Regional Disparities in Hungary in the Era of Absolutism and the Dualistic Period (1780–1914): A Statistical Analysis to Assess Inequalities and the Driving Forces of Development

Demeter, Gábor and Földvári, Péter (2025) Regional Disparities in Hungary in the Era of Absolutism and the Dualistic Period (1780–1914): A Statistical Analysis to Assess Inequalities and the Driving Forces of Development. HUNGARIAN STUDIES REVIEW, 52 (2). pp. 196-249. ISSN 0713-8083

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Abstract

This article aims to reevaluate different socioeconomic and political systems—the era of Habsburg absolutism and the reconstruction after the expulsion of the Ottomans (1720–80s), the age of reforms (1780–1880), and the beginnings of the capitalist development in the Kingdom of Hungary (1880–1914)—from a different perspective: by focusing on trends in inequalities and changes in development levels. In order to trace the changes in the pattern of backward areas, development was calculated for three time horizons relying on the settlement-level data of the GISta Hungarorum database. The novelty of our approach is that we consider development multidimensionally, therefore a composite indicator of development was calculated using a causal approach (Structural Equation Modeling [SEM]) to substitute for Gross Domestic Product (GDP) or Human Development Index (HDI), which cannot be reconstructed at fine scale, nor calculated for the eighteenth century. Regional patterns of core-periphery relations and their temporal changes (differences in dynamism) were analyzed using GIS-methods for the three time horizons, and the varying depth of backwardness was also investigated by tracing two U-curves of the type developed by Jeffrey Williamson and Simon Kuznets over three centuries. Special attention has been paid to the relationship between nationalities and development levels in our analysis, as state politics has been accused of a discriminative attitude toward national minorities.

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