forced migrations, forced assimilation and partly as a result of 
the mass appearance of immigrants (e.g. „Gastarbeiter/guest workers”, refugees). 
From among the present 703 million inhabitants of our continent, members of titu-
lar nations of the individual countries constitute only 85%, historic national and 
ethnic minorities constitute 10%, while the remaining 5% are immigrants with no 
1 Director, Geographical Institute, Research Centre for Astronomy and Earth Sciences, Hungarian 

Academy of  Sciences, H-1112 Budapest, Budaörsi út 45. E-mail: kocsis.karoly@csfk.mta.hu



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citizenship. According to census data, from among the European states (except for 
the micro states) Poland, Portugal, Hungary, the Netherlands, the Czech Republic 
and Norway are the closest to the above mentioned nation state homogeneity, 
where more than 93% of the population count as members of the titular nation. 
From an ethnic-linguistic perspective (except for Belgium, Bosnia, Cyprus and 
Switzerland, as well as the micro states that all have unique ethnic-political back-
grounds) the most heterogeneous ones are Spain, Latvia and Macedonia, since in 
their case the joint proportion of minorities exceed one third of the population.

Due to this signifi cant and in some cases increasing ethnic-linguistic di-
versity, the fading of the memories of the second world war and the dissolution 
of the former Communist federal states the number and intensity of the ethnic 
confl icts within the states has increased since the 1960s. In the background of the 
confl icts a rigid rejection of the collective rights of minorities (including those related 
to autonomy) and, as a result, the secessionist ambitions of the minorities could be 
observed in most of the cases. Following the civil wars on the territories of the 
former Yugoslavia and the Soviet Union in the 1990s, eff orts were made to sett le 
such confl icts peacefully, via negotiations, moreover, in the case of certain west-
ern nation states that had earlier been strictly centralised, a decentralization, and a 
movement towards regional self-governance could be observed (Benedikter, T. 2009). 
From among the states possessing solid democratic traditions, acknowledging 
territorial and cultural heterogeneity seeking to avoid confl ict, primarily Italy, 
Spain, Belgium and the United Kingdom pursued the deepening of the various 
forms of regional power-sharing, the most common one of which, along with the 
system of federal and associated statehood, is autonomy. Autonomy can be of 
non-ethnic (regional territorial) and of ethnic nature. The status of Spain and that 
of some Italian autonomous regions not populated by minorities (e.g. Andalusia, 
Madrid, Sicily) stand as examples for the former one. The latt er, the ethnic based 
autonomy (if ethnic-geographical conditions are met) may be territorial (e.g. South 
Tyrol, Åland Islands, Catalonia, Tatarstan) or local (administrative) and personal 
(cultural) (Benedikter, T. 2009). 

“A territorial autonomy is a geographically defi ned area, which diff ers 
from other sub-regions (like municipalities, federal states, etc.) in a specifi c country 
and has received special status with legislative and/or regulatory (administrative) 
powers” (Ackrén, M. 2009, p. 20). In the past such form of autonomy was consid-
ered to be the fi rst step towards separation, a means to disintegrate existing states 
(Pan, C. and Pfeil, B.S. 2003). Today, based on positive international experiences, 
we believe that territorial autonomy is the most developed asset of minority protection 
and the most modern form of internal self-governance, which can be considered as a 
compromise between the given state (the titular nation) and the national minori-
ties, which ensures autonomy – a fundamental human right – to the minorities 
and ensures the preservation of the territorial integrity and the intangibility of the 
borders to the state.



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In order to preserve the state’s territorial integrity and to grant the 
minority collective rights (voluntarily or under compulsion), territorial 
autonomies have so far been realised in Europe primarily on Scandinavian, 
Italian, Spanish and British territories and in Russia (Figure 1). It is conspicuous, 
however, that on the territory of France, the ideal of the strongly centralised 
nation states, and on the territories of the ex-communist East-Central and 
South-Eastern European countries, such autonomies – because of the fear 
of the suspected secessionist endeavours of the minorities – could not be 
realised. 

As shown by international experiences, an ethnic based territorial 
autonomy (disregarding the political conditions this time and concentrating 
on a pure ethnic-geographical aspect) can only be successful, where the ethnic 
area of the given minority is (more or less) contiguous and where the ethnic 
minority constitutes the absolute (demographic) majority (that is in the area 
the members of the titular nation represent a demographic minority). From 
this respect, in France Alsace (German speaking Alsatians), Lower Britt any 
(Bretons), the Northern Basque Country, Northern Catalonia/Roussillon and 
Corsica should have this form of self-governance. The same is true for some 
minorities living in the ex-communist countries (e.g. Poles in the joint border 
areas of Lithuania and Belarus, Turks in Bulgaria, Bulgarians in Serbia and 
in the Ukraine, Serbs in Northern Kosovo, Bosniaks/Muslims in the Serbian 
Sandjak area, and the Hungarians in the Carpathian Basin).

Historical roots of the territorial autonomies in the Carpathian Basin

The Carpathian Basin, accommodating almost 29 million inhabitants, has a situ-
ation similar to the European average, since 84% of its inhabitants are members 
of the individual titular nation. From among the other inhabitants who count 
fundamentally as national-ethnic minorities, due to state borders drawn aft er 
the two world wars and due to migration processes, it is only the Hungarian 
minority (to be more precise, only two third of them) who possesses a sett le-
ment area which meets the prerequisites of a territorial autonomy. All other 
minorities basically fi ght for survival on linguistic islands and in diasporas, 
where the only possibility is to realise local or cultural autonomy.

The period before 1918

It is a litt le-known fact that the Carpathian Basin can be called the cradle of 
European territorial autonomies, where the individual regions and ethnic 
groups had a large scope of autonomy until the middle of the 19th century.



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In the Carpathian Basin, Croatia – which had become part of the 
Hungarian Kingdom between 1091 and 1097 as a result of the military cam-
paigns led by the Hungarian kings Saint Ladislaus I and Coloman I – had the 
longest (lasting almost 800 years) regional territorial self-governance, which pre-
served its territorial separatism, its self-governance in the form of a personal 
union as regulated by the pact of 1102 (Pacta conventa) between King Coloman 
and the Croatian aristocracy during the existence of the Hungarian-Croatian 
state. This territorial separatism and self-governance were also represented by 
the ban (viceroy) of Croatia-Dalmatia and Slavonia and their national assembly 
(sabor). Slavonia (Hung. Tótország, Szlavónország) between the Drava river and 
the Dinaric Ranges permanently became a part of Hungary at the beginning of 
the 11th century and the foundation of the diocese of Zagreb by Saint Ladislaus I 
in 1091, and was ruled as a duchy by heirs to the throne and other members of 
the royal family or the bans of Slavonia from the 12th century (Figure 2). 

The diff erent degrees of autonomies of Croatia and Slavonia decreased 
signifi cantly aft er 1526 under the Habsburg rule and their territories were re-
duced to approximately to one third of their original size aft er the Ott oman 

Fig. 2. Territorial autonomies in the countries of the Hungarian Crown (1500). – 1 = Cuman 
(Kun) seats; 2 = Jassic (Jász) seat (Jazygia); 3 = Saxon seats in Transylvania; 4 = Saxon 
16 towns (pawned to Poland); 5 = Saxon 11 towns (in Hungarian Zips, Szepes, Spiš); 

6 = “Sedes X lanceatorum”; 7 = Székely seats



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(Turkish) invasion. Consequently and as a result of the large-scale migration 
the centre of the Croatian statehood (and the notion of Croatia) was pushed 
from the seaside to the northern, Slavonian territories near Zagreb, while the 
notion of Slavonia was pushed towards the east, to the territories between 
the Drava and Sava rivers, reconquered from the Ott oman Empire between 
1684 and 1688 (Szabó, P.Z. 1945). Aft er 1790 Slavonia is mentioned together 
with Croatia, as one of its parts. During the Hungarian revolution and war 
of independence in 1848, the constitutional law relations were discontin-
ued to be only restored in 1868 with the Croato–Hungarian Compromise, 
which again recognised the Kingdom of Croatia-Slavonia as a part of the Holy 
Crown of Hungary with wide autonomy. This commonwealth of states, that 
is the territorial autonomy within the Hungarian state was terminated by the 
Croatian Parliament aft er the fall of the Austro–Hungarian Monarchy, on 29 
October 1918 and it joined the new born state (Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and 
Slovenes, Yugoslavia) later, within the framework of which it could only enjoy 
the same degree of internal independence that had been established in the 
Croatian–Hungarian commonwealth of states signifi cantly later (1939–1941, 
1974–1991). In today’s terms the self-governance of Croatia and Slavonia in 
the Hungarian state could formally be conceived as a regional territorial 
autonomy, however, with respect to the fact that the majority of their popu-
lation was South Slav (until the middle of the 16th century almost the entire 
population was Catholic South Slav: Slavonian and Croatian), the internal 
independence of these territories can be understood as an ethnic based ter-
ritorial autonomy.

Transylvania (Hung. Erdély, Rom. Ardeal, Germ. Siebenbürgen) frequent-
ly embodied the diff erent degrees of regional territorial autonomy during 
the fi rst millennium of the Hungarian statehood, primarily because of its 
large distance from the core area of the state (Esztergom, Buda, Visegrád, 
Székesfehérvár) and because of its unique geographical location (Kristó Gy. 
2003). From the 11th century the representative of the Hungarian king, named 
mercurius princeps, and later voivode, ensured the province a regional territo-
rial autonomy to varying degrees, always refl ecting the strength of the central 
power. Following the batt le of Mohács (1526) the voivodship of Transylvania 
became the main territory of the Eastern Hungarian Kingdom ruled by John 
Szapolyai (former voivode, now King John I). Later, as agreed in the Treaty of 
Speyer (1570), in the following century it ensured the survival of the concept 
of an independent Hungarian statehood (theoretically as an inalienable part 
of the Hungarian Kingdom) ‘only’ as a principality. From 1541 this Hungarian 
state, which counted as an Ott oman vassal, had an extraordinarily wide range 
of regional territorial autonomy, even a minimally suppressed sovereignty 
within the Ott oman Empire. This relative independence ceased to exist aft er 
expulsion of the Turks. 



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As a consequence of the Diploma Leopoldinum issued by Emperor 
Leopold I in 1691, Transylvania became a province of the Habsburg Empire as 
a country of the Hungarian Crown and with a Hungarian public law status, 
but with its own statehood as a principality, and as a grand principality aft er 
1765. Aft er this, Transylvania and Hungary were fi rst legally reunited by Act 
7 of the Law of 1848, and later, aft er the Austro–Hungarian Compromise by 
Act 18 of the Law of 1868. As a result of the latt er one the relative territorial in-
dependence of Transylvania – which continued to exist within the Hungarian 
state from the Middle Ages – was permanently eliminated in accordance with 
the goals aimed to be achieved by the united Hungarian nation state.

