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The ethnic structure of this region has been strongly influenced by the evolution of different historical-geographical, and political factors, but also by the evolution of the confessional structure. Ethnicity, from this point of view, is closely related to religion. What is typical and important to note is that the ethnic structure is very diverse. In addition to Romanians and Hungarians, also Gypsies, Germans, Slovaks, Jews, Ruthenians, and Serbs are present; other ethnic groups are numerically insignificant. For this period we identified two important categories of documents relating to ethnic identity of Transylvanians: 1. records made by the Austrian state authorities; 2. Church documents. They must be viewed and analyzed with great care because they do not correspond directly to the necessity to establish ethnic identities. The documents that are available to us do not allow for an accurate determination of a person's ethnicity. Given the lack of a variable on nationality from the few censuses conducted by the Hungarian State, we propose based on analysis of other documents (particularly those of ecclesiastical origin) to: a) check the mother tongue, b) establish religious identity and c) run an onomastic study.

Mixed marriage is one of the factors providing the link between interethnic and interreligious communities. Ethnic and confessional diversity of the population imposes a communication, an interference of different ethno-confessional communities. As these communities were living together, it was natural that this "cooperation" should be visible in the case of marriage. Given the context, mixed marriages acquired an innate multiculturalism due to the need for living together. The "social barriers" completed the ethnic and confessional differences. The State becoming more and more powerful in time imposed itself and promoted a new perception of mixed marriage through a lay legislation. On the other hand, in the mixed Greek-Catholic and Roman-Catholic communities, inter-confessional marriages were more easily accepted officially as both confessions were under the same hierarchic authority, the Pope. It is important to get a glimpse of the ethnic structures and their dynamics, as well as of the confessional realities to have a clear image in the analysis of interethnic or inter-confessional marriages. Marriage may be one of the social mechanisms to change the demographic volume of certain communities not only quantitatively, but also qualitatively, and to alter traditional spiritual values.

The recognition of the local collectivities and the essential role of democratic
society require the clear definition of the term "local collectivity", which would allow the
avoiding of ambiguities in its usage.
The defining element of the local territorial collectivities is the population, which
includes all inhabitants permanently living in the territorial perimeter of the local
collectivity.
There are identified criteria that allow the establishment of the individuals' belonging
to a specific local collectivity. This is very important because the individual's ability to be
part of a particular local collectivity gives him the opportunity to take part in local selfgovernment.
I insisted on the recognition of the local population as a subject of the local autonomy,
and not of the local public authorities elected by the population who are representatives of
the local territorial collectivities, while also examining the causes of the population's nonparticipation
in local public life.

The present paper wishes to be an inventory of the historical-demographical writings within Romanian landscape. We were able to identify preoccupation for demographic phenomena even since late 19th century, that have grown once with the creation of a discipline of historical demography in the post-war period, especially after the changes that Romania was put througt after Revolution in 1989.

The two documents which are the subject of the present study, made to share property in the event of divorce, help to form an image on various aspects of daily life, poorly known from other sources: household size, land property, earnings in marriage furniture, tools, animals, prices, food, secular and religious involvement of the private life etc. In addition to legal information, both inventories, which stood at the base of documents on which the property was to be divided, reveal another perspective on social history of Arad in the late eighteenth century.

The parish registers of civil status, although the main sources of documentation for historical demography, are used with significant results by the other sciences such as history, ethnography, sociology, anthropology, linguistics, etc.. The perspectives of approaching the rural community and family have expanded considerably using these sources of ecclesiastical origin documentaries. The first researchers who refer to a systematic methodology that uses the parish registers of civil status as documentary sources for the completion of demographic data suggest the use of other sources, hitherto unused for this purpose. They will apply a new method, a modern innovation, the stripping and analysis of parish registers of civil status within the meaning of the reconstruction of demographic events (birth, marriage, death).
The family reconstitution method, by analyzing the parish registers of civil status proposed by L. Henry and M. Fleury, has revolutionized the field of study dealing with people. Louis Henry believes that the parish registers of civil status is the ultimate source of information for the pre-state period and this is precisely the reason for which he proposes restoring the family's biological life. Church registers are only able to give us an insight into the family in rural areas, at least for the second half of the XIX century. Church documents, the fundamental sources for researching family life, are of two categories: 1. civil status registers and annual reports of the parishes, 2. Church authorities funds, documents and minutes recorded by the bishops. These documents are complex sources for the researcher interested in historical demography, social history, and the economic history of toponymy, birthdays, etc.
Processing the data contained in these records requires a specific methodology. They allow us to observe trends that have occurred on the long-term demographic events such as: birth, marriage or death. These records are presented for a long time as their only source of documentation regarding civil status and demographic events in the life of most people. Researching these records can unveil important features of natural population movement, the phenomenon of birth, of marriage, the divorce or death. Then, an analysis of form and content of these registers can capture the cultural universe of the priests who fill these records.
These Church documents proved to be important, especially where other documentary sources (mainly those in the category of records made by the state) have proved insufficient, incomplete and unclear. The parish registers of civil status in this case are suitable for both a qualitative analysis, and a quantitative one at the level of local communities. Beyond their usefulness and significance of documentary source, these documents should be regarded as being subjective because they were managed by priests (every priest is then an exponent to promote demographic and confessional "realities" and such realities were viewed from the perspective of his own religious convictions). The parish registers, however, prove to be the only documents that allow us to penetrate the privacy of individuals in each community. A documentary is also undeniably a good dowry that researchers should promote and use in their research not only locally but also to verify and demonstrate certain behaviours and overall trends.

