Hungarian Studies Newsletter, 1979 (7. évfolyam, 19-22. szám)
1979 / 19-20. szám
ARTICLES & PAPERS (The Case Worker). He and Szeldnyi have produced several sociological studies on the distribution of state-subsidized housing. (Peter Bell, U. of California, San Diego) □ Czekner, John Jr., “A Comparison of the Agricultural Systems of Austria and Hungary in the two Decades before World War I,” East European Quarterly XII (Winter 1978) 461- 473. Czekner compares the agricultural systems of Austria and Hungary not only to each other but also to those of Western Europe, where standards were much higher. Thus, Cisleithenia (Galicia, Bohemia, Moravia and the Austrian hereditary provinces) ranked only slightly below Europe in yields of cereal grains and potatoes, but Hungarian production was considerably lower. In the use of machines and livestock, Austria “appeared at the half-way point in a comparison of European states,” although in “land ownership distribution Austria showed some of the largest disparities in all of Europe.” While Hungary played the dominant agricultural role in the Empire and produced more in certain areas than Cisleithania, its per acre yield was poor, and the number of agricultural machines woefully few. Animal husbandry however was intensive even in European terms, and fewer land ownership inequalities existed than in Austria, although still worse than the European mean. In terms of the relations between Austria and Hungary, it is clear that while Hungary possessed the greater portion of the Empire's agricultural wealth, and Cisleithania depended on her to supply food, Hungary also needed the Austrian markets for her surplus. □ I.H. Halasz De Beky published two more bibliographies as nos. 7 and 8 of the Bibliotheca Hungarica Torontonensis. (For information on previous issues see HSN nos. 14 and 15.) No. 7 contains 68 entries on works by and about Gyula Illyés and available in the U. of Toronto Library. No. 8 has 84 entries on works by and about Zsigmond Móricz, available in the same library. For copies write to Dr. I.L. Halasz De Beky, J.P. Robarts Research Library, U. of Toronto, Toronto, Ont. Canada M5S 1A1. □ Pacy, James S. "Poland and Hungary: Two Historical Footnotes,” East European Quarterly XII (Winter 1978) 501- 504. During the sessions of the Council of the League of Nations in 1934 on the assassination of Yugoslav King Alexander, Tibor Eckhardt, the Hungarian representative, received a call from the Polish ambassador to London, Edward Raczynski who came to let him know that he would not support the Little Entente’s efforts to humiliate Hungary. The traditional friendship between the two countries thus stood the trials of diverse politics, as it did in 1939 when Regent Horthy told the U.S. diplomat, Howard K. Travers, that Hungary had no intention of joining Hitler’s aggression against Poland, and then showed Travers a set of Herend porcelain dinnerware that had been intended as a state gift to the Polish President Moscicki. Since this set could not be given to Moscicki, Horthy presented it to Travers. The porcelain, with the Polish and Hungarian coats-of-arms and the inscription, “If God is with us, who can be against us?” is still in the possession of the Travers family, except for one piece that found its way to Leon Orlowski, Polish minister to Hungary from 1936-1939 via Mrs. J. M. Riddell of Washington, D.C. The author is Prof, of Political Science at the U. of Vermont.□ Komlos, John, “The Emancipation of the Hungarian Peasantry and Agricultural Growth,” in The Peasantry of Eastern Europe. Ivan Volgyes, ed., Pergamon Press, Elmsford, NY, 1979. (See review on p. 6.) John Komlos argues that while change of the property rights in land in 1848 was morally desirable, it did not lead to increased agricultural productivity. Before 1848, the peasants held about 2/3 of the lord's land in usufruct, i.e. they owed 104 days of labor for a full session, or 52 days with work animals. The average peasant owed 23 (13) days; the land was inherited, and some of the services could be performed by the children. Also, the peasant received land for gardening, had the right to graze animals on the common pasture and collect firewood from the lord’s forests. They paid taxes—1/10th of the gross yield to the landlord and 1/9th to the church; the lord performed the functions of judge, administrator, protector, executor, insurance agent and medical advisor. The peasant could, moreover, leave the estate without payment, marry at will, sell his produce unencumbered and was not forced to use the lord’s flour mill. Thus, while individual prosperity depended on the fertility of the land and the accessibility of markets, the peasants were not badly off. The system did run counter to the modern concept of citizenship and equality under the law, and thus it is not surprising that it was one of the first reforms in 1848. The landlords, however, were also compensated. Examining the economics of emancipation, Komlos finds that the free time gained by release from robot was negligible and the use of this leisure continued to depend on markets and wages, i.e. it was not used if no markets were available for the extra produce and if no goods could be obtained by the worker; it was utilized if the markets were good or wages (in various government projects such as road building) justified the disruption of village routines. Thus, while it is true that there was a shortage of labor in the 1850’s, this was not a new phenomenon, labor shortages having existed throughout the 19th century (therefore the not wholly successful immigration policy of the Habsburgs). The barter system (labor for land) continued, although the forms had to be worked out individually, which often contributed to short-term shortages. Even mechanization seems not to have been particularly spurred by, or helpful to, the labor shortage. In short, “emancipation” did not lead either to rapid capital accumulation or greatly increased efficiency because the available resources were already being used to near capacity. The author is Assistant Prof, of Economics at Aurora College. □ Bell, Peter D. presented a paper on “Gypsies and Magyars: Communities Apart in a Contemporary Hungarian Village,” at the 76th Annual Meeting of the American Anthropological Association in Los Angeles, November 14-18, 1978. The 350,000 Gypsies accounted for by the Hungarian Government, constitute 3% of the population, and may, by 2000, account for 5% if the present trend of increase continues. The author carried out his doctoral dissertation field research in a village of northeastern Hungary, which suddenly experienced the influx of some 100 Gypsies, creating an array of new social problems among the 900 Magyar inhabitants. Keenly observing the behavioral changes which occurred as a result of the “newcomers”, he describes the prevalent social stereotypes and concludes that these generalizations which were attributed to all Gypsies, 8 NO. 19-20, 1979, HUNGARIAN STUDIES NEWSLETTER