In the Middle Ages, the Hungarian rulers granted collective self-gov-
ernance rights prevailing over the whole community and confi ned to a certain 
territory, occasionally for periods of centuries to numerous ethnic communi-
ties and social groups who were sett led on their estates in exchange for their 
military service. The majority of such privileges were equal to what today we 
defi ne as ethnic based territorial autonomies. The document that is the fi rst one 
granting such rights in Europe is the charter issued by Andrew II of Hungary 
in 1224 (Andreanum), which granted the Transylvanian Saxons territorial based 
collective rights (Érszegi, G. 204). 

The autonomous region of the German sett lers called Saxon was es-
tablished in South Transylvania with its seat in Hermannstadt (Szeben, Sibiu) 
from the second half of the 12th century. The „Saxons” gradually sett led in for 
the defence of the South Transylvanian border that had been under threat from 
the att acks of the regular heavy-armed Byzantine troops in the 12–14th century 
to replace the light cavalry Székely border guard population transplanted to 
Eastern Carpathians. Apart from the rights typical for territorial autonomies, 
the larger Saxon sett lements were granted market and staple rights, which 
resulted in an accelerated urbanisation on their territories from the 14th cen-
tury. The Saxon autonomy in Transylvania became territorially complete in 
1486, when king Matt hias Corvinus expanded their privileges included in the 
Andreanum to the entire Transylvanian Saxon ethnic territory (Königsboden, 
Nösnerland, Burzenland), thus establishing the autonomous territorial unit, 
“Saxonian University” (Universitas Saxonum) (Müller, G.E. 1928; Hanzó, 
L. 1941). From the time of the Reformation, the Saxons did not only separate 
from their surroundings as regards their territory, but also their (Lutheran) 
confession. Their territorial autonomy ceased temporarily between 1785–1791 
and 1852–1860, and fi nally permanently as a result of the public administra-
tion reform of 1876 (Act 33).

A territorial autonomy similar to the one of the Transylvanian Saxons’ 
was enjoyed for longer than 600 years by the majority of the Zipser Saxons 
(Germans) sett led from the 12th century to the feet of the High Tatra mountains 
into the valley of the rivers Poprad and Hernád (Hornád). Their privileges 



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were affi  rmed by Stephen V in 1271 and he also declared their territory to be 
a closed autonomous province, independent of the county, with Leutschau 
(Lőcse, Levoča) as its seat (universitas seu provincia Saxonum de Scepus) (Fekete 
Nagy, A. 1934). Their customary law was affi  rmed and codifi ed by Louis I 
(Great) in 1370 (Zipser Willkür). 13 out of the 24 towns of Zips (Szepes, Spiš) 
were pawned to Poland in 1412 by King Sigismund, where their autonomy 
continued to exist until its 1770 (1772) reannexation (Žudel, J. 1984). While 
the remaining 11 Saxon towns that were not pawned gradually came under 
the rule of the county, the ones who returned in 1770 – and were joined by 
Altlublau (Ólubló, Stara Lubovňa), Pudlein (Podolin, Podolinec) and Kniesen 
(Gnézda, Hniezdne) – could preserve their autonomy until as late as 1876 
under the name Province of 16 Zips (Szepes, Spiš) towns.

In connection with the Zips area, one of Hungary’s oldest autonomies, 
the 'Sedes X lanceatorum' (county of the ten lance-bearers), needs to be men-
tioned. The privileges of its border guard inhabitants were affi  rmed by Béla IV 
in 1243 (Fekete Nagy, A. 1934). From the 16th century the population of the ter-
ritory had a Slovakian majority. Later, its more than six-century long autonomy 
ceased in 1802 when it was merged into the county of Zips (Szepes, Spiš).

In the 12th and 13th centuries there was a close correlation between 
the sett ling in of the above-mentioned Transylvanian Saxons and the migra-
tion of the border guard Székely population, and the subsequent creation of 
their autonomous territories, what later became Székely Land (Székelyföld, 
Szeklerland). The Székelys of Bihar County were sett led over to the southern 
region of Transylvania in the 11th century, which they gradually had to leave 
because of the Saxons moving in to their territory in the 12th and 13th centuries 
in order to fi nd their fi nal homeland as the defenders of the eastern border in 
the Eastern Carpathians. In their new home, similarly to the Saxons, Cumans 
and Jassic people, they established territorial units (authorities), so-called 
“Seats” („Szék” districts) with judicial, administrative and military scope in the 
14–15th centuries (Szádeczky Kardoss, L. 1927; Endes, M. 1935). The privileged 
situation of the military society of the Székelys remained intact until the 16th 

century, for the restoration of which – aft er serious confl icts – the Transylvanian 
princes in need of the military force of the Székelys made several eff orts aft er 
1601 (Egyed, Á. 2006). The Székely territorial autonomy (similarly to other 
administrative units in a similar situation) was terminated and merged into 
the newly created counties of Csík, Háromszék, Maros-Torda and Udvarhely 
by the „county reform” of 1876 (Act 33) that aimed at establishing a modern, 
centralised Hungarian nation state aft er half a millennium of existence.

The foundations of the ethnic territorial autonomy of the Cumans 
(Kun people) invited into the country in the middle of the 13th century were 
laid down by the so-called Cuman laws (constitutional charters) issued by 
Ladislaus IV. (the Cuman) of Hungary in 1279 (Bánki-Molnár, E. 2005). The 



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original clan organization of the Cumans sett led in Central Hungary (Litt le 
Cumania in the Danube-Tisza Interfl uve and Greater Cumania) was converted 
into a territorial organisation, into a seat-system, in the 15th century based 
on the Saxon model. The privileges of the Jassic (Jász) people, who sett led in 
later, granted for similar military services, can be connected to their charters 
of 1323 and 1407 (Gyárfás, I. 1870–1885). Their ethnic area along the Zagyva 
river (today Jászság, Jassic Land) became an autonomous administrative unit 
(“Seat”) around 1480 (Fodor, F. 1942; Pálóczi Horváth, A. 1989). The Ott oman 
Power respected the local self-government of the Cumans and Jassic people 
during their authority (1541–1686), however, their autonomy was intermitt ed 
several times for diff erent reasons under the Habsburg rule: 1702–1745 (sell-
ing), 1787–1790 and 1850–1860 (administrative rearrangement) (Figure 3). 

The autonomous territory consisting of the – from the 17th century ad-
ministratively more and more intertwined – Jassic and Cuman seats, the Jassic-
Cuman District (Jászkun Kerület) with Jászberény as its seat, ceased to exist 
in 1876 when it was merged with the newly created Jász-Nagykun-Szolnok 
and Pest-Pilis-Solt-Kiskun county. The Pechenegs (Besenyők) who were sett led 

Fig. 3. Territorial autonomies in the countries of the Hungarian Crown (1780). – 
1 = Hajdú District; 2 = Jassic-Cuman (Jászkun) District (Jazygia-Cumania); 3 = Saxon 
seats in Transylvania; 4 = Saxon 16 towns; 5 = “Sedes X lanceatorum”; 6 = Székely seats; 

7 = counties of Transylvania



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scatt ered in the country in the 12th and 13th centuries only had a territorial 
autonomy in the border area of Fejér and Tolna counties (Sármellék area), and 
even there only for a short period (1321–1352) (Györffy, Gy. 1939).

The immigration of the Romanians (Vlachs, Rumanians) into the 
territory of the Hungarian Kingdom (mainly in the Southern Carpathians, 
Máramaros/Maramureş and in the Apuşeni Mountains), who diff ered from 
the great majority of the country’s inhabitants both regarding their religious 
affi  liation (Orthodox) and language (Romance), following the Mongol invasion 
(1241–42), became signifi cant mainly from the 14th century (Fekete Nagy, A. 
and Makkai L. 1941). In the 14th and 15th centuries under the rule of their heads 
(cneaz, vaida, boer), in the Fogaras/Făgăraş Land, Máramaros/Maramureş 
county, Hátszeg/Haţeg and Szörény/Severin district, they acquired a territorial 
self-governance to a certain degree. This Romanian autonomy, however, de-
cayed because their leaders became nobles and because they turned Hungarian 
(and Catholic), and therefore it never reached the same levels as those of the 
Saxons’ or the Székelys’ (Fekete Nagy, A. and Makkai, L. 1941).

The Serbs2, populating the devastated southern territories abandoned 
by the Hungarians in the 16th and 17th centuries, strove more and more overtly 
for territorial self-governance – beyond their self-government provided by their 
Orthodox Church. Beyond the privileges issued by Leopold I between 1690 
and 1695, they already had a certain degree of territorial autonomy over the 
territories with a Serbian majority (Regiment of Petrovaradin, Illyrian section 
of the Banat General Command, Šajkaš district) in charge of the Military Border 
(Militär-Grenze) ruled from Vienna, between 1700 and 1873. The Serbian na-
tional congress in Temesvár (Timişoara) addressed a plea to Leopold II on 4 
November 1790 about the Serbian territorial autonomy to be created on the terri-
tory of South Hungary, but it was rejected by the Emperor a few months later.

At the time of the 1848–49 Hungarian revolution and war of inde-
pendence, aft er the Hungarian government had refused the Serbs’ demand 
for a territorial autonomy, the Serbian national congress of Sremski Karlovci 
proclaimed the autonomous Serbian Vojvodina within the Austrian Empire on 
13–15 May 1848, which would have included Bács-Bodrog county, the western 
part of the Banat, the Szerémség (Srem, Syrmia) and the south-eastern corner 
of Baranya. Aft er the fall of the war of independence, on 18 November 1849, 
emperor Franz Joseph I created the province called the “Serbian Vojvodina and 
Banat of Temesvár” out of the parts of Bács (Bač), Torontál (Torontal), Temes 
(Timiş), Krassó (Caraş) and Szerém (Srem) counties that had a civil administra-
tion, and which he re-annexed to Hungary on 27 December 1860. The province, 

2 The Serbs arrived in Hungary (mainly to the southern regions and along the Danube) in the largest 
numbers in 1690 following Leopold I’s invitation, who, in exchange for their military service received 
them as a political nation (natio rasciana) with autonomy (CZOERNIG, K. 1857, pp. 157–158.).



13

which had a short life but encompassed large territories (nonetheless it was 
Serbian mostly in its name), did not satisfy the requests of the Serbs, since 
their nation only constituted a mere 20.4% out of the total population of 1.5 
million, preceded by the Romanians (28%) and the Germans (24.5%) (Hegediš, 
A. and Čobanović, K. 1991). 

The disappointed Serbs at the national congress in Sremski Karlovci on 
2 April 1861 once again demanded the establishment of the Serbian Vojvodina, 
an autonomous province with Serbian as the only offi  cial language, however, 
this time the territories were adjusted in a way that they matched areas with 
an approximate Serbian majority (Szerémség/Srem, Western Banat and the 
southern half of Bácska/Bačka) (Đorđević, J. 1861) (Figure 4).

