Austria-Hungary

Ethnic relations

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The ethnic distributionof Austria-Hungary

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GermanHungarianCzechPolishRuthenianRomanianCroatSlovakSerbSlovene

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Italian

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24%20%13%10%8%6%5%4%4%3%3%

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Czechs (the majority in the Czech lands, i.e.Bohemia, Moravia and Austrian Silesia), Poles and Ukrainians (in Galicia), Slovenes (in Carniola, Carinthia and southern Styria, mostly today's Slovenia) and Croats, Italians and Slovenes in Istria each sought a greater say in Cisleithan affairs.

Related Topics:
Czechs - Czech lands - Bohemia - Moravia - Silesia - Poles - Ukrainians - Galicia - Slovenes - Carniola - Carinthia - Styria - Slovenia - Croats - Italians - Istria

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At the same time, Magyar dominance faced challenges from the local majorities of Romanians in Transylvania and in the eastern Banat, of Slovaks in today's Slovakia, of Croats and Serbs in the crownlands of Croatia and of Dalmatia (today's Croatia), in Bosnia and Herzegovina and in the provinces known as the Vojvodina (today's northern Serbia). The Romanians and the Serbs also looked to union with their fellow-nationalists in the newly-founded states of Romania (1859 - 1878) and Serbia.

Related Topics:
Romanians - Transylvania - Banat - Slovaks - Slovakia - Croats - Serbs - Croatia - Dalmatia - Bosnia and Herzegovina - Vojvodina - Serbia - Romania

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Though Hungary's leaders showed on the whole less willingness than their German Austrian counterparts to share power with their subject minorities, they granted (it is argued) a large measure of autonomy to the kingdom of Croatia in 1868, parallelling to some extent their own accommodation within the Empire the previous year.

Related Topics:
Croatia - 1868

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Language was one of the most contentious questions in Austro-Hungarian politics. All governments faced difficult and divisive hurdles in sorting out the languages of government and of instruction. Minorities wanted to ensure the widest possibility for education in their own language as well as in the "dominant" languages of Hungarian and German. On one notable occasion, that of the so-called "ordinance of April 5, 1897", the Austrian Prime Minister Kasimir Felix Graf Badeni gave Czech equal standing with German in the internal government of Bohemia, leading to a crisis because of nationalist German agitation throughout the Empire. In the end Badeni was dismissed. On another occasion, the Czechs lost the privilege of using their own language in everyday life, including newspapers and in the workplace: Czechs had to use German. This caused general chaos.

Related Topics:
Kasimir Felix Graf Badeni - Bohemia

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From January 1907 all the public and private schools in Slovak part (aprox. 3 mil. people) of Hungary were forced to teach in Hungarian language only, burning Slovak books and newspapers. This led to wide criticism by Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson among others.

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It was not rare for the two kingdoms to divide spheres of influence. According to Misha Glenny (The Balkans, 1804-1999), the Austrians responded to Hungarian badgering of Czechs by supporting the Croatian national movement in Zagreb. (Croatia, in spite of nominal autonomy, was in fact an economic and administrative arm of Hungary; this the Croats resented.)

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