The establishment of Hungarian language universities in Romania and elsewhere has to be seen in context. It is an expression of legitimacy, including the legitimacy of definition. The minority group is free to decide how it should view itself, has a right to exist as a cultural entity, to express itself in the language of its choice. This is a battle fought on the cultural plane, the only plane on which minorities have been given international recognition. The wish to found such institutions is felt keenly because it is perceived as a life or death struggle.
Recognition is, to all practical intents and purposes, a guarantee of survival.
Use of one's native tongue to set out one's own thoughts and emotions is not usually contested. It is more usually seen as a fundamental, basic right. Only official recognition can legitimate a minority's desire for this limited degree of cultural autonomy. Coupled with the importance attached to language within Hungarian self-definition, Hungarian interest in the fate of Hungarian minorities abroad can be better understood as neither morbid chauvinism nor concealed revisionism. With the ratification of the Treaty of Trianon, Hungary was forced to cede two thirds of her territory to her neighbours.