The Jews of Hungary had to face difficult situations at the end of the war. Before the Holocaust, they were approximatively 756 000-800 000 people in the extended Hungary, so it shows Tamás Stark in the study Hungarian Jewry during the Holocaust and after liberation. From them almost 600 000 died during Nazi and Hungarian persecutions. Budapest was an important train station for the returned Jews. Once they arrived in Hungary they saw that the series of difficulties continue. They were in impossibility to regain their old houses, they did not have sufficient money to survive. They were helped by the international organization Joint Distribution Committee to survive. Hungarian antisemitism was a feeling that did not manifest all of a sudden, it grew in time. The interwar period time was a time when this antisemitism manifested itself including through the law numerus clausus which limited the number of Hungarian students in universities and which was imposed in these years. Antisemitism was abolished immediately after the end of the war. Most Jews chose the path of assimilation in Hungarian communist state in spite of the persecutions which they had suffered before. A new system was emerging on the horizon, the communism, which promised the equality of all citizens in the Hungarian state, no matter of their ethnic background. A lot of Jews accepted this system and chose to keep secret the fact that they were Jews and did not tell their children about their origin.

Efficient functioning of the local government depends on its territorial organization, which must correspond to the objective needs of building public power structures, capable of responding, in line with European standards, to the new political, social, economic and cultural realities in which located Republic of Moldova.
To investigate the phenomenon and identify efficient solutions was proposed to change the paradigm of investigation the phenomenon. It affirms the necessity to abandon the paradigm of an administrative-territorial organization and adopt a paradigm for the territorial organization of public power. In this sense, a theoretical-conceptual and methodological basis was elaborated in the domain of the territorial organization of the public power, in general, and in the local one in particular.

Among "the bad years" of the 18th century that affected the city of Arad, 14 of it were because of the floods, the most severe overflows taking place on July 1771. The devastations were considerable and due especially to the fact that the city wasn't protected and the bad weather lasted full days, the waters retracting only after about 7-8 days.
The authorities were interested in stocktaking the effects of the overflow and as a cause they organized charts in which were totalized the losses suffered by the inhabitants of the city in the summer of 1771. The data from these charts permit us to realize the immensity of the disaster: 252 completely destroyed houses, 9 dead, about 8500 florins losses due to the overflowed and devastated gardens, the inundation of the agrarian fields from the proximity of the city, 200 animals drowned, 88 hives destroyed by the waters etc.
Even though the authorities realized along the time works meant to regularize the flow of the river Mureş, and the urban policy thought about the danger of the floods, the city of Arad kept to be endangered by the river in the decades that followed until the waters overflowed again in: 1772, 1774, 1779, 1780, 1783, 1785, 1793 and 1799.

After the peace of Karlovitz, the Mureş River became the official border between the two great empires: the Habsburg and the Ottoman Empire. In this context was organized the military border Tisa-Mureş, and the first called to defend the region were the Serbs, recognized for their military skills. The authorities created the first militarized localities in the county of Arad simultaneously with the first arrival of Serb immigrants in this region. Their presence in the city of Arad and other settlements located on the right bank of the Mureş River changed the ethnic proportions in these areas.
The situation modified after Banat was conquered by Austrians and after the abolishment of the Tisa-Mureş military border. Most Serbs emigrated to the south of Mureş River and even in Russia, their share in the city and county of Arad decreasing significantly after the mid eighteenth century.

The present study aims to investigate in terms of quantitative and qualitative perspectives the rural habitat in the county of Arad during the eighteenth century. The dynamics of settlements, their evolution over the century, changes occurred in the types of environments were conducted in conjunction with the policy of the new imperial authorities and in accordance with the populationist policy of the Habsburg Empire.
The rural habitat which predominated in the Arad County suffered changes of great importance not only just as a consequence of the official systematization policy, but also as a result of the constant demographical increase which occurred in the eighteenth century.

