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Coping strategies in the hinterland: the social impact of the Russia-Ukraine war on the Transcarpathian Hungarian community
5-32Views:31Although the territory of Transcarpathia, the westernmost county of Ukraine, is located relatively far from the focal points of the combat operations of the Russia-Ukraine war, the everyday lives of the region’s inhabitants have undergone profound transformations since February 2022. While several hundred thousand internally displaced persons arrived and settled in the oblast, a substantial segment of the Hungarian population has responded to the introduction of martial law and the ensuing economic hardships by emigrating. However, a considerable number of Transcarpathian Hungarians have chosen to remain in their homeland despite the challenges of wartime conditions. The present study focuses on the situation of the latter community by: (1) outlining the most important socio-demographic changes taking place in the region; (2) examining the coping strategies of the Transcarpathian Hungarian community under wartime circumstances, the underlying factors shaping migration decisions, and the main motivations for remaining in their homeland; and (3) analyzing the effects of the influx of internally displaced persons on local society and the evolution of interethnic relations. Based on the findings of our empirical research, it can be concluded that the key to remaining in one’s homeland lies in the continuous adaptation and reconfiguration of family coping strategies in response to rapidly changing circumstances. It can also be observed that, while emigration has been the primary factor reducing the number of Transcarpathian Hungarians over the past decades, since 2022 both the scale and nature of migration have shifted considerably, posing new social challenges for the community that has remained at home.
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The impact of recent migration flows on the number of Hungarians in Transcarpathia, Ukraine
5-29Views:311According to the last Ukrainian census in 2001, 152 thousand people declared Hungarian
ethnicity in Transcarpathia. Since that time, there is no reliable and up-to-date data on the
ethno-demographic development of the region’s population. It is especially hard to register the
migration flows particularly salient since the outbreak of the armed conflict in East Ukraine
in 2014. Based on four data sources (official Ukrainian and Hungarian statistics and two
representative surveys), the present study aims at revealing the volume of the permanent and
temporary migration of Hungarians in Transcarpathia and its impact on their number. We
found that the same migration flow is associated with various figures by each of the data sources
conducted with different methods and by different actors. According to the more reliable surveys,
9 to 14 thousand ethnic Hungarians emigrated from Transcarpathia since 2001; consequently,
the number of Hungarians is estimated at approximately 130 thousand people in the beginning
of 2017. -
Political reorganization in the shadow of the pandemic and war: The 2022 Latvian parliamentary election and its consequences
73-94Views:178Latvia’s party system has been one of the most unstable in European comparison since the 1990s, essentially since independence and democratization. Although there was a period in the middle of the 2010s, which showed the stabilization of the range of relevant parties and a decrease in the number of parties, by the end of the decade the fluctuation between the parties of the Baltic republics was again high. The Kariņš cabinet, formed after a record long time after the 2018 election, nevertheless set a unique record in the country: it was the first government to complete a full four-year parliamentary term. The government faced two challenges during its tenure, the pandemic that began in the spring of 2020, and the Russian aggression against Ukraine that began on February 24, 2022. Both had a significant impact on the development of the party structure. The aim of this paper is to present the changes in the political palette of Latvian parties in the last two legislative cycles, to analyze the results of the October 2022 election, giving priority to the effects of the Russian-Ukrainian war on the transformation of the party structure and the results of the elections.
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Reconfiguration in Post Euromaidan symbolic landscape: comparison of Kyiv and Transcarpathia
142-164Views:259The relation between power and public space has been one of the main interest of geographical
research in the last decades (Massey 1994, Mitchell 2003). Researches have illustrated that
following a regime change, the symbolic space of the city – compiled of street names, statues
and monuments – usually gets reconfigured. Following the Euromaidan, in 2015, the laws on
decommunization were accepted in Ukraine, which disposed more comprehensibly than ever before the banishment of Communist symbols from the public space. The decommunization
besides toponymy, entangled other elements of public space resulting in major shifts the urban
landscape as well.
Main interest of present paper is to study the major shifts in symbolic landscape in the capital,
Kyiv and compare it to the processes that have taken place in the westernmost periphery of the
country, Transcarpathia. Based on the examples of Uzhhorod, Berehove raion and Berehove, our
further aim is to shed light on the role of locality and how local memory is represented in public
space. -
Maintenance of minority languages and economic viability of minorities in the mirror of the Transcarpathian linguistic landscape
119-141Views:140The study examines the linguistic landscape of the territories of Transcarpathia (Ukraine) which
are mostly inhabited by Hungarians in the context of language and economy. It will be presented
how economically prestigious world languages, English and Russian are displayed in this region.
We show that economic realities suppress the nationalism of the minority int he linguistic landscape.
We note that the language policy in support of the language maintenance of the national
minority can not be successful if it is not related to the development of the economy. If we want to
improve the economic situation of the Hungarians of Transcarpathia in a multilingual environment,
the teaching of languages is one of the areas where it is necessary to invest. -
The economic quickening role of the credit unions related to the execution of the Egán Ede-plan in Transcarpathia
30-62Views:136The purpose of this study was to submit the last years’ particularities of the hungarian
economical supports in ventures’ improvements of competitiveness, representing through the
transcarpathian business environment and a specific sector (credit unions). In the period when
the study was being carried out there were not such statistic data at service as the efficiency
of the supports could have been shown precisely, but in virtue of the first years’ experiences
those deviances and elements (which need minor corrections) have been clarified which can improve the plans’ fulfilment. On the other hand – which means the central point of the study –
the authors’ realization is over the non-refundable aids to grant micro or so called co-operative
credits which makes independent the economics’ process of quickening, which can give a longterm
insurance to the capitalization’s enhancement of the micro-, small- and medium-sized
enterprises (ventures). For this a good tool can be the resurrection of the credit union system and
the improvement of the infiltration to our economical system, which is widespread in Ukraine,
endemic in Transcarpathia but not peculiar in our hungarian region nowadays. The system’s
estimate of situation and the principle proposal for the future is drafted in this study.
