Unit. 1.3 Nicholas II Flashcards
Nicholas II reign overview 1890-1905
1890-1900- Wittes Great Spurt- massive industrialisation thanks to Witte. Built more railways and heavy industry. By 1914, Russia 5th largest industrial power. But living and working conditions for urban workers led to discontent.
1901-05 - Increased Opposition- Tsar offers no opportunity for change, still using army and ohkrana for control. 1901- economic slump led to increased unrest and new political parties and groups formed.
1905- Japanese attack Russian naval base in china. Russian plan for attack to be short and efficient but a disaster and 24 out of 27 Russian fleet sunk in one battle.
there is lots of discontent and 150,000 workers go on strike- 20,000 go to palace holding pictures of the Tsar with peaceful intentions but 100 shot, Bloody Sunday.
Also a mutiny and general strike in Oct 1905- all workers in St Petersburg go on strike.
Nicholas II reign overview 1906-1915
1906-1911- Agrarian reforms - Stolypin reforms Mir system and redemption payments abolished. Reforms lead to increased peasant land ownership but land hunger still a problem as nobility still own 50% of land.
1906-1915- Four State Dumas- In October Manifesto he promises civil liberties and a state Duma, 1906 he issues fundamental laws saying he has total supreme autocratic power and he can appoint and dismiss Dumas when he wants.
1910-14- Strikes increased - 1912 massacre when 500 striking workers killed by army in Lena goldfields massacre
1914- WWI breaks out, Nicolas goes to front line to fight and leaves Rasputin with Wife
Nicholas Weakness
Declared himself ‘wholly unfit to reign’
Lacked the training and experience for leadership
Had inability to make decisions and an unwillingness to engage in politics
Lack of organisational skills
Found it difficult to say unpleasant things to ministers to their face and would often write notes to them after critiquing their ideas and proposals
“He lacked personal drive and ambition to install a sense of purpose and direction in the minsters and bureaucracy”
Tsarina
Alexandra was born of a German royal house and was a protestant. She converted to the Orthodox Church and thew herself into learning Russian customs and traditions. She declared a strong dislike for court like and this was reciprocated. Court perceived her as cold and aloof and she was regarded as an outsider. She was strong willed and obstinate. She believed firmly that the Tsar had been appointed by God to be the autocratic ruler of Russia. She was adamant that he should keep his power and not share with the people. Her influence on him was great. She would argue against move towards constituan monarchy. She also insisted they maintain their relationship with Rasputin
Rasputin
Grigory Yefimovich, gained reputation as a holy man, and the name Rasputin. 1905, he came to St Petersburg and became known to the royal family. Tsars Son suffered from Haemophilia and Rasputin seemed to be able to stop bleeding. Tsarina gave Rasputin an elevated position in court with direct access to the royal family. High society women flirted to him to ask for healing or carry petitions to Tsar. Rumours Rasputin solicited sexual favours for this help. Stories caused repetitional and political damage to Tsar. Created tension between church and Tsar.
Sergei Witte
In 1892 Sergei Witte became Finance Minister
His policies were little different to his predecessors, but his aims were more ambitious and he was more driven and dynamic. He was respected as a very capable statesman.
He supported autocracy but also believed industrilisation was necessary to preserve autocracy. He believed Russia had to industrialise to remain a world power and also that industrialisation would curb Russia’s revolutionary unrest.
As a result of Witte’s leadership there was more industrial progress made in the 1890s than there had been in the last decade. This period subsequently known as ‘Witte’s Great Spurt’.
Sergei Witte - Approach
Witte had a kind of holy passion for railways’ and saw them as agents of civilisation and progress. They would link up the vast spaces, the people, farms and factories of the Empire. They would carry products of industry to markets and raw materials to factories. More distant areas could be opened up for the supply of food and grain to the cities, encouraging more efficient farming.
Railways would also serve another purpose: they stimulated the metallurgical, engineering and coal industries. He believed that iron, coal and steel industries would form the basis for industrial development as they had done in western Europe.
Witte believed, like his predecessors, that industrial development had to be state led. Once it had taken off, private businessmen would run and develop industries.
Sergei Witte - Action
Witte continued the policies of previous finance ministers but on a bigger scale…
The development of railways and heavy industry was supported by:
High tariffs on foreign industrial goods: Witte continued the policy of high tariffs to protect domestic industries from foreign competition. This meant that companies in Russia bought home-produced iron, steel and other products and less money flowed out of Russia.
