The birth year of modern Romanian State could be conventionally considered 1859 when the historical provinces of Moldavia and Valachia (including Oltenia and Muntenia) united. In spite of the fact that in Transylvania (and in other western territories and provinces, as seen in Figure 1.) the Romanian population constituted a demographic majority and there existed an articulated national movement, six decades had to pass before these territories were passed under Romanian sovereignty. After 1918 Romania as modern state become one of the largest sovereign territories of Central and Eastern Europe. Beside the provinces of Moldavia, Valachia and Transylvania, Romania took over and incorporated Basarbia (the actual territory of the Republic of Moldavia) and the Northern part of Bucovina (actually belonging to Ukraine). After the Second World War part of these territories, with a large amount of Romanian population were lost, but the Romanian state succeeded (excepting of a short interlude between 1940-1945) to maintain within its borders Transylvania and all the western territories.

Romania as modern state inside of its actual boundaries has a long history and experience of the territorial presence of national minorities. More than that, in the case of some of the above-mentioned territorial changes, the minority issue was frequently evoked due to the fact that the ethnic borders were not congruent to state boundaries. Consequently, the Romanian historical awareness is very sensitive on the minority - especially on the Hungarian - issues considering it as being one of the factors of potential territorial instability.

Concerning the minorities, it is rather difficult to outline shortly the roots of all of them and to reflect on the specificity of their historical status. There will be taken into account some considerations with a certain risk of losing some aspects of the nuances of a long inter-ethnic co-habitation specific for the territories of actual Romania.

First of all it has to be taken into consideration that Romania, in its actual configuration, is composed of territories which used to be separate political entities for centuries having more or less a different history, where different ethnic groups were having a substantially differentiated political status. Also, it has to be mentioned that the different minority groups are composed of successive strata of immigrants and/or colonists with major differences regarding the historical context when, and regions where they were settled.

The Hungarians installed in the region (in Transylvania, Banat, Crisana and Maramures) since the 9^th century. Starting with the eleventh century all these territories were organized as parts of the Hungarian Kingdom, but with Transylvania having a special autonomous status. The representatives of the Hungarian nobility, together with the Saxon and Szekler leaders in 15^th century signed a joint treaty (the so-called Union of Three Nations) in order to assure the supremacy of the ruling political elite, this act reiterating, beside its political significance, the mixed character of the provinces. After the breakdown of the Medieval Kingdom of Hungary and its Ottoman occupation (including also the province of Banat), Transylvania enjoyed an unsteady autonomy. At the end of the 17^th century the province was gradually incorporated into the Habsburg Empire. In 1848, in defiance to the protests of the Romanian and Saxon population, the Hungarian leaders of the province decided the unification with Hungary.

Consequently, the Hungarian nobility represented for long centuries a dominant political stratum, and after 1848 within the process of modernization of the education and the state as whole, the Hungarians enjoyed a status of majority as it is definable in the present sense of the word. Besides, not just the political standing of the Hungarian population was important, but also the cultural investments (in many cases concretized in longstanding religious and educational institutions) and the particular historical significance of the regions inhabited by them (in collective memory Transylvania is frequently represented as a cultural core region for all the Hungarians).

After the First World War, as the Austro-Hungarian Empire disintegrated, Transylvania, Banat, Crisana and Maramures provinces with Romanians constituting the majority, but also with a significant Hungarian minority - more than 30% of the total inhabitants -, were assigned to Romania by the Trianon Treaty.

For the Hungarians leaving at these territories, the rapprochement with the new state structures and with the status of minority was not easy, moreover the new Romanian state's cultural and educational policies having strong nationalizing tendencies.

After the Second World War , for about two decades the situation of Hungarian minority in Romania seemed to improve, but this progress was followed by a very aggressive Romanian nationalistic policy, such as in 1990 at the beginning of the so-called democratization process, the Hungarian minority felt very frustrated and deprived.

