Nationalism and Falling Behind: The Failure of National Industrialisation

Haza és lemaradás: a nemzeti iparfejlesztés kudarca

Author(s): Mária Hidvégi,Tamás Vonyó / Language(s): Hungarian / Issue: 11/2012

Keywords: Hungary; national industrialisation; stabilisation; failure

Policy makers in Hungary faced a monumental challenge after World War I in trying to adapt the country’s economic structure to new borders and to markedly different geopolitical conditions. Following a successful stabilisation in 1924, national income and industrial production picked up, and surpassed pre-war levels significantly by the 1930s. However, productivity growth was negligible due to depressed investment levels and sluggish technological progress. Industrialisation was promoted by the state, but output growth relied primarily on employment expansion and outdated technology. One of the main factors behind the unsatisfactory macroeconomic performance was that Hungary fell behind western nations in electrification and motorization, the locomotives of technical change in the interwar era. Limited access to capital and the lack of effective government coordination are mainly to blame, but the case of two major companies present evidence that successful adaptation models existed.

Turning point. Outside change. Inside change?

Fordulópont. Külső változás. Belső változás?

Author(s): Anikó Borbála Izsák / Language(s): Hungarian / Issue: 11/2012

Murádin János Kristóf: Transformãri instituþionale în viaþa culturalã maghiarã din Transilvania în perioada 1944-1948, Scientia Kiadó, Kvár, 2012.

Crosses - represented and hidden

Kirajzolt és rejtett keresztek

Author(s): Lajos Kántor / Language(s): Hungarian / Issue: 11/2012

Háromnegyed évszázados állomásához érkezett grafikus, festõ (és tehetségét más, a képzõmûvészetbe illeszkedõ, illetve azzal határos területeken kipróbáló) barátunk, a Korunk egyik legrégibb és legmegbízhatóbb munkatársa, Paulovics László mûvészete számos forrásból táplálkozott, táplálkozik. E háttérvilágnak korántsem elhanyagolható része a történelem, mindenekelõtt a magyar história. Amikor lovakat rajzol, örökít színesbe, akkor is gyakran a múltba réved (van egy 1991-es, kevert technikájú munkája, amelynek a Lovagkor címet adta); mitológiai kalandozásaiban ugyancsak megjelennek a lovak, akár kentaur formában; de a harci mének konkrétabb történelmi pillanatok megidézésében is szerepet kapnak, például Tinódi Lantos Sebestyént idézve (Vitézi ének, 2005.).

Book recommendations

Könyvajánló

Author(s): Gyöngy Kovács Kiss / Language(s): Hungarian / Issue: 11/2012

Fate and fatelesness

Sorsfordulók, sorskérdések és a sorstalanság

Author(s): Károly Krajnik-Nagy / Language(s): Hungarian / Issue: 11/2012

Romsics Ignác: Magyar sorsfordulók 1920–1989, Osiris Kiadó, Bp., 2012.

The Extreme Right in the Horthy Regime

A szélsőjobboldal a Horthy-korban

Author(s): Rudolf Paksa / Language(s): Hungarian / Issue: 11/2012

Keywords: far-right politics; Győző Istóczy; National Socialism; Hungarism, Ferenc Szálasi; Arrow Cross Party

The roots of far-right politics in Hungary, which is a widely varied phenomenon in itself, reach back to the 19th century. The birth of the “idea of independence”, nationalism, imperial ambitions and Turanism all date back to this century. The ideas were associated in the final third of the same century with anti-modernist concepts like anti-Semitism, directed against Jewish emancipation, the agrarian movement, built up against capitalism, as well as the idea of a Christian Renaissance. One of the precursors of fair-right politics was Győző Istóczy, the father of modern Hungarian anti-Semitism, whose followers also took inspiration from Christian socialist thinkers like Ottokár Prohászka and Béla Bangha. The extreme right in its current form was born as a reaction against the revolutions of 1918-1919. The first national socialist groups appeared in Hungary during the worldwide economic crisis. The most successful far-right political party was the Party of National Will, lead by Ferenc Szálasi, who published an overview of his ideas with the title Út és Cél (The Way and the Goal), in which he elaborated his views on “Hungarism”. Szálasi considered Hungarism the specifically Hungarian form of National Socialism. He also called his politics, directed at the “dejewification” of Hungary, in contradistinction to the anti-Semites who proposed the limitation of Jewish rights, anti-Semitism, which would have entailed the expulsion of Jews from the country without their fortunes. The Szálasi government, which came into office on 16 October 1944, promised the solution of the “Jewish question” and the establishment of a Hungarist state, which meant the totalitarian regime of a single-party state. Accordingly, at the beginning of November, Szálasi took up the title “Leader of the Nation”, concentrating the functions of head of the state and of the Arrow Cross Party’s leader.