State investment: By 1899, the state bought almost 2/3rds of all metallurgical production, controlled 70% of the railways and owned numerous mines and oilfields. Witte also offered loans, subsidies and guarantees of profits to private companies. This was state sponsorship on a massive scale involving millions of roubles.
Foreign expertise: Witte encouraged more foreign companies, engineers and experts from France, Britain, Germany and other European countries to contribute their commercial and technological expertise. They were particularly evident in the new industrial areas in the South and in the oil industry.
To invest in railway construction and heavy industry he needed to increase state revenue:
Foreign loans, investment and expertise: Witte negotiated huge loans, particularly from the French. He also drew in foreign investors to put money into Russian joint-stock companies. By 1900, almost 45% of the capital in industrial joint-stock companies had been invested by foreigners.
Adopting the gold standard: A stable currency was essential to attract capital from abroad. Russia had built up its gold reserves and in 1897 adopted the gold standard for the rouble. This meant exchange rates for the rouble were fixed against other gold-backed currencies, providing added security for foreign investors.
Raised taxation rates: To get revenue for the state Witte raised indirect taxes on everyday items such as kerosene, matches and vodka.
Grain exports: The increased indirect taxes hit the peasants hard and they had to sell more grain to pay them. This allowed Witte to increase grain exports. Grain exports were the main way Russia could gain foreign currency to pay the high interest charged on foreign loans. So the more grain the better.
Sergei Witte- Impact- Positives
-Production in heavy industry increased: In the 1890s there was an annual growth rate of eight per cent. Coal output tripled, 1890-1900. Russia was now a major world producer of iron, steel and oil. Vast new areas of heavy industry producing iron and coal had opened up in places like the Donbass, and the oil industry in Caucasus had grown rapidly. The industrial areas in St Petersburg and Moscow were growing rapidly and by 1900 Moscow was one of the ten biggest cities in the world.
-The railways had stimulated industrial production: There was a railway boom in the 1890s and the amount of railway tracks nearly doubled. By the end of the 1890s almost 60% of all coal and iron was being used for railway development. Witte’s most famous project was the Trans-Siberian Railway across Russia. It involved 25 factories producing 39 million roubles worth of rails, and other Russian manufacturers producing 1,500 locomotives and 30,000 wagons. The railways also connected supplies of raw materials, areas of production and markets.
-Despite his dependence on foreigners, a new class of go-ahead Russian industrialists, entrepreneurs and businessmen began to emerge, especially in Moscow.
Sergei Witte - Impact - Negatives
-Neglected light industry: The production of cotton cloth increased by two-thirds during this period as the textiles industry was already established in Russia and benefitted from new markets opening up but on the whole Witte prioritised heavy industry. This meant that the smaller, sophisticated machine tool and electrical industries that would have reduced the need for imports and helped modernise manufacturing were not developed sufficiently.
-Over-reliance on foreign loans drained finances: The interest rates to service foreign debt were very high. By 1900, twenty per cent of the budget was used to pay off foreign debt, ten times as much as was spent on education.
-The people suffered: Witte was squeezing the people very hard but he hoped that industrial growth would take off and create more wealth for everyone before it hurt too much. The very rapid industrialisation meant that working and living conditions for workers were appalling. Wages were also kept low so that money went back into industrial development rather than into wage bills. This created strikes and general unrest.
-Neglected consumer goods: He failed to develop a market in consumer products which would have made life more tolerable for ordinary people. High tariffs on foreign industrial commodities made many goods very expensive for Russians to buy, especially agricultural machinery.
Trans-Siberian Railway
The most acclaimed development was the impressive construction of the Trans-Siberian Railway line, which crossed Russia from west to east. Its building provided a huge industrial stimulus while the psychological boost it provided, both at home and abroad, was perhaps even greater.
The Trans-Siberian Railway
Between 1891 and 1902 (with additions to 1914), at Witte’s instigation, a railway was constructed, linking central European Russia and Moscow with the Pacific Ocean. It ran to Vladivostok through an arrangement with the Chinese Eastern Railway in Manchuria - a distance of 7000 kilometres. It brought economic benefits - both through its construction and by opening up western Siberia for emigration and farming. It also had strategic benefits, but it promised more than it delivered.
Russian Industrial Development 1892-1914
Following Witte’s Great Spurt there was a depression in which there was slowed development:
* An international recession, starting in 1899, slowed progress. Russia entered a depression affecting the whole economy.
