ETHNIC AND RELIGIOUS DISPARITIES IN THE APUSENII SĂLAJULUI FROM COMMUNISM TO CAPITALISM

Abstract

The aim of this study was to achieve an evolutionary-temporal analysis of demographic evolution, ethnic and confessional structure in Apusenii Sălajului. The period subjected to the study begins with the abdication of King Mihai I and the establishment of communism in Romania in the year 1948. The two demographic structures have undergone significant influences from the regime, contributing decisively to their modification. Unfortunately, the confessional structure had the most to suffer because of the atheism promoted by the communists. In Apusenii Sălajului there is an important confessional diversity due to several ethnicities that populate the mountain space. The most destructive confessional community in the Apusenii Sălajului was the Greek Catholic. In the year 1948, the regime banned this confession, with the population constrained to convert to the Orthodox confessional. Priests who did not obey, were arrested and convicted, many dying in prisons, as was the case of bishops. Because of these repression, the population passed to the Orthodox confession. All confessions were compelled to pass to the Orthodox cult, being the only cult accepted by the regime. Five censuses were used to carry out the study, from 1941, 1956, 1977, 1992 and 2011. The census of 1956 and 1977 are those of the Communist period that did not record the confession. Thus, in order to be able to analyze and observe the significant changes we used the data from the census in the year 1941.