This article proposes to pay attention on the sources of historical demography in the old eparchy of Arad. At the end of XVIIth century, the Ottoman domination in the zone have been filled with the domination of Habsburgs and the Arad city became a significant orthodox Episcopal centre subordinated in religious plan to the metropolitan of Karlovitz. For the reconstitution and the knowledge of the demographical aspects into old counties Arad and Zarand, we can use many documents, which are preserved in the Departmental Direction of National Archive of Arad. Various censuses, tax conscriptions, wills and especially parochial registers of the marital status are sources of first category. With the methods used by Michel Fleury and Louis Henry this sources are essential to know the behaviours demographic for the various ethnos groups, as well majority Rumanian as the population German, Hungarian, Serb or Jewish which have lived in these places 300 years ago.

The review in 2003 of the territorial-administrative structure for the purpose of replacing the 10 districts with 32 districts, and the creation of 252 new administrative-territorial units of the first level was, to a certain extent, a return to the old administrative organization of the Soviet period.
Democratization of the society needs to change the focus towards local initiative and the strengthening of regional centers. The improvement of the administrative-territorial structure is an effective lever to encourage local initiative and to successfully implement the functioning of the public administration.
The logical organization of a State's territory contributes to the judicious ordering of state power and administration. It meets the general interest and fully meets the local needs and requirements contained in the administrative-territorial units.
The administrative organization of the territory must meet the judicious division of the territorial limits taking into account the traditions, mentalities and the needs for good governance and democratic criteria.
The option for a particular model of administrative-territorial organization must be the result of deep scientific investigation.
The territorial-administrative reform requires a thorough preparation. It is necessary to provide substantiation of political, economic, social and financial standing of such actions. The problem of financial resources, which primarily refers to training local taxation, is a vital issue. This is because it involves financial autonomy, a central component of local autonomy, without which the decentralization can not work. Insufficient training can lead to some unexpected consequences or compromising actions.
In organization and demarcation of territorial administrative units (by number, structure, size, etc.) the social, material, financial costs and all the activities related to them can not be neglected for a short, medium or long term.

This study submits to our attention some qualitative and quantitative aspects related to urban and semi urban habitat from the former Arad County in the eighteenth century. If in 1715 there were 6 market towns, at the end of the century were already 15. Based on the conscriptions, urbariums and census, I have tried to detect the evolution of market towns during the entire eighteenth century. Reform policy of the Habsburg absolutism has determined even an economic and demographic increase in the market towns of Arad County. Between those 15 market towns of the county existing in 1787 only Arad had obvious urban characteristics. Here was concentrated 6.15% of the county population. By comparison with other counties from Transylvania and Hungary, I have pursued to dignify and quantify different aspects of the urbanization degree in the Arad County registered in the eighteenth century. The development of market towns in Arad County has had the same evolution with those of Central and Eastern Europe, because the agrarian character of these localities was predominant. The evolution towards urbanization was evident along the eighteenth century both in terms of population growth and a great social mobility and also in light of the economic and municipal development. The transformations in the direction of modernization registered during the eighteenth century were the basement of the future process of urbanization of Arad County in the century that has followed.

Divorce is, irrespective of the perspective of approaching the phenomenon from the point of view of the society typology, a form of social deviance that has as effect the dilution of family image and norms. We do not discuss here of a dilution of the traditional norms concerning family, as someone might misunderstand, it is an erosion of the idea of family in general. "Family" starts to have other forms than the "official" ones. Divorce is the last step in the process of erosion and dissolution of the central axis of the family – the marital couple. Despite the fact that we have considered the divorce as the last step in this process of dissolution, we have to admit the fact that, after the divorce, considering that the old couple had children, the existence of the family does not cease, it just takes a new form.
The research of the archives, preserved due to the parish notes (often duplicates), provides the opportunity of identifying the main issues at a certain epoch in the Romanian rural world concerning divorce and the act of divorcing. Our research is structured in two directions: 1. a broad one, through which we will make a quantitative analysis of the size of the phenomenon in the counties of Bihor and Satmar (by observing the particularities in the county seats) – in this way, we will try to calculate the divorce gross rate (by calculating the number of divorces at one thousand inhabitants); 2. the other direction, through a case study on the Greek-Catholic parishes of the diocese of Oradea, will pursue a rather qualitative analysis without ignoring the quantitative aspect. The choice of the Greek-Catholic parishes was made for several reasons: the first is the quality of the materials preserved; the second is the fact that the confession, unlike the Roman-Catholic one for instance, accepts the divorce, thus providing the opportunity of bringing to light the separations undoubtedly existing in the Catholic environment; the third is that we think that, by its position as compared to the two Churches (Catholic and Orthodox), the Uniate Church provides an image that is closer to the reality as shown on the level of the whole population in the region.