The annual growth rate fell to 1.4%.
* The areas that had been growing fast were the hardest hit: in the Donbass region mines were closing. The railway industry suffered and metal working firms in St.Petersburg were forced to close as government orders fell. Output in basic industries such as iron, oil and coal all declined.
* By 1903 Witte had lost the support of the Tsar and was dismissed.
* Just as there were signs of recovery in 1903, the Russo-Japanese War and the 1905 revolution held up development
After this there was a Recovery in which there was rapid development:
* From 1908 industry began to expand again. Heavy industry was still the driving force. This was in large part due to the government’s rearmament programme with huge orders for metallurgical companies to rebuild the Baltic fleet after the losses of the Russo-Japanese War and also to restock with weapons generally
* Railway construction regained pace. By
1913 Russia had the second largest railway network in the world (although it was not a close second to the USA’s).
*Industrial production grew steadily at a rate of around 6% per annum until 1914.
Evidence for and against Russia succeeding economically during this period
For:
-By 1914, Russia was the world’s fourth largest producer of coal, pig iron and steel. It was the world’s fifth largest industrial power.
-Development was becoming less state-led and less dependent on foreign investment. By 1909-11 domestic investment was three times greater than foreign investment. Russian entrepreneurs were investing in new factories, mines and power plants. There was a growing internal market and production of consumer goods rose. Russia appeared to be developing into a self-sustaining industrial economy.
-Russia had been late to industrialise, but this meant they could employ modern production methods. Industries were large-scale employing over 1,000 workers and in some plants tens of thousands, many more than in Germany. The latest technology was also being used.
Against:
-There were still structural problems in the economy. The focus on rearmament economy wasn’t balanced. For instance, industry could not meet the demand for agricultural tools and machinery. The chemical and machine tools industries remained weak, so these goods were still being bought from abroad.
-Russia still lagged behind other industrialised countries.
Per capita (per head) income in Russia was 1/10’h of the / USA and 1/5th of Britain. Industrial growth was still less rapid than in the USA or Germany so the gap widened.
-Although there were large-scale modern works, there were still a huge number of small-scale workshops. Almost 70% of the labour force worked in the small-scale workshops but they only produced 33% of total industrial output. This meant that their productivity was low.
-There was geographical imbalance, industry was heavily concentrated in areas such as the Donbass, Moscow and St Petersburg; not spread evenly across Russia. For instance, the Donbass region supplied almost 90% of Russian coal by 1913.
Khutor farm
Independent of Mir. This is what Stolypin hoped would happen to all the village.
Otrub farm
strips have been consolidated into 2 blocks, but still part of Mir System
Successes and Limitations of Stolypin’s agrarian reforms
Successes:
-The hereditary ownership of land by peasants increased from 20 per cent in 1905 to nearly 50 per cent by 1915.
-Grain production rose annually from 56 million tons in 1900 to 90 million by 1914. By 1909, Russia was the world’s leading cereal exporter.
-Stolypin’s encouragement to migrate took 3.5 million peasants away from the over-populated rural districts of the south and west to Siberia, and helped Siberia to develop into a major agricultural region, specialising in dairy and cereals by 1915.
Limitations:
-Changes in the land tenure arrangements took a long time to process. Disentangling land from the commune and trying to ensure each household gained land equivalent to their strips was difficult and led to protracted legal battles. By 1913, only 1.3 million out of 5 million applications for the consolidation of individual farms had been dealt with.
-By 1914, only around 10% of land had been transferred from communal to private ownership. In 1914, 90% of peasant holdings were still in strips, with conservative peasants (particularly in central Russia) reluctant to give up traditional practice and the security of the mir.Some saw those who left - the ‘Stolypin separators’ - as traitors to the peasant tradition.
-No redistribution of noble land (they still owned 50% in 1914) – without this land hunger would remain
-Land did transfer from the poorer peasants to the more enterprising but perhaps only 1% became kulaks
Stolypin’s Agrarian reforms
The rural violence of 1901 led to the establishment of a Commission of Agriculture, 1902. Stolypin, Governor of Saratov province at the time, was the most influential member.
The government was concerned by the peasant disturbances of the early twentieth century. Stolypin seemed to be the only Governor with firm control over his province leading to his appointment initially as Minister for Internal Affairs then as Prime Minister.
Stolypin believed peasant prosperity was the key to political stability.
