Regional and Cohesion Policy in Hungary [antikvár]

1 Regional patterns of transformation A constant concomitant and determining factor of the development of modem economies is an ever fluctuating presence of differences in the economic development of different regions. The volume and spatial extent of obvious inequalities in the income relations and living conditions of the population, and in the state of the settlement structure and the environment are influenced by both long term development trends (e.g. the history of the settlement structure of the country) and short term cycles (e.g. effects of economic boom and recession, the changing of the economic paradigm). In 20th century Hungarian regional development, apart from the influence of the inner regularities of the economy, economic policy and state regional development policy was influenced by international political decisions that upset the spatial structure of the country and delayed its integration into Europe. Due to the economic policies of the last fifty years and to the settlement structure development initiated in the 1960's, the spatial structure of the country has changed, its settlement structure has become formally (considering the rate of urbanisation) more modern and differences between the major regions have lessened. In spite of these undoubtedly favourable changes, the spatial structure of the country still does not suit the conditions required for the rise of a modern market economy. The increasing social and economic innovations as well as the country's integration into the European regional division of labour are hindered by the lack of cohesion and infrastructural connections between the regions of the country and by the under-developed character of regional centres. Hungary's present regional structure may be characterised by the following {Enyedi, 1993a): 1) A small country which is homogeneous from an ethnic, linguistic, and historic point of view. The population also shares the same history. Over 90 percent of the people speak Hungarian as their mother tongue. The Hungarian language does not have regional dialects that differ markedly from the accepted standard. Traditionally, the country has a uniform, centralised public administration system. The autonomy of territorial units is weak, and there is no tradition of federalism. Regionalism is weak within the country. Homogenisation was writ large especially in the socialist era; now the pendulum has started to swing back. A specific feature of the Hungarian local goverrunent system is recognising the fact that local authorities are unlimited legal subjects. The local government system is very fragmented. Over 35 percent of 3,100 local authorities have less that 500 inhabitants.