Anders Blomqvist
Panel 3 The Hungarian Minorities
Abstract
Satu Mare’s location in the de-nationalised zone in Romania at the Romanian-Hungarian frontier made it strategically important and an extreme case regarding Romanian national re-building as it had 97 % non-Romanians before 1914, according to the Hungarian linguistic definition of nationality. The city was heavily magyarised with a strong Hungarian and Jewish elite who were opposing the Romanisation. The Romanians were in minority, but they were backed up by the state and the international community through the peace conference, even though there was a conflict between the protection of minorities and the Great Power interest in re-nationalising Satu Mare.