He identified the peasant commune with its antiquated farming methods which ‘paralysed personal initiative’ as the problem. It also now seemed redundant to the government as a tool to control the peasantry, in fact it was responsible for stirring up unrest in some areas.
His reforms aimed to:
- reduce the power of the Mir (commune) allowing peasants to leave, to consolidate their strips of land into a single unit, rather than as a collection of scattered strips around the village, and that each owner should be able to develop it without interference by the mir. This demanded a complete transformation of the communal pattern of rural life but taking land from the Mir was a more attractive way of appeasing land hunger than taking land from the nobility and gentry.
- encourage enterprising peasants, freed from the mir, to create larger, more efficient, farms. These prosperous and satisfied peasants would then be more likely to support the regime and create a consumer market for industry. He called this approach ‘a gamble not on the drunken and feeble but on the sober and strong.’
Agriculture 1855-1906 - Remaining problems in 1906
State-led economic development focused on heavy industry:
-All finance ministers prioritised heavy industry and largely ignored agriculture. What’s more the high tariffs on foreign industrial commodities (Bunge, Vyshengradsky, Witte) made agricultural machinery too expensive
Remaining problems largely in the central (Black Earth) region:
-Most farming was still small-scale, inefficient and tied to the Mir. Emancipation had failed to change agricultural practice and yields remained low. Three-field system and strip farming continued.
-Emancipation left most with slightly less land than they had workedbefore. Their strips of landproved difficultto maintain andyielded little. The allocation in the overpopulated central region waswell below the average.
-Redemption payments and increased indirect taxation meant most peasants were still poor meaning they were unable to invest in agricultural improvements. The solcha (wooden plough) was still widely used.
-On average output from British farms was 4 times greater
Agriculture 1855-1906 - Improvements since 1855
Development of a productive kulak class :
-The Emancipation led to some improvement: some,often the former state-ownedpeasants, could hire labour and buy land.Emancipation (nobles sold land opening up the market) and Land Banks led to increased peasant land ownership. (By 1905 27% of nobles land had been bought by the peasantry). The kulaks were a growing class able to producea surplus meaning there was a gradual increase in productivity from the 1870s. (2.1% annual increase in grain production between1883-1914)
Progress on Peasant and noble owned land outside of central region supported by industrialisation :
-Landowners in the Baltic region benefitted from access to Western markets
-Trans-Siberian railway provided farms in Western Siberia with access to markets for their cereals, livestock and dairy products. The government encouraged peasant migration to Siberia from 1896.
-New approaches and technology: new crop rotations (e.g. potatoes), iron ploughs, fertilisers. Wealthier noble landowners were using mechanised equipment like threshing machines by the early 20th century.
Agriculture 1855-1906- Problems in 1855
-Serfdom and Conservative Mir
-Lack of knowledge and technology
-Little access to markets
-Lack of fertile land(land hunger)
Social Change 1890-1914
The pace of economic change was reflected in the social upheaval Which Russia underwent in the period 1880-1914. Cities and towns grew rapidly and introduced a new social environment. Urbanisation also had a huge impact on the lives of peasants. Russian society became more complex as the working class and middle class developed and the role of nobles was in a state of flux.
An important factor in this period of rapid social change was the huge increase in population. The total number of inhabitants of the Russian Empire grew trom 74 million in 1858 to 128 million in 1897 to 178 million in 1914. Around 80 per cent were peasants. This had a huge impact on the countryside but it was the growth of the cities that was most startling
Between 1863 and 1914 the population of St Petersburg had quadrupled to 2.2 million . Moscow had more than 1.7 million inhabitants by 1914.
And these growing cities were full of peasants working in factories and as street vendors, builders, shop assistants and domestics. In 1890 over two-thirds of the population of St Petersburg had been born outside the city; in Moscow the proportion was even higher
How far did society change from 1894-1914 - Nobility - Continuities
-Maintained their Status - Many, as they had for centuries, maintained their stranglehold on the top jobs - in 1897, 1,000 of the1,400 highest ranking civil servants were nobles.The tsar wanted them to maintain their power and so appointed them to influential roles such as provincial governor or vice-governor.
-Land Ownership Decreased- In 1861 they owned 80% of land, 191450% - and they sold it mainly to peasants.
-Adapted with new careers - A relatively small numberdeveloped their estates, using more modern methods and machinery. Most moved tothe cities and towns adapting to their changing circumstances by forging new careers as professionals, investors or businessmen.