The Political System of Hungary between the Two World Wars

Magyarország politikai berendezkedése a két világháború között

Author(s): Levente Püski / Language(s): Hungarian / Issue: 11/2012

Keywords: administration; authoritarian regime; democracy; dictatorship; parliament; parliamentarism; political stability; regent

After the fall of the Hungarian Soviet Republic on August 1, 1919, the coalition government of Károly Huszár set out to normalize the political situation after November 1919. By the middle of 1920, a dualistic political system had emerged which showed the characteristics of a parliamentary democracy as well as of a dictatorship.The transitional character of the system disappeared with the premiership of István Bethlen, who introduced a new state and governmental system in the first phase of his government between 1921 and 1926. This essay surveys the phases of this process and makes an attempt to define precisely the characteristics of the political system introduced by Bethlen. According to the author, a parliamentarian political system emerged in Hungary by the mid-1920s with some characteristics of an authoritarian regime at the same time. This system had to face serious challenges during the 1930s, among which the emergence of the extreme right was the most important. Such reforms had been incorporated into the system during the 1930s, as the result of which it can described as an authoritarian regime after 1939. This system existed until March 1944, when Nazi Germany occupied the country.

The Horthy Regime’s Character

A Horthy-rendszer jellege

Author(s): Ignác Romsics / Language(s): Hungarian / Issue: 11/2012

Keywords: Miklós Horthy; Horthy regime; fascist; authoritative and traditionally liberal elements

Although some contemporary analyses and historical reflections published immediately after 1945 could have provided a good starting point for a more systematic and archives-based research work concerning the character of the Horthy regime, the intellectual climate of the rigid Communist dictatorship established after 1947-1948 made this task totally impossible. According to the prevailing view on the time period between 1920 and 1945, succinctly stated by Erzsébet Andics, one of the leading figures of the communist historians, “there was an essentially fascist regime in Hungary too for 25 years”. The brochures and the school textbooks of the first 10-15 years did in fact outline this view in detail and illustrated it with concrete material. Due to the more liberal atmosphere of the Kádár regime, real historical research began after the 1956 revolution, and its first results were published in the 1960s. According to the new approaches published in the late 60s and early 70s, the power system of the Horthy regime contained not only fascist but authoritative and traditionally liberal elements as well. By the late ’80s it has been largely accepted that in respect of its political institutions and their functions the Horthy regime should be characterized as a limited parliamentary system with distinctly authoritarian features. Although the evaluations have recently diversified again, professional historians continue to consider the Hungarian regime of the inter-war years as one of authoritarianism with predominant party relations.

Positive Answers to Trianon

Pozitív válaszok Trianonra

Author(s): Gábor Ujváry / Language(s): Hungarian / Issue: 11/2012

Keywords: Kuno Klebelsberg; Bálint Hóman; Minister of Religious Affairs and Public Education; Hungarian culture

The two defining personalities of Hungarian cultural politics, Kuno Klebelsberg and Bálint Hóman, have served as the Minister of Religious Affairs and Public Education for nine years each (between 1922–1931, respectively 1932–1942). Although the Treaty of Trianon caused serious damage to Hungarian cultural institutions, this was negligible in comparison to the economic losses. Klebelsberg and Hóman were the ones to give positive answers to the cultural losses. Their program for the construction of elementary schools, from the period between 1926–1930 and 1935–1940, elevated the cultural level of the lower classes. Consequently, at the end of the 1930s, the percentage of analphabets in the population above the age of six was only 7%, which roughly corresponds to Western European standards. Another important aspect of their contribution was in the field of cultural diplomacy. This was the period of the establishment of Hungarian cultural institutions abroad (Vienna, Berlin, Rome, Paris) and the beginning of the state funding of Hungarian departments at foreign universities. Kuno Klebelsberg and Bálint Hóman implemented a distinctly modern cultural politics at a European level within the confines of an outdated society, and therefore the time period between 1920 and 1944 was one of the golden ages of Hungarian culture.

The Role of Hungary in Wold War II

Magyarország II. világháborús szerepvállalása

Author(s): Krisztián Ungváry / Language(s): Hungarian / Issue: 11/2012

Keywords: Hungary; Wold War II; Hungarian Honvéds; going to war; attempts to make peace; Holocaust

The role played by Hungary in the Second World War is still in the focus of public attention, although the generation which actively participated in the events does rarely appear in public life. The present study analyses the participation of Hungary in World War II between the coordinates of historical choice and necessity. It re-examines five issues, still widely misunderstood by public opinion, from this double perspective: the performance of the Hungarian Honvéds and of the military industry, the question of going to war, the attempts to make peace and the choices leading up to the Holocaust. This examination is also motivated by the fact that Hungarian military and economic participation was far from being an issue of secondary interest from a German point of view, and it even counted as unavoidable in some periods during the war. Neither can the participation of Hungary in the war be regarded as a simple matter, as because of its revisionist goals formulated in a contradictory manner this country effectively became a belligerent already in the spring of 1941. The circumstances surrounding the attempts to make peace which condemned these efforts to failure from the very beginning are still relatively unknown. The most debated issues among the historical events pertain to the genesis of the Holocaust and the question of Hungarian responsibility associated with this. The present review of these issues attempts to bring new contributions to their interpretation.

