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# {2-590.} 4. THE HABSBURG REGIME ADOPTS A MORE ACTIVE STANCE

Contents

- Tax Reform
- The Estates' Plans for Economic Reform
- The Last Wave of the Counter-Reformation; Recognition of the Romanian Orthodox Church
- The Institutional Consolidation of Absolutism
- The Establishment of the Frontier Guard; The Siculicidium
- 'Certain Points'
- Cultural Life

Around 1750, a significant shift occurred in Transylvania's political life. Previously, the Habsburg central government had concentrated on matters of taxation and the Counter-Reformation; now, it began to show a more active interest in Transylvanian affairs. The empire had been shorn of Silesia, and state debt had mushroomed as a consequence of the War of Austrian Succession; the imperial government thus felt compelled to develop and exploit the country's productive resources in a more systematic fashion. The initiatives taken did not depart fundamentally from the pattern in the preceding decades. Vienna still did not develop a comprehensive economic policy with regard to Transylvania, but it took a more systematic approach to the reform of fiscal and treasury policy.