-Some Struggled financially- Some fell into debt as they lost their land and failed to adapt to the changing world around them – they now had to create their own wealth. They did not for instance understand the need to use new agricultural methods or invest in the industrial economy.
How far did society change from 1894-1914 - Nobility - Changes
The traditional landowning nobles felt their status and power was under threat after the 1905 Revolution. They set up the ‘United Nobility’ in 1906 to protect their interests. They opposed Stolypin’s agrarian reforms and were a conservative influence on Nicholas II.
How far did society change from 1894-1914 - Middle class - Continuities
-Industrialisation and modernisation led to growth but still a small group. Some were sons of nobles choosing a different path, some of peasant origin- The number of home-grown businessmen was increasing during the twentieth century. By 1914 there were some 2,000 innovative and successful entrepreneurs. There were probably around 1 million professionals by 1914.
The number of doctors grew from 17,000 in 1897 to 28,000 in 1914.
The number of teachers had almost doubled between 1906 and 1914 to over 20,000
-Many of them worked for the zemstvo - Many of them worked for the zemstva,forming the ‘third element’ in society - lawyers, statisticians, civil engineers, managers, doctors, teachers, vets and agronomists.
-Professional associations established - The regime was worried by the proliferation professional associations, and they were right to be. The Pirogov Medical Society ninth congress in 1904 ended with demands for a parliament and cries of ‘down with the monarchy’.
How far did society change from 1894-1914 - Middle class - Changes
-Before 1905 industrialists, businessmen and bankers tended to stay out of politics because many needed government business and sponsorship. After 1908 a significant number took up positions in the Duma, representing a wide spread of political opinion, some in Liberal as well as the rightist parties. Industrialists and commercial groups did get together to express their views on matters relating to their field and tried to influence government, but it was only after 1905 that this took on a national dimension. In 1906 the Association of Industry and Trade was formed and had considerable political influence.
-Middle-class women had made progress, mainly after 1900. Female teachers, doctors and architects were working for the Zemstva. Ideals of female liberation had spread among the educated classes and some, like Alexandra Kollantai, could be found in Marxist groups. In 1905 university co-education was won. Women’s organisations started to spring up across Russia and in 1908 the First All-Russian Congress of Women was held in St Petersburg: half of the delegates earned their living. The women’s movement campaigned for sexual and educational equality. Women enjoyed literary, artistic and journalistic successes.
-The numbers of middle-class voluntary organisations and associations mushroomed. In Moscow by 1912 there were over 600. Some dealt with serious matters, for example, the Imperial Economic Society debated the great issues of industrialisation. But others were involved with leisure and entertainment, for example, new technology like motor cars. Importantly these groups were creating a more diverse society. The state could not control them or the views being expressed in them. The regime was finding it hard to come to terms with these new Western ideas and values which accompanied modernisation.
How far did society change from 1894-1914 - Peasants- Continuities
-Improvements outside central regions- In areas outside of the central agricultural regions area, especially those nearest to cities many peasants enjoyed higher living standards. This might account for the increased peasant consumption of consumer goods identified over this period, particularly in the lead up to the First World War.
-Growing wealth divide- kulaks- Stolypin’s reforms contributed to the growing divide between the richest and poorest sections of the peasantry. The kulaks continued to grow as a class but remained small. After Stolypin’s reforms some of these would have been khutors farming their consolidated plots independently of the Mir.
-Areas closest to urban areas benefitted -Areas nearest to cities or with access to transport benefitted from industrial developments. New technologies - railways, roads, the telegraph - were moving closer to the peasantry. Hospitals, schools,reading clubs and libraries were appearing.
-Increased migration to urban areas -Russia’s urban population quadrupled 1867-1917 and most were migrant peasants. By 1914 3 out of 4 people living in St. Petersburg were peasants by birth and over half of the city’s population had arrived in the last 20 years.
-Little change in the central region- Peasants continued to live a hard, traditional way of life in the central regions in spite of Stolypin’s reforms. For most, poverty, debt, disease and land hunger were still common features of peasant life. The Mir remained the heart of the village. Strong loyalties to the tsar and the Russian Orthodox Church remained.
-Population growth - The number of peasants grew. The Russian Empire grew from 74 million in 1858 to 128
million in 1897 and 178 million in 1914.Around 80% were peasants. Although mortality rates were still the highest in Europe. Average life expectancy was around 28 years in Russia and 45 years inEngland.