In the same year, on 6–7 June 1861, the Slovak national congress in 
Turócszentmárton (Martin) also demanded an ethnic based territorial self-gov-
ernment based on Hungary’s integrity for the Upper Hungarian Slovak District 
(Kemény, G.G. 1952). The claimed Slovakian autonomous territory would have 

Fig. 4. Claims of the largest national minorities of Hungary for ethnic based territorial 
autonomy (2nd half of the 19th century). – 1 = Croats, Bunjevci, Šokci; 2 = Hungarians; 
3 = Romanians; 4 = Serbs; 5 = Slovaks; 6 = other ethnic groups; 7 = border of autonomous 
Croatia–Slavonia; 8 = border of Vojvodina claimed by Serbs (March 24, 1861); 9 = border 
of Upper Hungarian Slovak District claimed by Slovaks (June 7, 1861); 10 = border of 

autonomous Transylvania claimed by Romanians (since 1867)



14

comprised the counties with Slovak majorities and the Slovakian majority 
areas of the neighbouring counties and its borders would have adjusted to 
the Slovakian ethnic territories.

The concept of territorial autonomy adjusted to their ethnic areas did 
not become known among Romanians at this time. Their political struggles 
primarily concentrated on the autonomy of Transylvania, that had by the mid-
dle of the 17th century been populated by a Romanian majority (59.5% in 1850) 
(Mester, M. 1936).

On 11 February 1867 the representatives of the diff erent ethnic mi-
norities promoted a bill that would have recognised six political nations 
within Hungary (Hungarian, Romanian, Serbian, Slovakian, Russian /Rusyn-
Ruthenian/, German) and that would have demanded – among several other 
requests – the adjustment of the borders of the counties and electorates to the 
ethnic areas (Kemény, G.G. 1952). This latt er proposal would have created 
a cluster of adjacent autonomous territories of the ethnic minorities on the 
peripheries of the country. 

Following the Austro–Hungarian Compromise of 1867, Act 44 of the 
Law of 1868 (On the subject of the equal rights of the nationalities), the fi rst 
law on national minorities of the world was, in fact, “a compromise between 
doctrinal liberalism, minority programmes aiming at domesticating the system 
of national autonomies and the supporters of a unitary Hungarian nation state” 
(Szász, Z. 1988). Similarly to the Hungarian government of 1848–49 and follow-
ing the French nation state concept, the law only recognised the existence of one 
and indivisible Hungarian (political) nation in Hungary, irrespective of the ethnic 
and linguistic affi  liation of its citizens (Katus, L. 1993, 2002). Consequently the 
Hungarian state, which had a territorial autonomy within the Austro–Hungarian 
Monarchy (except for the Croatian–Slavonian self-governance), emphatically re-
fused any ethnic based territorial autonomy requests initiated by its minorities, 
since these were viewed as a fi rst step of their separation and thus as one of the 
gravest dangers threatening the country’s territorial integrity.

The period between 1918 and 1945

Aft er the First World War, during the Romanian, Serbian and Czech occupa-
tion of Hungary and at the times of a military and economic chaos, the rep-
resentatives of the diff erent national minorities proclaimed their separation 
from Hungary one aft er the other. Mihály Károlyi’s government, who came 
into power as the result of the “Aster Revolution” (25–31 October 1918), made 
a historically belated att empt to federalise Hungary on an ethnic-territorial basis 
and to compromise with the national minorities in order to preserve its ter-
ritorial integrity (Szarka, L. 1990, 2008a). Aft er failures to compromise with 



15

the Romanian and Slovakian national councils, the main emphasis was laid 
on retaining the smaller ethnic groups of the Hungarian territories not yet 
occupied by the Czech, Romanian and Serbian troops constantly advancing 
in November 1918. On 21 December 1918, the territorial autonomy of the 
Rusyns (Ruthenians) (Act 10) was enacted (the autonomous region called 
“Ruska Krajna” on the Ruthenian majority territories of Ung, Bereg, Ugocsa 
and Máramaros counties). The Germans were granted a similar right (Act 6) 
to establish a territorial autonomy on 28 January 1919 (Kemény, G.G. 1952). 
The third nationality law of the Károlyi government on 11 March 1919 (Law 
30 on the self-government of Slovakia –Slovenská Krajina) was completely 
anachronistic, since by that time the territory referred to by the law was under 
Czech military occupation and was de facto a part of new-born Czechoslovakia 
recognised by the Entente powers. 

Aft er the fall of the Hungarian Soviet Republic (1 August 1919), follow-
ing an almost complete military occupation of the country, the Treaty of Versailles 
(Trianon) on 4 June 1920 confi rmed with the means of the international law the 
dissolution of the historical Hungarian state territory that had started to dissolve 
as early as at the end of 1918. This resulted in annexing 67.1% of the country’s al-
most 283 thousand square kilometres of territory and 33% of its ethnic Hungarian 
population to the neighbouring states (Lőkkös, J. 2000). As a result, the ethnic 
homogeneity of the population, that is the proportion of the ethnic Hungarians 
living within the borders of the Hungarian state increased (from 54.6% in 1910 
to 89.6% in 1920) and thus, because extended territories with non-Hungarian 
majorities were annexed to other countries, the question of the ethnic based ter-
ritorial autonomy practically ceased to exist for the Hungarian state.

With the Treaties near Paris (1919–1920), the decision-makers created 
(along with Hungary and Austria that were also shrunk into small states with 
a nearly homogeneous population) medium-sized, but multi-ethnic countries (e.g. 
Czechoslovakia, Romania, Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes [S.H.S.]) 
on the ruins of the large, multi-ethnic Austro–Hungarian Monarchy and the 
historical Hungarian state. The aggregate fi gure of the non-Germans and 
non-Hungarians was 57.1% in 1910 in the Monarchy that had 51.4 million in-
habitants, while the joint proportions of the non-ruling nations and minorities 
in the new (and enlarged) states around 1921 were as follows: non-Czechs in 
Czechoslovakia: 49.8%, non-Romanians in Romania: 28.1%, non-Serbs in the 
Kingdom of S.H.S.: 62.3% (Figure 5). 

The fact that about 20 million people with minority background were 
annexed to the states governed by the Czechs, Romanians and Serbs sheds 
light on the fact that the strategic, military and economic interests of the 
Entente and their allies surmounted the principle of people’s self-governance, 
the ethnic principle, when drawing the borders of the aforementioned states 
(Macartney, C.A. 1937).



16

When marking the new borders of the defeated Hungary, language bound-
aries (apart from the Croatian and Austrian neighbourhood) played no role 
whatsoever. The principle of ethnic self-governance was only important from the 
perspective of the decision-makers to the extent that they intended that as few 
non-Hungarians as possible should remain under Hungarian supremacy and 
that the vast majority of Slovaks, Romanians and South Slavs of the Carpathian 
Basin should become citizens of Czechoslovakia, Romania and the Kingdom 
of S.H.S. Beyond these principles it was the economic and military interests of the 
neighbouring states that determined the marking of the new Hungarian border-
line: the plain regions populated primarily by ethnic Hungarians which played 
a decisive role in supplying the Slovakian, Ruthenian, Romanian and Serbian 
highland population with food (mainly bread-grain); the annexation of railroads 
that were of vital importance in the winners’ communication among each other 
(avoiding Hungary); the creation of a state border that was aligned to natural ob-
jects (e.g. rivers, ridges) and was militarily defensible; marking the state border 
far away from the capital (e.g. Belgrade) (Edvi, I.A. and Halász, A. 1920). The 
“Hungarian issue” in the Carpathian Basin that played an important role aft er 

Fig. 5. Ethnic structure of the population of the successor states of the Austro–Hungarian 
Monarchy (1921). – 1 = state border (1914); 2 = state border (1924); 3 = Bosniaks; 4 = Croats, 
Bunjevci, Šokci; 5 = Czechs; 6 = Germans; 7 = Hungarians; 8 = Poles; 9 = Romanians; 
10 = Rusyns, Ukrainians; 11 = Serbs; 12 = Slovaks; 13 = Slovenes; 14 = other ethnic groups



17

1920 from the perspective of our current topic was born as a result of asserting 
these criteria in the course of the dictated peace in Trianon (the annexation of 3.3 
million ethnic Hungarians and their homeland, among others the Székely Land 
and an almost homogeneous Hungarian ethnic territory in the width of 10–60 
kilometres from Bratislava [Pozsony] to Subotica [Szabadka] among others).

The successor states, that united in the alliance called “Litt le Entente” in 
1920–21 against the Hungarian revisionism, declared themselves to be unitary 
and indivisible nation states in their fi rst constitutions and because of the fear of 
a disintegration of their multi-ethnic countries they denied the minorities’ collec-
tive rights of any kind (primarily the ones related to an ethnic based territorial 
autonomy). As a result of their centralising, ethnically homogenising and assimi-
lating policy, they started to rearrange the administrative territorial structure 
(province, county and district borders) inherited from the (mostly Hungarian) 
past in a way that the “unreliable” (mostly Hungarian) minorities should be-
come (also numerical) minorities in the new administrative units everywhere (or 
at least wherever possible). Such ethnically manipulative administrative reform 
(that disjointed the Hungarian ethnic areas administratively) was enacted in 
Czechoslovakia in 1923 and 1927, in the Kingdom of S.H.S in 1923 and 1929, in 
Romania 1925 and later in 1938 (Kocsis, K. 1993, 2002; Molnár, J. 1992).

The leaders of Hungary and those of the Hungarian minorities of the 
successor states were hoping to solve the problem of the annexed Hungarian 
ethnic territories of the border regions primarily with a territorial revision (re-
annexation to Hungary), the change of the state borders, and, in the period 
between the two world wars there were even plans by Hungarians for an ethnic 
based (Hungarian) territorial autonomy (Rónai, A. 1937; Szvatkó, P. 1937; Bárdi, 
N. 2004; Molnár, M. 2009).

The wide-scope territorial autonomy promised to the “fellow-nations” 
in the centralised Czechoslovak and South Slav states was not realised be-
tween 1918 and 1938, in spite of the fi erce political struggles of especially the 
Slovaks and the Croats. Although the Rusyns were not considered to be a fel-
low-nation by the Czechs, the new Czechoslovakia needed their territories from 
a strategic point of view, therefore, in the Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye 
(10 September 1919), it even promised a wide-scope territorial autonomy to 
Subcarpathia (Podkarpatska Rus, today Transcarpathia in Ukraine) (Pop, I. 2005). 
Czechoslovakia postponed the establishment of the Slovakian and Rusyn territo-
rial autonomies (for two decades) until the last minute, until the October of 1938, 
aft er losing the German majority Sudetenland in the Munich Agreement on 
29 September 1938, and later losing the Polish majority Zaolzie area in Czech 
Silesia on 2 October 1938.3 

3 The autonomy of  Slovakia was proclaimed in Žilina on 6 Oct. 1938, and the Prague government consented 
to appointing the government of  the autonomous Subcarpathia on 11 Oct. 1938 (FEDINEC, CS. 2002). 



