A RENDSZERVÁLTÓ ÉV: 1848
The Regime-Changing Year: 1848

Summary/Abstract: The civic transformation of Western Europe was an example to follow for those intellectual groups and liberal circles of nobility who wanted changes in the Habsburg Empire. The wars at the start of the 19th century gave rise to a great prosperity in agriculture throughout the continent. This proved an opportunity for Hungary to rejoin the main stream of the world economy. The landowners, the bondsmen and the towns all noted the positive changes facilitated by the economic opportunities. The need for civic transformation increased steadily and was synthesized in the "Hitel" (Credit) by István Széchenyi in 1830. Several different programs of transformation were distilled, and leading personalities emerged during a quarter century of long internal disputes. Many different factors led to the European revolutionary wave, including the Polish uprisings (1830, 1846), the potato blight that caused great famine and the internal problems of Italy and France. The civic regime changes of Hungary took place in three towns. Pozsony (Bratislava) as the seat of the parliament and Bécs (Wien) as the capital of the empire also played major parts besides the well-known events of Pest. The events unfolding in these three towns, often without knowledge of what was happening elsewhere, simultaneously led to the fact that after the start on 15th March 1848 the revolution could end on 11th April with the ratifications of the laws creating the new civic arrangements. Hungary joined the ranks of civil states in 1848 with the help of 25 years of preparations and the general European situation.

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