The Saxons from Transylvania, invited as colonists by the Hungarian Kings in the 12-13^th centuries, were settled in the Southern and Eastern parts of Transylvania. They used to enjoy a large degree of political autonomy within Hungarian Kingdom or within the autonomous Principality of Transylvania. Being the main promoters for the development of urban life and crafts, they represented reference models for the patterns of cultural and administrative organization. But this was not the only infusion of Germanic population in the actual territory of Romania. Starting with the very beginning of 18^th century the Swabs were colonized in Banat and Crisana, having a Catholic religion in comparison with the Protestant Saxons. During the 19^th century the Saxons lost their special political status, and after the Second World War also their special economic and social positions, moreover they were subjects of collective harassment and hostile treatments. After all these historic losses, the experience of collective punishment, enduring the difficulties of the accommodation with communist system, starting with the seventies the Germans from Romania started to emigrate in Germany.

Before the 18^th century the Jewish population was not a significant presence in the territories entered in the actual configuration of the Romanian state. In Transylvania their amount increased starting with the 18^th century, and in Bucovina, Moldavia and Muntenia they started to emigrate at the beginning of 19^th century. Their paths of integration were significantly different. In Transylvania (as specific for the whole Hungarian Kingdom) they adopted first the German culture and at the end of the 19^th at the beginning of the 20^th century the Hungarian culture.

In Bucovina and Moldavia they get integrated just in the economic system with sporadic contacts with the Romanian culture. This was one of the reasons frequently evoked during the 19^th century as regards the political refusal to offer them citizenship, this problem being partially solved in 1923.

During the Second World War in the provinces of Old Kingdom they were the main victims of the aggressive behavior of paramilitary fascistic formations, in the North Western parts of the Romanian territory reenacted to Hungary between 1940 and 1944, being victims of the deportations assisted by the Hungarian authorities. As a result of such a treatment, and due to the massive process of immigration which has started after 1945, from the third largest minority in 1930, they become in 1992 one of the smallest ones.

The Armenians arrived during the 14^th century in Moldavia, and beginning with the 17^th century they formed colonies of merchants also in Transylvania. The last significant migratiomnal wave of Armenian population arrived at the end of the 19^th - beginning of 20^th century.

The Slovaks and Czechs were colonized starting with 18^th especially in 19^th century, in mountainous areas of Banat and Western Transylvania, the majority of them in order to exploit the mineral resources of this area.

The Ukrainian population has established in the northern part of the actual territory of Romania (especially in Maramures) starting with the 14^th century. Their presence in Bucovina, according to the opinion of most of the historians, is in relation with the minority policy of Austrian Empire, administrating this territory starting with the last quarter of 18^th century.

The Greeks established in Valahia and Moldavia during the 18-19^th centuries, have had a complex influence on the development of this province, due to their significant presence not just on the commercial but also on the cultural life, being considered as promoters of the spirit of modernity. Greek refugees arriving in Romania were registered even at mid of the 20^th century.

The Turks and Tartars are present mainly in Dobrogea - a territory existing for centuries under Ottoman authority which became part of Romania after the Congress of Berlin in 1878.

The presence of Roma population on the territories of Romania seems to be documented from the eleventh century. In the 14^th and 15^th centuries the slavery became institutionalized in the historical provinces outside Transylvania. Some efforts were made, starting with the mid of the 18^th century to abolish slavery, but this succeeded just in the second half of the 19^th century. Even if from legal point of view it was free, this group never enjoyed fully the advantages of various social and economic process such as the various land reforms of the 20^th century. More than that they were continuously facing the prejudices of the majority population, and even certain institutionalized discriminative policies of the state, as being the massive deportations of some Roma people from 1942 and later on, during the Second World War. From the point of view of local administration it should be mentioned, that partially due to various factors. as the nomadic traditions, the high level of illiteracy, the fact that in communism a large part of the Roma population was used in agriculture as a mobile workforce, several Roma persons do not have proper ID's, and are not registered as belonging to any the administrative unit. Consequently it is rather difficult to appreciate the exact number of Roma persons living in Romania, but fact is that there is a strata of population which is not in the position to benefit from local social policies, being from administrative point of view, out of the system.