18

Aft er the att ainment of the Slovakian and Rusyn territorial autonomy, 
the annexation of the German- and Polish-majority territories to Germany and 
Poland – the unsuccessful Hungarian–Czechoslovak negotiations in Komárno 
(Komárom) – the First Vienna Award took place on 2 November 1938, where 
Czechoslovakia returned to Hungary a 11,927 square kilometres large terri-
tory inhabited predominantly by Hungarians (84.4%) that it had occupied in 
1919. The Slovaks and the Rusyns, who were disappointed by the Czech in 
the course of their two-decade-long confl ict over the question of autonomy, 
were not contented with a territorial autonomy any longer. In line with the 
aggressive foreign policy of Hitler’s Germany that unleashed the world war 
with Germany’s support, the independence of the Slovak Republic and Carpatho-
Ukraine was proclaimed on 14 March 1939, which resulted in the dissolution of 
the Czecho-Slovak state, and, on the following day, the occupation of the re-
maining Czech parts of the country by the Nazi Germany (Fedinec, Cs. 2002). 
In the subsequent two weeks the 12,146 square kilometres large Carpatho-
Ukrainian and eastern Slovakian territories (that were occupied by the Czechs 
in 1919) were reoccupied by the Hungarian Army and a Hungarian–Polish 
joint border was created (Thirring, L. 1939).

The Croats lost their wide-scope territorial autonomy (Croatia–Slavonia) 
that they possessed in the Hungarian half of the Austro–Hungarian Monarchy 
(Transleithania, Hungarian Empire) in the Serbian ruled S.H.S. Kingdom which 
was founded on 1 December 1918. Consequently, they fought fi ercely against 
the Serbian supremacy between the two world wars in order to regain their 
lost territorial autonomy and coequality (Csuka, J. 1995). Aft er the annexation 
(“Anschluß”) of the neighbouring Austria by the Germans (12 March 1938), 
the dissolution of Czechoslovakia (14 March 1939) and the seizure of Albania 
by Italy (7 April 1939), on the eve of the second world war, in the last minute, 
the increasingly isolated regime in Belgrade managed to come to terms with 
the Croats (Cvetković-Maček Agreement, 24 August 1939) and granted them 
the autonomous Banate of Croatia (Banovina Hrvatska, 65,456 square kilome-
tres, 4 million inhabitants) including also Dalmatia and West Herzegovina, 
which comprised 88% of the Croats of Yugoslavia. The Croats, who, aft er 
two decades of desperate political struggle, were bitt erly disappointed with 
the coexistence with the Serbs, were no longer contented with the territorial 
autonomy, which they considered to be the fi rst milestone on their way to a 
total independence.

In the course of the second world war, aft er the occupation of France 
by the Germans and the seizure of Bessarabia by the Soviets (28 June 1940) a 
casus belli was created over the issue of Transylvania between the strategically 
weakened Romania and Hungary that regained some of its strength as a re-
sult of the territorial revisions. Aft er the failure of the negotiations at Turnu 
Severin (16–24 August 1940), in order to avoid a war between Hungary and 



19

Romania, the Nazi Germany and Italy volunteered to arbitrate, which was 
accepted by both the Romanian and the Hungarian parties (Rónai, A. 1989). 
The Second Vienna Award compelled Romania to return a territory of 43,104 
square kilometres (“Northern Transylvania”) to Hungary from among the 
territories occupied in 1918–19 (Thirring, G. 1940). As a result of the division 
of Transylvania, Hungary gained 2.6 million inhabitants (with almost 1.3 mil-
lion non-Hungarians), while Romania kept a Transylvanian population of 3.3 
million (with 1.1 million non-Romanians) (Varga, E.Á. 1992).

On 27 March 1941, aft er the coup d'état overthrowing the pro-German 
Cvetković Government that had joined the Tripartite Pact, Hitler ordered the 
occupation of Yugoslavia with the involvement of its neighbours. On 6 April 1941 
German and Italian troops started a relatively fast invasion of the politically 
extremely unstable country, which was offi  cially terminated by the capitulation 
of the Yugoslav Army led by Serbs on 17 April. In the meantime, on 10 April, 
Ante Pavelić, the supreme leader (poglavnik) of the Croatian Ustasha move-
ment, proclaimed in Zagreb the Independent State of Croatia (NDH),4 which 
meant that Yugoslavia became dissolved. On the day when the Germans oc-
cupied the Srem, Banat and Serbia (11 April), the Hungarian troops entered 
Baranya and Bačka, regions with a relative Hungarian majority, which had 
been occupied by Serbian troops in 1918 and which now practically became 
a no man’s land. 

The Axis Powers divided the territory of the occupied Yugoslavia on 
24 April 1941 at the Vienna conference. Hungary was allowed to keep the re-
annexed Bácska (Bačka) and Baranya, and was additionally given the Slovenian 
majority Prekmurje, that it lost in 1919, and the almost entirely ethnic Croatian 
Muraköz (Međimurje). This resulted in Hungary’s regaining 11,475 square 
kilometres with a population of one million (39% Hungarian) from the former 
Yugoslavia (Schneider, Á. 1941; Fogarasi, Z. 1944).

As a result of the territorial revisions between 1938 and 1941, the 
Kingdom of Hungary succeeded in regaining 41.5% of its lost territories and 
this meant that its territory grew to 171,753 square kilometres and its popu-
lation rose to 14.7 million. Together with the increase of the territory, 95.2% 
of the Carpathian Basin’s 12 million Hungarians became residents within 
the Hungarian state, however, in exchange, the proportion of the minorities 
increased from 7.9% to 22.5% (equalling approximately 3.3 million inhabit-
ants) between the censuses of 1931 and 1941 in Hungary (Fogarasi, Z. 1944) 
(Figure 6). 

4 The territory of  the Independent State of  Croatia encompassed 102,725 square kilometres (and primarily 
included the historical Croatia-Slavonia, Bosnia-Herzegovina and parts of  Dalmatia unoccupied by 
the Italians). Out of  the total population of  5.6 million 52.5% were Roman Catholics (predominantly 
Croats), 32% Orthodox (Serbs) and 13% Muslims (Bosniaks) (KLEMENČIĆ, M. 1992).



20

It was only the Rusyn minority who considered (due to historical 
and geographical reasons) to establish an ethnic based territorial autonomy 
(Voivodeship of Subcarpathia) within the Hungarian state. This was proposed 
by Prime Minister Pál Teleki as a legislative bill, however, he was later forced 
to withdraw it on 5 August 1940 because of internal political and military in-
terests (Fedinec, Cs. 2001). On the territory of the Government of Subcarpathia, 
administrative units independent of the Hungarian counties were created 
instead of an absolute autonomy, where Rusyn (“Hungaro-Russian”) was 
declared the second offi  cial language aft er Hungarian (Botlik, J. 2005).

The period between 1945 and 1989

At the end of the Second World War, aft er the changes of state power, the 
territorial revisions between 1938 and 1941 were annulled. This was fi nalised 
from the Hungarian aspect on 10 February 1947 in the Paris Peace Treaty. Dur-
ing the war, the Czech-ruled Czechoslovakia was revived and Yugoslavia was 

Fig. 6. Ethnic structure of Hungary and her neighbours (1941). – 1 = Bosniaks; 2 = Croats, 
Bunjevci, Šokci; 3 = Germans; 4 = Hungarians; 5 = Jews; 6 = Romanians; 7 = Rusyns; 

8 = Serbs; 9 = Slovaks; 10 = Slovenes; 11 = other ethnic groups



21

turned into a federal state in 1945 at the cost of ceasing the independence of 
Slovakia and Croatia. The Ukrainian (Rusyn)-majority Transcarpathia (for-
merly called Subcarpathia) was annexed to the Soviet Union as ruled in the 
Czechoslovak–Soviet agreement of 29 June 1945. The Hungarian–Romanian 
state border drawn in 1920 was resorted, and later the Romanian administra-
tion was restored in Northern Transylvania, which had become the subject of 
Soviet political blackmail and which had been under Soviet rule between 12–14 
November 1944 and 9–13 March 1945 (Vincze, G. 1994).

As a consequence of the changes of power, large-scale forced migra-
tions took place. The German and Hungarian population in Czechoslovakia, 
Yugoslavia and Romania, decimated by evacuation, fl ight and blood-revenge 
were considered to be war culprits, the servants of the occupants and were 
looked upon as collectively guilty and thus their total or partial elimination 
(expulsion, deportation) began immediately, especially from the strategically 
important border areas (Kocsis, K. 1992, 1999).5 Taking advantage of the ”fa-
vourable” historical moment, to replace the Germans and the Hungarians, 
an organised colonisation of the members of the given country’s titular nation 
– mainly embedded into the framework of agricultural reforms – began imme-
diately, which resulted in a fundamental change in the ethnic structure of the 
(mainly borderland and urban) population, served national-social purposes 
and aimed at making any prospective Hungarian claims for territorial revision 
impossible (Kocsis, K. 1999). 

As a result of the general anti-minority atmosphere as well as the en-
deavours of the “mother-countries” to reach an ethnic concentration and ho-
mogeneity, there was a boost in the migration of minorities into their nation 
states, which caused a signifi cant increase in the proportion of the titular na-
tion in each country and, at the same time, a considerable ethnic “dilution”, a 
mass mixture of the autochthonous and allochthonous (new-comer) population and 
hence an increase of the interethnic tension. In spite of the forced migrations, 
a Hungarian minority of about 3 million still remained on the territories of the 
countries neighbouring Hungary, half of whom lived in the borderland, and the 
sett lement area of whom became ethnically more mixed, but theoretically still 
allowed for a potential realisation of an ethnic based territorial autonomy.

5 After 1944 about one million Germans “disappeared” (fl ed, were evacuated, deported 
or killed) from the Carpathian Basin: e.g. 336 thousand from Vojvodina and Croatia, 
274 thousand from Transylvania (in broader sense), 255 thousand from Hungary and 
120 thousand from Slovakia (KOCSIS, K. 1992; CZIBULKA, Z. et al. 2004). The number of  
Hungarians who fl ed, moved or were deported to the present territory of  Hungary between 
1944 and 1950 from the neighbouring countries is an estimated 230–300 thousand (STARK 
T. 1989; KOCSIS, K. 1992).



22

In the countries of the Carpathian Basin (except for Austria) under 
the infl uence (mostly military control) of the Soviet Union, Soviet-type com-
munist regimes were forcefully created between 1945 and 1948, which made it 
impossible in the following decades to realise any ethnic based territorial au-
tonomy. Independently from this, it should also be mentioned that Yugoslavia, 
reborn as a “federal people’s republic” in 1945, ruled by Josip Broz Tito – as 
opposed to the centralised, Serbian-ruled Yugoslavia between the two world 
wars – guaranteed radically diff erent life conditions to all non-Serbian eth-
nic groups of the state by practicing territorial decentralisation, maintaining 
an autonomy of Yugoslav republics, recognising and granting in principle 
the identity and equality of each South Slav nation (Croats, Macedonians, 
Montenegrins, Muslimans/Bosniaks, Serbs, Slovenes). 

