Gyula Juhász was an eminent Hungarian historian, who focused in his scholarship on the 1930s and 1940s. His works deal primarily with diplomatic and intellectual history. During the period of Stalinism in Hungary, he joined the armed forces and led the history department of the Stalin Military and Political Academy (which was renamed after Stalin's death). In 1956, he left the army in protest against the reprisals which were taken in the wake of the 1956 Revolution. In 1958, he completed a degree in history from Eötvös Loránd University, and he became an employee at the Institute of History of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. Because of his involvement in the Revolution, he initially had limited access to archives, but he still decided to train himself as a professional historian. He practically relaunched his career. He became one of the historians who renewed the discipline beginning in the 1960s, and he was a target of criticism by officials for his “objectivism” (meaning that his research was based on the  thorough study of primary sources). In 1985, he founded the Institute of Hungarian Studies, and he became its first director. From1986 until his death in 1993, he served as the director of the National Széchényi Library. He also co-presided over the World Association of Hungarians from 1989.