According to the census from 1992, the number of citizens declaring to have a different nationality than Romanian exceeds 10% of Romania’s overall population (Tables 1 & 2.). Among the existing diverse ethnic groups including the majority one, there are significant differences, especially concerning the main religious denominations they belong to, and their mother tongue (see Tables 3 & 5). Also, the territorial distribution and the degree of urbanization are variable for different minorities. Most of the minority population is concentrated in Transylvania (Table 4.), where the amount of Romanian population is 75,29%, the Hungarians representing 20,96%. Regarding the level of urbanization, the German, Jewish and Armenian population are above the national average, the distribution of Hungarians among the rural and urban areas being more or less corresponding to the national average.

According to statistical data regarding regional concentration, level of urbanization, religion, mother tongue it has to be mentioned that at the level of different regions there are various regional mentalities, having different integrative forces. Such as, in the region of Banat -having one of the highest degree of diversity of the minority populations represented - the regional identity seems to have a large integrative force, in some cases being stronger than the particular ethnic loyalties.

Concerning the level of political mobilization and the relation between the political elite of one particular minority and the Romanian State, there can be identified three different cases, risking to ignore some details and exceptions:

• The case of the Hungarian minority, trying to renegotiate with the Romanian state its political and public status. The major goal ever expressed publicly by the political representatives of this minority (we are referring just to the period after 1989), was to be considered as co nation with the Romanian nation, in other words to be considered an equal but distinct/autonomous constituent of the Romanian political community. In addition to this general goal, Hungarians are striving to acquire an official status for Hungarian language, to set up new cultural and educational state policies creating a frame for autonomous administration of these issues, and also to have some forms of territorial autonomy for the regions where Hungarians live compactly.

• The case of minorities existing as a small communities (less than 100.000 persons belonging to), facing particular problems in preserving their cultural identity. They are integrated within the political system through specific mechanisms of representation (see the chapter analyzing the political participation of minorities). Their needs and demands are not exceeding the actual political and administrative system their grievances usually not generating major political and public debates.

• The Roma minority, spread all over the Romanian territory, marginal both from social and cultural point of view, facing harsh prejudices of the population frequently manifested between 1990 and 1996 in form of violent aggressions. Concerning the dimensions of this population, there is an ongoing debate, due to the fact that during the census from 1992 many persons identified as being Roma by their immediate surroundings, declared themselves as belonging to another nationality. With an under-dimensioned but very active stratum of political and intellectual elite, Roma minority presents a very low level of political mobilization, their problems not being sufficiently articulated at the level of political life. One of the reasons leading to this phenomenon can be the high level of stratification of the above mentioned elite. However, the problems associated with this ethnic group remain diversified emphasized mainly at local level.

One can still notice (Tables 1 & 2) a gradual decrease of the weight and number of national minorities in Romania. This is only partially explained through their assimilation by the majority group, the main reason of this phenomenon, especially in the case of Germans, Jews and Hungarians, being the mass emigration.

The demographic patterns of the existing ethnic groups are significantly differing, which also can partially explain their decreasing amount. Even though there are accounts of linguistic and even ethnic assimilation (Table 5), there can not be advanced considerations in this respect, because the problem is highly politicized. Furthermore there exists no official data concerning the extent and direction of these trends.

The demographic stress, the fear of significant decrease in number is especially strong among the Hungarians from Romania, the emigration of Hungarians, as a consequence of an inadequate and unfavorable minority policy, being frequently mentioned in various discourses of Hungarian public and political actors. The fact is, that the Hungarians from Romania are more disposed to emigrate than the ethnic Romanians (Table 6) but it is rather difficult to clearly determine whether an unfavorable minority policy or the declining economy could be considered as a major reason for this.

Regarding the demographic stress, there is a widespread discourse of the Romanian political elite on the increase of the amount of Roma population, sustained by the demographic indicators, but often formulated in a language with racist accents.

Note: What conventionally is understand as Transylvania includes the historical provinces of Banat, Crisana, Maramures and Transylvania.

Table 3 Ethnic and religious structure of Romania’s population Census from1992 (Percentages)

*We marked with a T the counties which are in Transylvania.