On 29 November 1945, at the time of the creation of the communist 
Yugoslavia, Vojvodina was granted the autonomous province status, which 
was promised as early as the national liberation war (in 1943). “Vojvodina” 
(called South Hungary or Délvidék/Southern Region until 1918) was granted 
a regional autonomy because of the historical past and ethnic diversity of this 
Central European territory and the strong regional identity of local Serbs. 
This, of course, did not mean that the minorities of Vojvodina (especially the 
429 thousand Hungarians living there) could realise an ethnic based self-
governance, since owing to the forced migrations, aft er 1945, the majority of 
Vojvodina’s population was ethnic Serbian (1948: 50.6%, 2011: 66.8%). The 
regional autonomy itself could also be completely realised (almost up to the 
level of the self-governance of the Yugoslav member republics) aft er the new 
constitution of 21 February 1974 (Strugar, V. 1976).

In the Carpathian Basin an ethnic based territorial autonomy in the 
20th century was realised only for a short period (between 1952 and 1960/68) in 
the middle of Romania. What the Soviet Union (that is Stalin, to be more pre-
cise) did not realise on the annexed Transcarpathia and what it did not expect 
Czechoslovakia to do, it requested (the non-Slavic and his 1941 and 1944 war 
opponent) Romania to do: the realisation of the Hungarian territorial autonomy 
(Bottoni, S. 2008). The new Romanian constitution enacted on 24 September 
1952 called into existence (acting upon Soviet order) the Hungarian Autonomous 
Region (MAT), an administrative unit comprising 13,550 square kilometres, 
with a seat in Târgu Mureş (Marosvásárhely), consisting of 10 rayons and 731 
thousand (77% Hungarian) population. The territory of the region basically 
encompassed the historical Székely Land. The MAT included 565 thousand 
Hungarians, however, 63.7% of the Transylvanian Hungarian population (al-
most a million people) remained outside the borders of the MAT, whose minor-
ity right (exactly because of the existence of the MAT) were violated to greater 
and greater extents, and whose Hungarian language usage was repressed. 
The Romanian communist nation state increased the political pressure and 



23

Fig. 7. Ethnic map of the Mureş-Hungarian Autonomous Region and its neighbourhood 
(Romania, 1966).

restricted the power of the MAT due to a decrease in the Soviet pressure fol-
lowing Stalin’s death (1953), the Transylvanian Hungarian sympathy with 
the defeated Hungarian revolution and war of independence of 1956 and the 
Hungarian national solidarity reaching over the borders. On 24 December 1960, 
in the course of reorganising (and renaming) this administrative unit (Mureş-
Hungarian Autonomous Region/MMAT), the southern rayons (Sfântu Gheorghe/
Sepsiszentgyörgy, Târgu Secuiesc/Kézdivásárhely with Hungarian majority 
population) were adjoined to the Braşov Region (absolutely dominated by 
Romanians) on alleged economic grounds, and, at the same time, rayons with 
a Romanian majority (Luduş/Marosludas and Târnăveni/Dicsőszentmárton) 
were annexed to the MMAT (Elekes, T. 2011) (Figure 7). 

This reorganisation did not only mean that the Romanian nation state 
altered the territory and ethnic composition6 of the area in a way that was 
extremely disadvantageous for the Hungarians, but it also accelerated the 

6 The proportion of  Hungarians in the region, the territory of  which changed because of  the 
reorganisation at the end of  1960, decreased between the 1956 and the 1966 censuses from 77.3% to 
60.2% (while the proportion of  the Romanians rose from 20.1% to 36.8%).



24

process of diminishing the institutional background of the Hungarian ter-
ritorial autonomy, that had thus far had the eff ect of a “cultural greenhouse” 
(Bottoni, S. 2008). The autonomous region (considered by many to be a mere 
ethno-political showroom, a Hungarian ghett o anyway), which was turned 
into a formal entity as one stage of the less and less concealed Romanian nation 
building policy aimed at an ethnic homogenisation, was terminated with the 
enactment of the law restoring the county system on 19 December 1968.

The federalist restructuring of Yugoslavia in reality, the shrinkage of the pos-
sibilities of defending Serbian interests directly, the decrease in the former Serbian 
dominance – especially aft er Tito’s death (1980) – immensely increased the dissatis-
faction of the Serbs, who were accustomed to their privileged situation. They were 
especially indignant about the fact that from among the territories that had unique 
ethnic or historical backgrounds, only the provinces of Kosovo and Vojvodina in 
Serbia were granted autonomy, whereas the Serbian-majority territories in Croatia 
(e.g. Krajina) were not. This was conceived as a great exasperation for the Serbs, 
considering themselves to winners of the war, but losers of the peace. As a result, 
there were fi ercer and fi ercer Serbian att acks on the constitution of 1974 from the 
middle of the 1980s. Aft er artifi cially rousing the feeling of being threatened, under 
the leadership of Slobodan Milošević, an “All-Serbian” movement was started, as a 
result of which in the course of the so called “anti-bureaucratic revolution” serving 
the Serbian concentration of power, in 1988–89 the autonomy of Vojvodina and Kosovo 
was restricted to exist merely on paper (in fact it was terminated).

The period aft er 1989

In the former socialist countries of Europe, a political, economic and social tran-
sition (change of regimes, changing of the regime) began in 1989, in the course of 
which the demolition of the communist regime was started, and the foundations 
of the western-type parliamentary democracies and the market economy were 
laid. The most important milestones of this process were the free, multiparty 
parliamentary elections of 1990, which brought about the success of the parties 
with strong national (oft en nationalist) rhetoric (Weilguni, W. et al. 1991). 

The events taking place in the countries of the former Soviet bloc, 
pointing in the direction of a change of regime and also fortifying each other 
(e.g. revolutions, multiparty elections, starting to change the political-economic 
system, endeavours of federal member-states to become independent) had a 
great impact on the political behaviour of the Yugoslav nations and nationali-
ties. The formerly communist circles suddenly changed their internationalist 
guises into national ones and started a politics aimed at “saving the nations”. 
The new Croatian constitution of 1990 recognised the Croats as the only titular 
nation and treated the former fellow nation, the Serbs, as a national minority 



25

and did not allow them (either) to establish an ethnic based territorial au-
tonomy (Silber, L. and Little, A. 1995). 

The outraged Croatian Serbs, manipulated by Serbia, aft er their refer-
endum on the issue of autonomy on 30 September 1990, proclaimed the Serbian 
Autonomous Oblast of Krajina (SAO Krajina) with its seat in Knin, within the terri-
tory of Croatia, belonging in those days to Yugoslavia. Along with the escalation 
of the Serbo-Croatian confl ict into a war, the Serbs proclaimed their independ-
ence from Croatia and joined Serbia on 2 April 1991, and later on 19 December 
they proclaimed the independent Republic of Serbian Krajina (RSK) (Dakić, M. 
1994). The internationally unrecognised Serbian state formation encompassed 
more than a quarter (approximately 15,000 square kilometres) of the territory of 
Croatia including not only Krajina in a narrower sense (North Dalmatia, Lika, 
Kordun, Banovina/Banij a having a Serbian majority population until then), but 
also certain western parts of Slavonia and areas along the Danube in Croatia 
(Baranya, West Srij em/Srem) (Baletić, Z. et al. 1994) (Figure 8).7 

As late as at the end of 1992, Croatia off ered the Krajina Serbs the status 
of territorial autonomy (expanding to the districts/kotars of Glina and Knin), 
however, since by then the Serbs had this territory in their possession, they 
7 The territory under Serbian control had 549,083 inhabitants (52.4% Serb, 37.1% Croatian) in 1991. According 

to the Serbian authorities of  Krajina there were only 433,595 inhabitants (91% Serb, 7% Croatian) in the 
June of  1993 (Republika Srpska Krajina [specijalni prilog], Vojska [Beograd], Br.11. mart, 1994).

Fig. 8. Ethnic map of Pannonian areas of Croatia and the front lines (1991). – 1–5 = parts of 
the „Republic of Serbian Krajina”



26

did not fi nd this status satisfactory. The Croatian-Serbian frontline remained 
basically fi xed until the beginning of May 1995, when the Croatian army fi rst 
reoccupied the Okučani area in West Slavonia, then between 4 and 8 August 
the areas of North Dalmatia, Lika, Kordun and Banovina (Banij a), from where 
more than 200,000 Serbs fl ed to Serbia, a small proportion of whom sett led 
down in Baranya, East Slavonia and in West Srij em (that remained under 
UNO-Serbian control until 1998).8 This put an end to the existence of the RSK 
and the ethnic area of the Croatian Serbs became completely decomposed 
because of the forced mass emigrations and thus their hope for a prospective 
ethnic based territorial autonomy diminished.

The Milošević regime in Serbia att empted to compensate the fact that 
it reduced the federal autonomies to have mere nominal statuses by “decon-
centrating” the state power in a way that in 1991 districts (okrug) governed 
by leaders appointed by the prime minister were created (Jordan, P. 2010). 
There were seven “okrugs” (districts directed from Belgrade) established in 
Vojvodina in a way that the Hungarian ethnic territory near the Tisza was 
subdivided into three parts (annexed to the districts of Novi Sad, Subotica 
and Kikinda). Incidentally, the same method was applied also with the eth-
nic area of the Muslims and Bosniaks in the Sanjak region. Aft er the loss of 
Kosovo and the fall of Milošević, the Serbian governments gradually started 
to restore Vojvodina’s autonomy that had been lost aft er 1988. The constitu-
tion of Vojvodina that has six offi  cial languages was enacted on 1 January 2010 
and has been eff ective up to this day. Restoring the autonomy of the province 
that had a 2/3 Serbian majority following the 1995 mass Serbian infl ux also 
served though the interests of the Vojvodina Hungarians, who (the Democratic 
Fellowship of Vojvodina Hungarians, VMDK), nevertheless, had created a 
three-level self-governance model9 that includes the ethnic based territorial 
autonomy in 1992 (Gerencsér, B. and Juhász, A. 2001; Surányi, Z. 2001). 

The Hungarian parties forming an electoral coalition continue to have 
as their aim to create – along with the personal self-government – a regional 
self-governance for the eight Hungarian-majority municipalities (opština) near 
the Tisza (Hungarian Autonomous District) (Surányi, Z. 2001; Gábrity Molnár, 
I. 2009). This prospective autonomous district, that would comprise almost 
60% of the Vojvodina Hungarians, would have 327 thousand inhabitants, out 

8 Due to migration and assimilation, the proportion of  the Serbian population in Croatia dropped from 
581,663 (12.2%) in 1991 to 186,633 (4.4%) in 2011.

9 According to the „Memorandum on the self-government of  Hungarians living in the Republic of  
Serbia” worded at the congress of  the VMDK in Kanjiža (Magyarkanizsa) (25 April 1992): 1. Personal 
self-government (with the Hungarian National Council as its executive body), 2. Territorial self-
governance (partnership of  the Hungarian-majority municipalities/opština: Hungarian Autonomous 
District), 3. Local self-government (self-government for the representation of  Hungarian-majority 
settlements outside the ethnic bloc).



