Majority of Romanians believe Hungarians in Romania have just enough rights

Since the fall of communism, support for education in Hungarian has never been this high among Romanians; roughly six out of ten Romanians agree that minorities living in their country should receive education in their native language. Society's acceptance of separate Hungarian schools and the use of minority languages in educational institutions remains lower though, despite these being rights guaranteed by law. On the other hand, although those who approve of these are not in the majority, there has been some progress in this regard compared to previous years. However, 28 percent of respondents believe that Hungarians pose a security threat—all of this was revealed by a joint survey conducted by the Szeklerland Institute for Public Policy (Székelyföldi Közpolitikai Intézet-SZKI) and the National Insitute for the Study of Minorities (Nemzeti Kisebbségkutató Intézet-ISPMN), the results of which were presented on Wednesday afternoon in Cluj-Napoca.

The evolving attitude towards Hungarians was one of the central themes of this representative study. The survey was conducted between October and December 2025, polling 1,013 Romanians.

According to the researchers, the current survey does not indicate any significant change in how Romanians characterize the relationship between Hungarians and Romanians. Over the past two decades, the proportion of those who described this relationship as contentious has generally remained at 20–30 percent, while 50–60 percent have usually described it as cooperative.

When the question was examined in terms of different social categories—or, to use a more formal term, social background variables—it appeared that among supporters of the far-right Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR), the poor, and the unemployed, those who viewed relations between Hungarians and Romanians as cooperative were not in the majority. Compared to a similar survey from 2020, the proportion of those who perceive relations between Hungarians and Romanians in Romania as contentious has decreased in almost every category, with the exception of young people aged 18 to 34 and supporters of the Social Democratic Party (PSD), where no decline was observed.

“Among supporters of the National Liberal Party (PNL), the proportion of those who view the relationship as conflictual has dropped dramatically,”

political scientist Tibor Toró explained. The researcher attributes this in part to the fact that some former PNL voters now support AUR, and in part to an opening on the Romanian right toward various minority and human rights issues. He backed up the latter assertion with several examples, which we will return to later.

A security issue?

Roughly half of the surveyed Romanians said that Hungarians do not pose a security threat to Romania. To be precise, 46 percent believed that the Hungarian community actually contributes to the better functioning of the Romanian political system. Twenty-six percent of respondents were somewhat neutral on the issue, while 28 percent tended to view Hungarians as a problem. Respondents were asked to rate the relationship on a scale of 1 to 10, where 1 meant Hungarians pose a problem, while 10 meant they contribute to the country’s functioning, and the average came to 6.2. When looking at the question by party preference, voters for the PNL and the Save Romania Union (USR) score well above the average—meaning they are most likely to believe that Hungarians are beneficial to Romania, while AUR voters tended to view their presence as problematic.

The survey also revealed that, over the past few decades, the majority of Romanians have maintained the view that minorities in Romania have exactly as many rights as necessary. At the same time, there was a slight increase in the number of respondents who believe that minorities in Romania have too many rights, and, naturally, a slight decrease in the proportion of those who believe they don’t have enough rights.

When the question was examined according to party preference, it turned out that AUR and PSD voters were most likely to believe that minorities have too many rights.

When asked specifically about some rights, 60 percent of respondents agreed that Hungarians in Romania should be able to study in their native language in public education, and 58 percent supported providing higher education in their native language. Tibor Toró noted that

over the past three decades, there has never been such a high level of approval for providing education in the Hungarian minority's mother-tongue; previously, the proportion of those in favor was typically around 40–50 percent, and now they are clearly in the majority.

There is still no majority support for Hungarians in Romania having separate schools, nor for their ability to use their native language in public institutions. The former is supported by 36 percent of Romanians, while the latter is supported by 35 percent. Support for territorial autonomy in regions with a Hungarian majority was measured at 15 percent.

The voters of PSD are the least likely to support learning in one’s native language; only 49 percent of them agree with this, with support for this right being even higher among AUR supporters. The use of the mother tongue in official/institutional settings is least supported by those over 55, with only 27 percent in favor, while support among young people stands at 43 percent.

“It appears that the type of strong linguistic hierarchy that has been characteristic of the country for the past 35 years is beginning to break down among young people,” Toró concluded, adding, however, that further research is needed to substantiate this.

How much does the use of Hungarian bother Romanians?

The survey also measured how much it bothers the majority when a person of Hungarian ethnicity uses Romanian incorrectly on TV or the radio, or when people speak Hungarian around them. In the former case, there has been significant progress.

While in 2020, the survey found that those who were bothered by a Hungarian individual not speaking Romanian perfectly in the media were in the minority, two-thirds of respondents now consider it normal for a native Hungarian speaker to speak Romanian incorrectly.

There has been little change in how bothered Romanians are by hearing Hungarian being spoken: while in 2020, 29 percent of Romanians said they were bothered when people spoke Hungarian around them, in 2025 this figure was 26 percent. They have become somewhat more accepting of two Hungarians not switching to Romanian when members of the majority are nearby: in 2020, 68 percent of respondents considered this rude, while in 2025, only 61 percent did.

According to the survey, the most significant improvement was observed among residents of Bucharest and progressive voters, this is where the most notable softening in attitudes with regard to the rejection of the Hungarian language was recorded. Toró stressed that the change is striking even among those who do not normally come in contact with Hungarians. “For them, Hungarian is an abstract category; this may mean that linguistic tolerance is beginning to be included alongside other human rights issues that define progress,” he said.

Among PSD and PNL voters, however, there has been no change in recent years; as Toró puts it: there has been no change in the attitudes of supporters of traditional parties with regard to linguistic hierarchies. It is also interesting to note that AUR voters are typically more permissive on language use than supporters of the PSD or the PNL.

Toró explained this by the fact that the PNL and the PSD took stronger positions on the issue of making Hungarian an official language, whereas AUR voters haven't necessarily been addressed on this topic.

Finally, respondents were also questioned about their stance on dual citizenship, and there has been little change in this regard. Roughly six out of ten Romanians continue to support Hungary granting dual citizenship to Hungarians living in a neighboring country, including Hungarians in Romania.