Diverging or dependent development? The impacts of the Treaty of Trianon on spatial development patterns in the territory of Esztergom and Komárom counties

Abstract

This study investigates the transformation of territorial development disparities in Esztergom and Komárom counties between 1910 and 1941. The area investigated belonged to Hungary before WWI, but over half of its settlements were given to Czechoslovakia in 1919, as the river Danube constituted the new state border up until 1938. Before the world war, large agricultural estates were important actors at both sides of the river with a remarkable size of agricultural land, and consequently a great proportion of agricultural earners worked as servants or agricultural workers at these estates. However, a rather radical land reform began in Czechoslovakia in 1919, which aimed to dissolve many of the large estates and promoted agricultural smallholders, predominantly those belonging to the Czech and Slovak ethnicities. Meanwhile in Hungary the agricultural land concentration hardly changed, although the number of smallholders grew after a conservative land reform was carried out in 1920.
The study scrutinizes the ways (1) development disparities in the territory of Esztergom and Komárom counties changed after the Treaty of Trianon, and (2) agricultural and ethnic policies affected local development patterns. In order to answer these questions, a multi-dimensional development index was applied for 1910 (for both sides of the Danube), 1938 (for the left side of the Danube, belonging to Czechoslovakia) and 1941 (for the right side of the Danube, belonging to Hungary). Besides the development index, proportion of agricultural land owners and leaseholders was analysed in order to shed light on the role of land concentration on local development.
The results indicate that territories characterised by non-agricultural population (villages inhabited by miners, and a couple of major towns) were among the most developed ones both before and after Trianon. These settlements were located predominantly on the right side of river Danube. Between 1910 and 1938/1941 a number of settlements on the left side of river Danube stepped forward in terms of development ranking: at the eastern part of this area a number of villages were above the average development level in 1938. These settlements were affected by the Czechoslovak land reform, hence the proportion of land owners and agricultural leaseholders grew between 1910 and 1938. On the other hand, the western territories of the area investigated (at both sides of the Danube) can be characterised by diminishing development ranks: these villages were still inhabited predominantly by the agricultural proletariat in 1938/1941.