27

of which 53% would be Hungarians, 24.4% Serbs, 5.5% Bunjevci and Croats 
and 8% of unknown ethnicity (2002). The territorial autonomy has not yet been 
established, but a wide-scope cultural (personal) autonomy was created by the 
Vojvodina Hungarians mainly owing to the work of the Alliance of Vojvodina 
Hungarians (VMSZ) (Gábrity Molnár, I. 2009; Korhecz, T. 2009, 2010).

Aft er the fall of communism the populous Hungarian minority com-
munities established their independent (cultural and political) organisations 
not only in multi-ethnic Yugoslavia, but also on the territories of states consid-
ering themselves to be unitary nation-states, such as the present-day Ukraine, 
Slovakia and Romania. These organisations articulated their various self-gov-
ernance and autonomy concepts almost immediately (Ríz, Á. 2000).

Transcarpathia was still a part of the Soviet Union, when in 1989 the 
Hungarian Cultural Federation in Transcarpathia (KMKSZ) expressed its commit-
ment to creating a Hungarian autonomous district with its seat in Berehovo 
(Beregszász) (Botlik, J. and Dupka, Gy. 1993). At the same time, the autochthonous 
Slavic population of the region, the Rusyns10 (to be more precise, the Society of 
Carpathian Rusyns), whose independent national existence was eliminated under 
the Soviet supremacy, started their seemingly hopeless struggle for the restora-
tion of the autonomy that Transcarpathia (Carpatho-Ukraine) had enjoyed in 
1938–39, and this evoked extremely heated debates even locally. At the referen-
dum held on 1 December 1991 primarily on the issue of Ukraine’s independence, 
the vast majority of the local population in Transcarpathia supported the special 
self-governance status of the region (78%), and, moreover, the foundation of the 
Hungarian Autonomous District in the Rayon of Berehovo (Beregszász) (81.4%). All 
this, however, had no political consequence, since Kiev (pressurized by nationalist 
forces) sternly rejected both endeavours (Osztapec, J. 2010). 

The unity of the young Ukrainian nation state was declared by its 
constitution enacted on 28 June 1996, which was forced to acknowledge the 
existence of only the Autonomous Republic of Crimea (Krym) due to Russian 
pressure. Because of Ukraine’s rejection of the ethnic based territorial au-
tonomy, starting from 2000 KMKSZ has initiated the formation of a Rayon of 
Tisza-region (Tisza-melléki járás) with its seat in Berehovo (Beregszász), where 
the Hungarians would constitute the majority of the population (72%) in a way 
that it would also include three quarters of the Transcarpathian Hungarians. 
Only a prospective future Ukrainian administrative reform would potentially 
allow for the changing of the district borders that had been marked in the 
Soviet period and that have been unaltered in the past half a century, and even 
then on the condition that the ethnic perspectives are observed from a point 
of view that is favourable for Hungarians.

10 At the 2001 census only 0.8% of  the Transcarpathian population (10,090 people) declared Rusyn 
ethnicity (in 1941 58.9%, 502 thousand Rusyn mother tongue).



28

The Hungarian parties in Slovakia proposed several autonomy concepts and 
draft s in the 1990s; the earliest (in 1991) and most articulated claim for a territorial 
autonomy was expressed by the Coexistence-Együtt élés Political Movement. These 
endeavours reached their summit and were devoted a wide scope national public-
ity at the Congress of Komárno (Komárom) of the Hungarian members of Slovakian 
parliament and of the Hungarian mayors of Slovakia (8 January 1994) (Az ön-
kormányzat… 1994; Gerencsér, B. and Juhász, A. 2001; Molnár, M. 2009). The ter-
ritorial autonomy draft  presented and approved depicted two scenarios (one con-
tiguous or three Hungarian-majority regions). Had the fi rst scenario been realised, it 
would have resulted in creating a region of 8,245.3 square kilometres, adjacent to the 
Hungarian–Slovakian borders, with approximately 824 thousand (61.5% Hungarian) 
inhabitants (Oriskó, N. 1993; Duray, M. et al. 1994; Kocsis, K. 2002). 

The second scenario, as presented above, would have resulted in three 
Hungarian-majority regions: 1. In the west between Bratislava (Pozsony) and Šahy 
(Ipolyság) (525 thousand people, 63.1% Hungarian), 2. In the middle, between 
Šahy (Ipolyság) and Košice (Kassa) (239 thousand people, 54.2% Hungarian), 
3. In the east (59 thousand people, 77.3% Hungarian). Both the Slovak politics and 
wide masses of the Slovak society reacted with plain rejection, sometimes even 
almost hysterically to the Hungarian plans concerning an ethnic based territorial 
autonomy and administrative reform (Bakker, E. 1997; Fazekas, M. 2009). 

Among the Slovaks (partly similarly to the Rusyns and Ukrainians), who 
had been fi ghting for their autonomy and independence under the Hungarian and 
the Czech supremacy for more than a century, the word “autonomy” meaning 
the endeavour to achieve an internal territorial self-governance, equals with the 
fi rst milestone on the way to independence, an overt civic disloyalty and seces-
sionism. Therefore, it did not come as a surprise that the Slovak Parliament in its 
Act 221/1996 “On Territorial and Administrative Division“ enacted such – still 
eff ective – administrative order which represents the exact opposite of the concep-
tions of the Hungarian parties. The new region (kraj) and district (okres) borders 
completely partitioned the Hungarian ethnic area in South Slovakia in a way that 
Hungarians were in minority in almost all medium- and higher-level administra-
tive units so that the Hungarians’ endeavours to achieve territorial self-governance 
would be prevented (Kocsis, K. 2002; Hamberger, J. 2008; Szarka, L. 2008b). 

The Party of the Hungarian Coalition (MKP), that became a government par-
ty in 1998, gave up the idea of the ethnic based territorial autonomy under these 
new circumstances as a result of political negotiations, although initially it strove 
to reconsider the law of public administration referred to above. As opposed to the 
Coexistence-Együtt élés draft  mentioned above, they made vast allowances pro-
posing the creation of a western region called “Podunajsko/Dunamente (or Komárno/
Komárom)” with 602 thousand inhabitants comprising a 55.2% Hungarian major-
ity between Šamorín (Somorja) and Šahy (Ipolyság). The plan of this Hungarian 
majority region was considered “professionally unfounded” and “endangering 



29

the territorial integrity of the Slovak nation state”, thus it was sternly rejected by 
the Slovak government (as well as by the nationalist parties of the opposition). 
Since then the apparently hopeless issue of the Hungarian territorial autonomy 
has receded in the Hungarian parties’ politics, and the initiative was taken over 
by civil motions (Comorra Aula).

The largest Hungarian community beyond the borders of Hungary, 
with more than 1.6 million Transylvanian Hungarians at the time, founded a 
unifi ed organisation for protecting their interests, called the Democratic Union 
of Hungarians in Romania (RMDSZ) at the end of the Romanian revolution, on 
25 December 1989. By 1992 within this multi-faceted movement, a political 
stream articulately requesting Romania to grant minority rights, overtly de-
manding autonomy and relying on favourable eff ects of exercising pressure 
from abroad came into prominence, which was also refl ected in requesting a 
fellow nation status for the Hungarians in Romania, as well as requesting au-
tonomy and a minority law (Bárdi, N. 2008). This was when the fi rst three-step 
autonomy models were draft ed, which included the demand for a territorial 
autonomy (the “Region of the Hungarian National Community” based on the 
free partnership of the local Hungarian-majority self-governments) (Csapó, 
I.J. 2003; Gerencsér, B. and Juhász, A. 2001; Bognár, Z.). 

By 1996, there were two wings within the RMDSZ, that in the mean-
time became a governing party: the “moderate” wing considered the process 
of arriving at an autonomy to be a longer one, as opposed to the “more radi-
cal” (“autonomist”) wing. By 2003, the inner confl icts between the two wings 
led to the foundation of the civil organisation Hungarian National Council of 
Transylvania (EMNT), and with a similar goal, but primarily with the Székely 
Land in focus, the „Székely National Council (SZNT) by the prominent fi gures 
of the “more radical” wing.11 The statute of the autonomy of the Székely Land 
elaborated on in 2003 by the SZNT was emphatically rejected by the Romanian 
Chamber of Deputies and the Senate. The modifi ed bill on the autonomy of 
the Székely Land was introduced in 2005, by the RMDSZ, as a member of the 
government, but it was rejected by the Romanian Chamber of Deputies aft er 
a few months, and by the Senate on 25 September 2012. The bill proposed the 
„Székely Land Autonomous Region” to be a region encompassing 9,980 square 
kilometres, with a total population of 809 thousand of which 76% Hungarians. 
The planned autonomous region would primarily have included the today’s 
counties of Harghita (Hargita) and Covasna (Kovászna) and the south-eastern 
part of Mureş (Maros) county. 
11 The MNT, fi ghting for the territorial autonomy overtly and striving to reach results 

quickly was founded on 25 April 2003 in Odorheiu Secuiesc (Székelyudvarhely), while the 
SZNT was founded on 16 October 2003 in Sfântu Gheorghe (Sepsiszentgyörgy). Former 
members of the RMDSZ founded the Hungarian Civic Party in 2008 and the Hungarian 
People's Party of Transylvania in 2011.



30

It is a litt le-known fact in connection with the autonomy struggles of the 
Transylvanian Hungarians that the EMNT supported the elaboration of a plan of 
a Hungarian autonomous region in Northwest Romania (Partium region) (Szilágyi, F. 
and Csomortányi, I. 2010). There have been several plans prepared for the region 
inhabited by a Hungarian–Romanian mixed population adjacent to the Hungarian 
border that has been considered by Romanians as a potential irredentist danger. 
The plan encompassing the largest territory would accommodate 349 thousand 
people (191 thousand, 54.5% Hungarian and 130 thousand, 37.1% Romanian) 
and would also include the city Satu Mare (Szatmárnémeti) and towns Carei 
(Nagykároly), Şimleu Silvaniei (Szilágysomlyó) and Marghita (Margitt a). This 
plan has not become known by the Romanian public. For the time being, the 
Hungarians in Northwest Romania are gett ing accustomed to the idea that they 
might achieve a territorial autonomy on their homeland. 

As a consequence of the series of failures regarding plans on territorial 
autonomy, the RMDSZ proposed the creation of a region uniting the counties 
Mureş (Maros), Harghita (Hargita) and Covasna (Kovászna) by restructuring 
the development regions planned in 1998 before the 2007 EU elections (Csutak, 
I. 2007; Szilágyi, F. 2010). This proposal for restructuring the administration of 
Romania was kept up until the negotiations with the president’s committ ee of pro-
fessional experts in 2010 (15 regions, one of them with a Hungarian majority).

Based on the failures of the autonomy struggles of the Hungarian mi-
norities in Romania, Slovakia and Ukraine, it can be argued that both the titular 
nations and the Hungarian parties should change their approach. The Romanian, 
Slovakian and Ukrainian decision-makers should see the reasons  and understand 
that a territorial autonomy is not an att ack on sovereignty and does not necessarily 
lead to a separation, but, on the contrary, if it operates successfully, it can be a form 
of integration and an eff ective means of overcoming confl icts. Simultaneously 
Hungarian minority politicians, who are at the moment seriously divided, should 
realise that autonomy is not a magic potion and it cannot be reached by unilateral 
declarations, but there should be (among others) a unity of action towards the 
titular nations, and at the same time, an atmosphere of trust has to be created, and 
all this takes a long time, patience and political wisdom (Salat L. 2004).

