Oszkár Jászi

Hungary Liberalism and republicanism 1875–1957 ○ Died

Social scientist who led the Radical Party and served as minister of nationalities in the Károlyi government

Born to a Jewish doctor’s family in Nagykároly, he saw the family change its name to Jászi and convert to Calvinism in 1881. In 1900 he co-founded the social-science review Huszadik Század (Twentieth Century) and became its leading editor for two decades, arguing for universal secret suffrage and land reform. In June 1914 he founded the National Civic Radical Party. After the Aster Revolution of October 1918 he became minister of nationalities in the Károlyi government and tried to keep the minorities within Hungary by offering them maximum autonomy, but failed and resigned in December. Unable to tolerate the Soviet Republic’s denial of freedom of thought and conscience, he emigrated on 1 May 1919. In 1925 he joined the faculty of Oberlin College in the United States as a history professor, wrote The Dissolution of the Habsburg Monarchy (1929) and died in Oberlin in 1957.