Nincs absztrakt.

The study deals with the nation-centred nature of the Slovakian historiography of co-operatives. As an example for Slovakian myth-making, the author discusses the interpretations of the penny co-operative founded in 1845 in Ószombat (present-day Sobotište in Slovakia). While this association comprised an organic part of the Hungarian community of associations, Slovakian historians consider it not only the first “ethnically Slovakian” credit union, but the first credit union in the Monarchy and the Continent. Contrary to historians’ charges, this association, which was founded to encourage self-help and savings and regulate the members’ self-improvement and lifestyle, did not discontinue due to discriminative Hungarian minority policies, but as a result of a natural process and adhering to the regulations laid down in its founding charter. The study focuses on the twentieth-century development of myth-making and the diminishing role of historical fact and archival research in the history of this particular association, as well as the foundation of actual associations in Ószombat in 1898 and 1902. It also addresses the nation-building concepts of Slovakian political elite. For Slovakian historiography the penny co-operative is not merely a subject of social historical research in the context of the local milieu of Ószombat. Slovakian historians also disregard the possibility of Habán (Anabaptist)-Slovak cultural interactions and have established a persistent historical construct to strengthen the Slovakian “small nation” identity.

The paper examines the structures of Hungarian business interest bodies and the self-organization forms that assumed various roles in business life. The analysis covers the business federations, cooperatives and industrial associations with Hungarian membership, located in the areas inhabited by the Hungarian minority, which were organized in the new economical-political space defined by the new centres of business in the Czechoslovakian Republic (Prague, Bratislava), examining the situation and the various phases of integration of these professionally led organizations within the framework of the state economy. With respect to business federations, the study pays special attention to the interest protection and organization building strategies that were adopted by the Hungarian opposition parties in Czechoslovakia in response to the discriminative minority policy measures taken after the change of power. Within the cooperative movement, the paper aims for a more detailed and balanced assessment of the Hanza and examines the problem of non-consumer cooperatives against a broader background. The continuation and transformation of pre-1918 institutional forms and the evolution of new ones are examined from the aspect of organization building (the creation of interest groups, centres and federations, the existence of monitoring and supervisory rights), and also attempts to define the inner temporal milestones of the process of institution organization.