The current geographical possibilities of ethnic based territorial 
autonomies in the Carpathian Basin

Beyond the necessary political conditions, historical traditions and lucky circum-
stances12, some ethnic and geographical-demographical conditions, as proposed 
above, need to be met (the minority should outnumber the titular state majority; 

12 See Ghai, Y. 2002.



31

the sett lement area should be relatively contiguous and large enough as well as 
economically sustainable) in order to reach ethnic based territorial autonomies 
(or at least regional associations of local self-governments with the minority 
in majority). These latt er conditions are only met in the ethnic territories of the 
Hungarians in Slovakia, Transcarpathia, Transylvania and Vojvodina mentioned in 
the previous chapter (Figure 9). Although a century ago there used to be several 
hundred thousand German and Serbian minority inhabitants in the Carpathian 
Basin, due to the forced emigrations (for the Germans 1944–50 and the Serbs 
1991–95), the territorial autonomy is no longer accomplishable for them.

During the last century on today’s territory of Slovakia, the number and 
the proportion of people declaring Hungarian ethnicity (or mother tongue) 
has continuously decreased due to the forced migrations, assimilation proc-
esses and the anti-Hungarian climate of opinion connected to the building of 
the Czechoslovak (then, from 1993 the Slovak) nation state.13 In spite of this, 
the vast majority of the Hungarians still constitute a more or less contiguous 
13 Hungarians on the present-day territory of Slovakia (m: mother tongue; e: ethnicity): in 

1910 880,851 (m), in 1930 585,434 (e), in 1991 567,296 (e), in 2011 458,467 (e).

Fig. 9. Geographically possible ethnic based territorial autonomies in the Carpathian Basin. 
– 1 = Bosniaks, Muslims by ethnicity; 2 = Croats, Bunjevci, Šokci; 3 = Czechs; 4 = Germans, 
German speaking Austrians; 5 = Hungarians; 6 = Poles; 7 = Romanians; 8 = Romani people; 

9 = Serbs; 10 = Slovaks; 11 = Slovenes; 12 = Ukrainians; 13 = other ethnic groups



32

sett lement area in the southern regions of the country, 
near the Hungarian border, where there was a native 
Hungarian-speaking majority in 414 towns and villages 
in 2011. Since the conspicuously anti-Hungarian admin-
istrative reforms (1960, 1996), only two (Komárno and 
Dunajská Streda) of the present 79 districts of Slovakia 
retained their Hungarian majority. Should natural hin-
terlands (catchment areas), historical traditions and eth-
nic relations be considered, there could be 16 districts 
created in Slovakia with a Hungarian-speaking majority 
population (Michniak, D. 2006; Halás, M. and Klapka, 
P. 2012) (Figure 10). 

All the seats of these possible districts used to be 
district or county seats in the past century (Kocsis, K. 
2002). Out of the districts lining up near the Slovakian–
Hungarian border, 9 in the west, 5 in the middle and 2 
in the east could constitute an association (“Autonomous 
Region of South Slovakia”), the total population of which 
would exceed 680 thousand; according to the mother 
tongue 63.5% (432 thousand) would be Hungarian, 
27.9% (190 thousand) Slovak, and 1.6% (11 thousand) 
Roma (Table 1). 

Only 15% of the Hungarians would remain out-
side this imaginary region, the majority of whom live in 
Bratislava and in the towns of the Slovakian–Hungarian 
linguistic boundary that used to have a Hungarian major-
ity until 1945, and since then predominantly a Slovakian 
majority (Senec, Šaľa, Levice, Lučenec, Košice).

In spite of the emigrations in the past half centu-
ry, the number of Hungarians in Transcarpathia (Ukraine) 
has not decreased dramatically (1959: 146 thousand, 
1979: 158 thousand, 2001: 152 thousand). Out of the 13 
rayons of the region there is a Hungarian majority in 
the rayon of Berehovo (Beregszász) only, constituted by 
(including the town of Berehovo/Beregszász) a mere 
35.6% of the Transcarpathian Hungarians. It would be 
necessary to reconsider the district borders that had been 
unchanged for the past 60 years in a way that natural 
hinterlands and ethnic scenes are considered; thus in the 
ethnic territory of the Hungarian minority adjacent to the 
Hungarian–Ukrainian border it would be reasonable to 
detach a rayon of Čop (Csap) with 49 thousand inhabitants 

Ta
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33

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34

from the actual district of Uzhhorod (Ungvár), and a rayon of Vylok (Tiszaújlak) 
with 38 thousand inhabitants from today’s rayon of Vynohradiv (Nagyszőlős) 
(Figure 11).14 The three new districts formed this way would have an absolute 
Hungarian majority and they could join to create an association (“Autonomous 
District of Tisza Region”, Prytysianska), the total population of which would 
exceed 165 thousand, with 68.2% of Hungarian, 25.5% of Ukrainian, 3.9% of 
Roma and 1.7% of Russian ethnicity (Table 2). 

Only one quarter of the Transcarpathian Hungarians would remain 
outside these rayons, especially in the towns near the Hungarian–Ukrainian 
linguistic boundary (Uzhhorod, Mukačevo, Vynohradiv) and in the Upper 
Tisza Valley.

14 The number of inhabitants in these imagined rayons would exceed the population number 
of today’s rayons of Velykyy Bereznyi, Perechyn and Volovets. The new rayons created 
this way along the Hungarian–Ukrainian border would be: rayon of Čop (Csap) (48,907 
inhabitants, 63.7% Hungarian, 27.1% Ukrainian); rayon of Berehovo (Beregszász) (79,553 
inhabitants, 69.4% Hungarian, 23.3% Ukrainian); rayon of Vylok (Tiszaújlak) (37,531 
inhabitants, 71.4% Hungarian, 28.1% Ukrainian).

Fig. 11. Ratio of the Hungarians on the territory of the geographically possible Autonomous 
District of Tisza Region (Prytysianska) in Ukraine (1941, 2001)



35

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.

Almost all the Hungarians of Romania 
lived on the territories belonging to Hungary until 
1918, in Transylvania in the broader sense, where 
their number rapidly decreased in the past almost 
four decades – primarily because of the acceler-
ated rate of emigration (1977: 1.7 million, 2002: 1.4 
million and 2011: 1.2 million ethnic Hungarians). 
Presently approximately half of the Transylvanian 
Hungarians live in the Székely Land, almost one 
fi ft h live in Northwest Romania (Partium or Crişana-
Maramureş), while one third struggles for ethnic 
survival in enclaves, diasporas. Since the admin-
istrative reform of 1968, out of the 16 counties of 
Transylvania only two, Harghita and Covasna, had 
a Hungarian majority. 

In 2011 out of the present 1,192 Transylvanian 
cities, towns and communes 214 had a Hungarian 
majority. From among the territories populated by 
minorities in the Carpathian Basin a possibility of an 
ethnic based territorial self-governance seems to be 
the most obvious in the Transylvanian Székely Land 
if we consider the ethnic, economic and historical 
background. The Hungarian (Székely) population 
living there enjoyed territorial autonomy from the 
14th century until 1876 (and from 1952 to 1960/68). 
The dominantly Hungarian ethnic nature of the 
historic-ethnic region called Székely Land has re-
mained intact from the 13th century up to recently. 
Without changing the boundaries of the municipali-
ties, communes, reconsidering the catchment areas, 
the ethnic structure and the historical background, 
it would be possible to join the Hungarian-majority 
towns and communes of the counties of Harghita, 
Covasna and Mureş to create a self-governance re-
gion (“Autonomous Region of Székely Land”), which 
would be home to 750 thousand (76.5% Hungarian-
speaking and 21.5% Romanian-speaking) inhabit-
ants (Figure 12, Table 3).

As opposed to the historical Székely seats 
(Székely Land) existing until 1876, this territory 
would not include the Romanian-majority areas of 
Buzău and Becaş, Topliţa and its environs, while 



36

Fig. 12. Ratio of the Hungarians on the territory of the geographically possible Autonomous 
Region of Székely Land (1941, 2011)

Fig. 13. Ratio of the Hungarians on the territory of the geographically possible Autonomous 
District of Northwest Romania (Partium) (1941, 2011)



37

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s

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m

an
ia

ns
Ro

m
a

O
th

er
s

Po
pu

la
tio

n 
nu

m
be
r

Ra
tio

 in
 p

er
 c

en
t

19
41

20
02

20
11

61
5,

94
5

80
6,

15
3

75
0,

11
7

55
8,

91
1

61
8,

75
3

57
3,

72
4

43
,5

92
17

3,
86

5
16

1,
35

7

8
12

,3
67

12
,5

71

13
,4

34
1,

16
8

2,
46

5

90
.7

76
.8

76
.5

7.
1

21
.6

21
.5

0.
0

1.
5

1.
7

2.
2

0.
1

0.
3

So
ur

ce
s: 

M
ot

he
r t
on

gu
e 

da
ta

 o
f t

he
 H

un
ga
ri

an
 (1

94
1)

 a
nd

 R
om

an
ia

n 
(2

00
2,

 2
01

1)
 p
op

ul
at

io
n 

ce
ns

us
es

.

the adjacent Hungarian-ma-
jority communes (outside the 
historical Székely Land) could 
be incorporated. 

In the north-west-
ern part of Romania, in the 
so called Partium (Crişana-
Maramureş) region, on the 
territories of the counties of 
Bihor, Satu Mare and Sălaj, 
an association of 86 (mostly 
Hungarian majority) towns 
and communes (“Autonomous 
District of Partium”) would 
be conceivable based on the 
catchment area of towns and 
the prevailing ethnic patt ern, 
where 430 thousand (56% 
Hungarian-speaking, 41.1% 
Romanian-speaking and 1.9% 
Roma-speaking) inhabitants 
could enjoy a territory based 
self-governance (Figure 13, 
Table 4).

This region would 
approximately coincide with 
the joint territory of the elec-
toral districts of Chamber 
of Deputies in which a 
Hungarian party (RMDSZ) 
won the majority of the votes 
on 9 December 2012. One 
third of the Transylvanian 
Hungarians would remain 
outside the above mentioned 
territories, mainly in cities (e.g. 
in Cluj-Napoca/Kolozsvár 49 
thousand, Oradea/Nagyvárad 
46 thousand, Braşov/Brassó 
16 thousand, Timişoara/
Temesvár 15 thousand, Baia 
Mare/Nagybánya 14 thou-



38

sand) and in the Transylvanian basin, where an autonomy based on a local 
and personal principle could help preserve their ethnic identity. 

