Southern Slovakia has traditionally been identified with the region inhabited by Hungarians. However, for analytical purposes it is more appropriate to assume the administrative-statistical regions, and in Slovakia, the most suitable territorial entities are the districts. In Southern Slovakia there are 16 districts with a significant proportion of Hungarian population, and, for historical reasons, Bratislava and Košice can also be classified as belonging to the examined region. Looking at the aggregated data of this area, it can be concluded that its development is lagging behind the national average. Regarding industrial production, the southern region, in view of its gravity, accounts for a smaller proportion of the national output. Similarly, lagging behind can also be observed in respect of the corporate average wage, as well as in view of productivity. The economic development of the southern region is uneven, the western–eastern opposition is significant, although it is continuously decreasing. The economically most backward region in the long term is Gemer. continue reading →
It has been already known that the educational attainment level of the Hungarians in Slovakia is far below the Slovakian average, i.e. the average of the Slovak majority. This was characteristic in the whole period of the socialist regime too. The problem was not only felt by the Hungarians, the government also tried to change the situation, in higher education the national minority quota was applied for a long time. The situation has improved since then, the number of Hungarians holding a higher education degree has increased, but despite expanding opportunities, it has not been able to keep pace with higher education becoming massive in the 2000s. This study also confirms that the Hungarian districts still lag behind. It can be seen, however, that the 16 districts no longer constitute a homogeneous region. Of course, it is not surprising, since it is a long-stretching, large region that can geographically and ethnically be divided into several districts. From the Bratislava agglomeration districts, however, only the Senec district has managed to catch up as regards the examined indicators, the Dunajská Streda, Galanta and Šaľa districts have not. Taking into account past experiences, combatting the backlog and mitigating its effects in the... continue reading →
The Hungarian history has a lot of personalities successful abroad and almost not known or valued at home. Ferenc Tóth – François de Tott (1733–1793), – belongs to them, who is French general, diplomat, engineer and writer of memoranda of Hungarian origin. As one of the most imporant representatives of the second generation of the Rákóczi emigration in France, is known mainly in France, but on the basis of the most important location of his activities works dealing with the history of the Osman Empire include him. Versailles in 1767 noticed the young diplomat. He was appointed consul of Grím, where he faced a difficult task. Against the rapidly growing influence of Russia he had to protect the claims of France. Later he was active in Carihrad, the sultan asked him to make a military map. The sultan was very satisfied with the work, with which he gained the sultan’s confidence, and therefore he was asked to fulfill another tasks: to strenghten the fortresses of Dardanellas, to renew the Turkish artillery, to establish a cannon foundry, to open a maritime school, to plan a pontoon-bridge, but he introduced the usage of bayonet at the Turkish army. These wide-range military... continue reading →
The Hungarian-inhabited region stretches along the entire southern border of Slovakia, somewhere in a wide, elsewhere in a thin strip. The region is divided into various regions, sites and dialects, these often reach over the other side of the border. The southern districts differ from the average Slovak districts in many aspects. If we look at the unemployment rate, for instance, irrespective of the outstanding results of Bratislava and Košice, in the 16 southern districts it is always significantly higher than the national average. The southern parts suffer much more from unemployment – it is especially evident in Štúrovo and Šahy –, but the situation is even more unfavourable in the regions with Hungarian majority. Despite the fact that the 16 Hungarian-inhabited districts differ from each other in many ways, and one or two – those situated close to Bratislava and Košice – may be in a better position than the national average, but from the economic point of view they still form one compact region, which generally is in a worse situation than the national average. This though does not mean that the southern border region is the most remote part of the country, but, in comparison with... continue reading →
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