Interwar Hungarian Foreign Policy

Magyar revíziós külpolitika a két világháború között

Author(s): Miklós Zeidler / Language(s): Hungarian / Issue: 11/2012

Keywords: Hungarian foreign policy, Treaty of Trianon, restoration of Hungary’s territorial losses, revision

The foreign policy of interwar Hungary aimed at the revision of the Treaty of Trianon and at the possible most complete restoration of Hungary’s territorial losses following World War I. The partisans of the so-called integral (complete) revision wished to restore Hungary’s old frontiers, invoking „historical rights”, „administrative abilities” and the regional „cultural supremacy” of the Hungarians, along with their „self-sacrificing wars in defence of Western civilisation” against subsequent Eastern invasions. They also made reference to the economic and geographical unity of the Carpathian Basin and to the resulting organical regional cooperation, the disruption of which, as they maintained, brought unfavourable effects for all nations concerned. The spokesmen of ethnic revision, on the other hand, would have been satisfied with a readjustment of Hungary’s political frontiers along the ethnic (or linguistic) lines. This concept was based on the principle of national self-determination, claiming that every (national) community had the right to decide about its own superior administrative institutions, and likewise the right to choose the state authority to which it wished to subordinate itself. The essay ventures to demonstrate the influences of these two different concepts on interwar Hungarian foreign policy.

The history of Móricz adaptation

Móricz-adaptációk gyártástörténete

Author(s): Adél Zsigmond / Language(s): Hungarian / Issue: 11/2012

Hamar Péter: Móricz Zsigmond mûvei a filmvásznon, Modus Hodiernus 3. Nyíregyháza, 2012.

Performing femininity

A nőiség performálása

Author(s): Panna Adorjáni / Language(s): Hungarian / Issue: 12/2012

The dialogue of learned generations in the textual space of memory

Tudós nemzedékek párbeszéde az emlékezés (szöveg)terében

Author(s): Norbert Baranyai / Language(s): Hungarian / Issue: 12/2012

A Genealogy of Home Movies

A családi film genealógiája

Author(s): Melinda Blos-Jáni / Language(s): Hungarian / Issue: 12/2012

Keywords: home movie/video; media practices; media genealogy; intermediality; participatory culture

The article deals with the changes of the private usage of moving images. The author argues that compared to the video practices of younger generations preferred by new media research, home movies offer a field of research where one may even study questions of media history, since the habitus of home movies has a documented, theorised history, while at the same time the change can also be sensed in the practice of contemporary movie making families: they grew up on “old media”, in contrast with the younger generation socialised on new media. This is followed by the presentation of the concepts of media genealogy: an interpretative model for grasping the processes of media history. The genealogy of the increasingly familiar (home) movie can also be relevant in theorizing the dissemination and the chameleonic aspect of media. Based on this methodology, the author analyzes the genealogy of an amateur film made in 1931 in Kolozsvár, and appoints it as an early example of the local participatory film culture. The case study also shows the importance of anthropological data in researching media history.

The psychiatry of Internet addiction

Az internetfüggőség pszichiátriája

Author(s): István Boncz / Language(s): Hungarian / Issue: 12/2012

The Erdélyi Helikon in the forties

Az Erdélyi Helikon a negyvenes években

Author(s): Gyula Dávid / Language(s): Hungarian / Issue: 12/2012

Tourism within a social media network community

Turizmus egy hálózati közösségen belül

Author(s): Melinda Nagy / Language(s): Hungarian / Issue: 12/2012

The many facets of dialogue from the perspective of a many-faceted psychologist

A sokszínű társalgás egy sokszínű pszichológus szemével

Author(s): Imre Péntek / Language(s): Hungarian / Issue: 12/2012

Alone in Front of the Computer – Millions in the Machine: Our Daily Video Games

Egyedül a gép előtt, milliók a gépben

Author(s): Árpád Péter / Language(s): Hungarian / Issue: 12/2012

Keywords: personal computer; video games; teenagers; online gaming; virtual worlds; “virtual Hungary”

The author briefly reviews the last decade’s most important computer games, the organizations of digital gaming, as well as the usage tendencies of this brand new media technology. He concludes that modern videogames are practically omnipresent in contemporary society, and not limited to the adolescents or teenagers, as common opinion holds it. He focuses on online digital games, and describes the infinity and interactivity of their virtual worlds as viable alternatives to the limited reactive capacities of older media. The author considers that the possibilities for practically unlimited interactions are the most addictive characteristics of virtual games. The essay also examines the Hungarian video game industry and concludes that this “virtual Hungary” is still light years away from more developed and better implemented computer game industry of the Western world.