Almost all the Hungarians of Serbia (251 thousand people) live on the 
territory of the Vojvodina Autonomous Province, where they are in majority in 
eight municipalities. These administrative units, located near the Hungarian–
Serbian border and the Tisa, in the hinterland of the cities of Subotica/Szabadka 
and Senta/Zenta, could voluntarily join to form an “Autonomous District of 
North Bačka” with 301 inhabitants, 50.4% of whom would be Hungarians, 
25.8% Serbs and 9.5% Bunjevci and Croats (Figure 14, Table 5).

Although 40% of the Vojvodina Hungarians (100 thousand people) 
would remain outside this territory, their already existing cultural autonomy 
(based on a personal principle) and their national minority self-government 
organisation, the National Council of the Vojvodina Hungarians would con-
tinue to support the preservation of their national identity.

Fig. 14. Ratio of the Hungarians on the territory of the geographically possible Autonomous 
District of North Bačka (Potisje) (1941, 2011)



39

Conclusion

The territorial autonomies as the most eff ective tools 
of minority protection and the most modern forms 
of internal self-governance of minorities that have 
been created in the past decades one aft er the 
other, all over the world, do not count as novel-
ties on the historical territory of Hungary, in the 
Carpathian Basin. The Hungarian rulers granted 
such territorial self-governance in exchange for mili-
tary service to diff erent ethnic groups (e.g. Saxons, 
Székelys, Romanians, Cumans, Jassic people and 
Serbs) from the 13th century, the majority of which 
remained in existence until the second half of the 
19th century. 

By the end of the 18th century, the birth of 
the modern nations and nationalism and by Joseph 
II’s Germanizing enlightened absolutism, the 
proportion of ethnic minorities reached 2/3 of 
the country's population (while until the end 
of the 15th century only one third of inhabitants 
were non-Hungarians) due to reasons related 
to demographic processes and wars that were 
basically reshaping the ethnic structure of the 
country from the end of the Middle Ages. Due 
to the increasing growth of their demographic 
weight, their political consciousness and their na-
tionalism brought partly about by the Hungarian 
nationalism (but also further provoked by the 
Habsburg Empire), the national minorities started 
to claim the recognition and implementation of 
their existence as independent political nations 
and their ethnic based territorial autonomies more 
and more articulated from the middle of the 19th 
century.

The Hungarian state, following the 
Austro–Hungarian Compromise (1867), was grant-
ed internal self-governance within the Austro–
Hungarian Monarchy, however, Hungary denied 
the same right from the national minorities (except 
for the Croats) living on its territory. The reason 
for this denial was the same as in the case of all 

Ta
bl

e 5
. E

th
ni

c s
tr

uc
tu

re
 o

f t
he

 p
op

ul
at

io
n 

on
 th

e t
er

rit
or

y 
of

 th
e p

os
sib

le 
„A

ut
on

om
ou

s D
ist

ric
t o

f N
or

th
 B

ač
ka

 (P
ot

isj
e)

” 
in

 S
er

bi
a 

(1
94

1–
20

11
)

Ye
ar

To
ta
l 

po
pu

la
tio

n
H

un
ga
ri

an
s

Se
rb

s
Bu

nj
ev

ci
, 

C
ro

at
s

O
th

er
s

H
un

ga
ri

an
s

Se
rb

s
Bu

nj
ev

ci
, 

C
ro

at
s

O
th

er
s

Po
pu

la
tio

n 
nu

m
be
r

Ra
tio

 in
 p

er
 c

en
t

19
41

20
02

20
11

32
7,

02
8

32
7,

03
1

30
1,

30
5

24
1,

99
8

17
3,

27
9

15
1,

99
9

32
,9

08
79

,7
74

77
,6

79

37
,6

58
34

,5
40

28
,6

78

14
,4

64
70

,5
24

42
,9

49

74
.0

53
.0

50
.4

10
.1

24
.4

25
.8

11
.5

10
.6 9.
5

4.
4

12
.0

14
.3

So
ur

ce
s: 

M
ot

he
r t
on

gu
e 

(1
94

1)
 a

nd
 e

th
ni

ci
ty

 (2
00

2,
 2

01
1)

 d
at

a 
of

 th
e 

H
un

ga
ri

an
 (1

94
1)

 a
nd

 S
er

bi
an

 (2
00

2,
 2

01
1)

 p
op

ul
at

io
n 

ce
n-

su
se

s.



40

other countries aiming to build an ethnically-politically unitary nation state: a 
fear of att empts of the minorities to separate, a fear that the territorial integrity 
of the state should be infringed and that the state borders that were hope to 
remain ever-lasting should be changed. It is regrett able that the Hungarian 
state that used to excel at ethnic-linguistic tolerance from the times of St. 
Stephen until the 19th century, submitt ing to the spirit of the age and complying 
with the illusion of the French nation-state idea, made a mistake by denying (among 
others) the ethnic-territorial autonomy requests of the minorities, that resulted in 
the estrangement of the minorities followed by their separation aft er the fi rst 
world war, and, as a fi nal outcome, in the dissolution of the thousand-year-
old Hungarian state. 

At the end of 1918, on the territory of the multi-ethnic Habsburg 
Empire new multi-ethnic, middle-sized “nation-states” were created, the borders 
of which had been drawn in a way that was disadvantageous for Hungary and 
thus several millions of Hungarians mainly in the border regions fell under 
their supremacy. In order to protect their territorial integrity the neighbours 
of Hungary did not only deny the autonomy requests of the Hungarian minori-
ties treated as third-rate minorities, but also those of their “fellow-nations” (e.g. 
Slovaks, Rusyns, Croats) considered as second-rate minorities.

In the period between 1938 and 1944, the Third Reich (in order to reach 
its conquering aims) made use of the desperation of the nations and minorities 
in the Carpathian Basin that were suppressed between the two world wars 
and it successfully applied the ancient Roman principle of “divide et impera”. 
It repelled the countries of the formerly ruling nations (Czechs, Romanians, 
Serbs) to their ethnic core areas with the new boundaries, “donated independ-
ence” to the Slovaks and Croats and allowed the Hungarians to unite their ethnic 
territory, that is approved of the re-annexation of the territories populated by 
Hungarians that were lost in 1919.

In the countries of the Carpathian Basin (except for Austria) that came 
under the infl uence (mainly military occupation) of the Soviet Union aft er the second 
world war, Soviet-type communist regimes were built, which made it impossible 
for the following decades (in a general anti-minority atmosphere) to estab-
lish an actual territorial self-governance. The forced migrations between 1944 
and 1950 already pointed in this direction, which basically transformed the 
ethnic structure of the region by removing the Germans almost entirely, weak-
ening the Hungarian minorities and colonising mainly Slovaks, Ukrainians, 
Russians, Romanians and Serbs in great masses. In the decades of socialism 
only Vojvodina in Serbia (1945–1989) and the Hungarian Autonomous Region in 
Romania (under Soviet pressure, between 1952 and 1960–68) can be mentioned 
as examples of permanent and temporary territorial autonomies, respectively.

During the years of the Yugoslav wars, there was a short period of ter-
ritorial autonomy and independence in the case of the Serbian Krajina, which 



41

sank irrecoverably into history in 1995. Aft er the years of the political transi-
tion, the signifi cant Hungarian minorities of the Carpathian Basin have elaborated 
on their autonomy concepts that typically consist of three steps. Within these 
frameworks they directly articulated and frequently submitt ed as bills their 
notion of territorial self-governance, which was immediately (and in certain cases 
repeatedly) rejected by the Slovakian, Ukrainian, Romanian and Serbian parties.

Because of the shocking eff ects of the socioeconomic systemic change (1990– ) 
and the world economic crisis (2008– ), the lack of welfare, the increasing social 
polarisation, the disappearance of the former strong central power, the lack of 
a democratic civil society, the existence of populous ethnic and national minorities 
and some bitt er historical memories, the politics frequently turns to nationalism as 
a weapon in the countries of the Carpathian Basin. Nationalist powers frequently 
provoke minorities, especially if they are large in number and live on a rela-
tively continuous ethnic territory in order to prove that minorities mean a (mostly 
irredentist) danger. As a result of the economic and political diffi  culties, the 
governments in question make att empts at centralising the state functions rather 
than at devolution the power and they, especially, oppose establishing ethnic based 
territorial autonomies, which the titular nations conceive to be overt att acks 
on the territorial integrity of the state. In this respect the lessons learnt from 
unsuccessful examples (e.g. Kosovo, Abkhasia, Karabah) are emphasised over 
successful, positive European ones. 

The geographical and demographical conditions of an ethnic based territorial 
self-governance are available in the case of most of the sett lements of Hungarian 
national communities in Slovakia, Transcarpathia, Transylvania (Székely Land and 
Partium) and Vojvodina (North Bačka). It seems, however, that for the time being, 
due to the reasons outlined above, both short-term and medium-term political 
conditions are missing, even in the case of att empting to realise ethnic based as-
sociations of local self-governments (municipalities) of minorities.



42

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    /NLD (Gebruik deze instellingen om Adobe PDF-documenten te maken die zijn geoptimaliseerd voor prepress-afdrukken van hoge kwaliteit. De gemaakte PDF-documenten kunnen worden geopend met Acrobat en Adobe Reader 5.0 en hoger.)
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    /ENU (Use these settings to create Adobe PDF documents best suited for high-quality prepress printing.  Created PDF documents can be opened with Acrobat and Adobe Reader 5.0 and later.)
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  >>
  /Namespace [
    (Adobe)
    (Common)
    (1.0)
  ]
  /OtherNamespaces [
    <<
      /AsReaderSpreads false
      /CropImagesToFrames true
      /ErrorControl /WarnAndContinue
      /FlattenerIgnoreSpreadOverrides false
      /IncludeGuidesGrids false
      /IncludeNonPrinting false
      /IncludeSlug false
      /Namespace [
        (Adobe)
        (InDesign)
        (4.0)
      ]
      /OmitPlacedBitmaps false
      /OmitPlacedEPS false
      /OmitPlacedPDF false
      /SimulateOverprint /Legacy
    >>
    <<
      /AddBleedMarks false
      /AddColorBars false
      /AddCropMarks false
      /AddPageInfo false
      /AddRegMarks false
      /ConvertColors /ConvertToCMYK
      /DestinationProfileName ()
      /DestinationProfileSelector /DocumentCMYK
      /Downsample16BitImages true
      /FlattenerPreset <<
        /PresetSelector /MediumResolution
      >>
      /FormElements false
      /GenerateStructure false
      /IncludeBookmarks false
      /IncludeHyperlinks false
      /IncludeInteractive false
      /IncludeLayers false
      /IncludeProfiles false
      /MultimediaHandling /UseObjectSettings
      /Namespace [
        (Adobe)
        (CreativeSuite)
        (2.0)
      ]
      /PDFXOutputIntentProfileSelector /DocumentCMYK
      /PreserveEditing true
      /UntaggedCMYKHandling /LeaveUntagged
      /UntaggedRGBHandling /UseDocumentProfile
      /UseDocumentBleed false
    >>
  ]
>> setdistillerparams
<<
  /HWResolution [2400 2400]
  /PageSize [612.000 792.000]
>> setpagedevice