FAREWELL TO JÁNOS
A gentleman has gone. János Rechnitzer, the chairman of the editorial board of the CITY.HU Urban Studies Review, was one of the fantastic figures of the Hungarian men's and geographers society: not only an excellent scientist, but also a true colleague and a true friend, straightforward, outspoken, helpful, respectful of knowledge and of others. He had a critical mind and was very talented. He was always elegant, with a well-tailored jacket and bow tie, and more recently, youthfully and fashionably coloured trousers. Before his illness, he was always cheerful, passionate about a more colourful and varied life, fine food and wine, socialising, books, music, science, the arts, and above all his family, his wife, children and grandchildren. He has read a lot and passed it on in his writings, from the university cathedra and more recently on the pages of the online journal CITY.HU. We set this up together, and although it was my original obsession to have an online academic journal on cities, he embraced it and took it on board as President of the György Enyedi Regional Science Foundation.
According to our website, the main aim of the journal is to present historical and especially modern urban phenomena, the theoretical context of the city, its spatial, social and economic problems and transformations in a scientific manner. Our essential aspiration is to publish the scientific results of Hungarian and international urban research. Particular emphasis will be given to the urban areas of Central and Eastern Europe, and to the results of comparisons with the Western urban development model. Among the objectives, emphasis will be placed on the presentation of various national workshops, research communities, individual research and the promotion of the publication activities of young researchers. The central aim is to preserve, disseminate and possibly reinterpret the scientific work and creative spirit of György Enyedi in the field of urban studies.
Showing his tolerance and openness to differences, one of the essential tasks of the journal is to bridge the gap between different professional fields, to bring together and integrate the perspectives of different disciplines. We both felt it was important to involve regionalists, geographers, social geographers, sociologists, urbanists, regional economists in the work of the journal. Not so long ago, he declared that he was now an urban researcher, and indeed many of his books, studies and research published in recent years have been on urban themes. But even before that, he was aware of the importance of territorial centres in economic and social life.
But now, sadly, we must say goodbye to him, and these are not just words, but the truth, he really does leave an unfillable void.
Rest in peace, my dear friend, colleague and companion.
Viktória Szirmai
Budapest, 23.06.2023.
The foundation
The number of regional scientific publication forums in the national journal market is extremely low. Apart from two or three qualified journals, there are only a few other publication opportunities and periodical online publications available to the scientific community. Within regional science, there are no periodicals specifically devoted to the theoretical and practical phenomena and research on cities, urban areas and urban systems. While there is a growing academic and lay interest in communicating the social, economic and environmental problems of large and smaller cities, there is also a growing need for a more comprehensive regional policy. The Enyedi György Regional Science Foundation aims to meet this demand.
In previous years, the Foundation has been involved in the scientific community by launching calls for proposals and supporting events. But now the time has come to broaden the Foundation's activities: partly because of the shrinking supply of national journals and partly because of the gradual strengthening of urban studies, the Foundation has set a new goal: to create an online journal that will provide a forum for urban issues and will be open to the professional public.
Scientific mission
The main aim of the online journal CITY.HU is to present theoretical interpretations of historical and especially modern urban phenomena, social and economic problems and transformations of different types of cities. An essential aim is also to publish the scientific results of Hungarian and international urban research. Particular emphasis is given to the urban areas of Eastern and Central Europe, and the results of comparisons with the Western urban development model. Among the objectives, emphasis will be placed on the presentation of the results of various national workshops, research communities, individual research and the promotion of the publication activities of urban researchers, including young researchers. The central aim is to preserve, disseminate and re-think the scientific work and creative spirit of György Enyedi in the field of the city. This is an expression of the outstanding merits of the György Enyedi Foundation in the establishment of the journal.
Another important aim of the journal is to fill in the different professional gaps, to bring together and integrate the perspectives of different disciplines, to make people aware that regionalists, social geographers, sociologists, urbanists, regional economists are all investigating the same spatial, social and economic processes, albeit from different perspectives, but the result is always the same: an objective, factual and multifaceted description of the phenomena taking place in urban spaces.
The founders
Viktória Szirmai - founding editor-in-chief
Viktória Szirmai, Doctor of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Széchenyi Prize-winning sociologist, university professor. Researcher in urban and regional sociology, environmental sociology, social conflicts, social competitiveness, spatial-social inequalities, climate change, social well-being. Research Professor at the Institute of Sociology of the Centre for Social Research, Head of the Department of Urban Studies at the Kodolányi János University. She is a film and book lover, a real urban researcher, loves travelling and exploring cities. Author of several monographs, edited volumes and studies (see MTMT), she lives in Budapest with her husband and daughter, a geographer, who are both involved in spatial planning. She loves cooking and, according to her friends, can cook.
János Rechnitzer - president of editorial board
János Rechnitzer (Hédervár 1952 - Budapest 2023), economist at PTE (1975), university doctor (1979), candidate of economics (1984), doctor of Hungarian Academy of Sciences (1994). In 1986 he founded the Scientific Department of West Hungary (Győr), which he was director until 2008, and research professor emeritus from onward. President of the Regional Science Committee of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (1996-2008, 2016-2018), President of the Hungarian Regional Science Society (2011-2019). In 2009 he was awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of Miskolc. Founder and head of the Doctoral School of Regional and Economic Sciences at Széchenyi István University (Győr) (2004-2020). Scientific advisor of iASK (Kőszeg) (2021-2023). During his academic career he has published more than 460 publications, including 23 books, and has around 3300 citations. His hobby was art collection, geometric and concrete works.