How far did society change from 1894-1914 - Peasants- Changes
-Stolypin’s agrarian reforms encouraged poorer peasants to sell out to the more prosperous ones. This created bands of migrant laborers looking for either farming work or industrial employment.
-There was a growing divide between younger and older peasants. Younger more literate peasants were better able to deal with new agricultural technologies and money matters e.g. contracts and loans. They were more likely to beStolypin ‘separators’. Older peasants represented the more traditional village.
-From 1896 peasants from the overcrowded central regions were encouraged to migrate to Siberia along the Trans-Siberian railway. Some were successful but many failed. Thousands (75,000 in 1910) returned home or joined the migrant labour force, often angry.
-Literacy among peasants had increased since the 1880s yet, as with the workers, the increase under Nicholas II was much more marked. There was an 85% increase in primary school provision 1905-1914. In the total adult population literacy rose from 21 per cent in 1897 to 40 per cent in 1914
How far did society change from 1894-1914 - Workers - Continuities
-Maintained rural connections-By 1900 around one-third had fathers who had been industrial workers. The rest, ex-peasants, retained their village connections and many returned for the harvest. Even in 1907 half of Moscow printers still kept farms in their home villages while 90% sent money back to relatives.
-Poor living and working conditions-Working conditions were grim. Long hours, harsh discipline and accidents common. Wages weregenerally low apart from a small section of skilled workers. Women were the lowest paid.
Housing was expensive and in short supply. Workers lived in huge overcrowded buildings in Moscow and StPetersburg. Peasant migrants often worked and lived together renting communal apartments. Some factories haddormitories attached and in smaller workshops some slept around their machine
The cities had poor sanitation.Many workers had to use communal bathhouses as houses were without running water. Sewage systems were lacking in 40% of houses in St.Petersburg so carts would collect excrement from back yards. As late as 1911 Stolypin talked of the problems of typhus, smallpox and cholera in St Petersburg where one-third of deaths were caused by infectious diseases.
-Some attempts to improve conditions-There were some attempts to improve conditions:
1897: Working day limited to 11.5 hours
1912: Sickness and accident insurance
Yet, the reduced working hours and 1912 insurance did not benefit the majority of the workforce. In some workplaces their hours were actually increased after 1905. For old age and unemployment there was little or no support.
-Small but still growing-By 1900, the workers numbered around 3 million (around 25% were women) and by 1913 there were 6 million.
-Urban areas offered new activities- Urban areas provided new activities. Many frequented taverns butmore ‘respectable’ workers also went to music hall, dances, tea-drinking clubs and self-helplectures
How far did society change from 1894-1914 - Workers - Changes
-As the workforce increased there was more pressure on housing and public services. Living conditions deteriorated.
-Rural connections reduced gradually as the workers developed their own identity. The majority of workers who began employment 1906-13 were the children of workers.
-The level of literacy had increased more for workers than peasants since the 1880s as there were more primary schools in urban areas. Yet, the increase under Nicholas II was much more marked. By 1914 64% were literate compared with 40% for the adult population in general. The impact of this was a wider readership of everything from newspapers, political leaflets (particular Marxist) and fiction.
-The provision of Churches and priests had not kept pace with the growth of urbanisation and, in any case, the Orthodox religion often seemed to have little relevance for the workers who were often more attracted by the teachings of the Marxist socialist groups who invited them to reading circles and talks. Some liberal clergy expressed the wish to regenerate the Church but their calls were silenced by Pobedonostsev, the Over-Procurator between 1880 and 1905
Culture 1894-1914- education
The growth of education also brought change. Government expenditure on primary education grew from 5 million roubles in 1896 to over 82 million by 1914. By 1911, over 6.5 million children between 8 and 11 (44 per cent of that age group) were receiving primary education, although only one third of these were girls, and the spread was uneven with urban areas better provided for than rural ones. There was still 40 per cent illiteracy in 1914, but a basic level of education certainly helped to increase a sense of self-worth among the literate. The number of books and publications proliferated, particularly after 1905 when the popular press boomed. There were 1767 newpapers being published at least weekly by 1914. Reading rooms were also establised and popular literature flourished, in which the portrayal of those who had succeeded in bettering themselves was a common theme.
Secondary and higher education remained elitist, however. Between 1860 and 1914 the number of university students in Russia grew from 5000 to 69,000 (45 per cent of them women). However, although a quarter of students in secondary school in 1911 came from the peasantry, this amounted to only 30,000 individuals.
More serious writers and artists used their art forms to address problems in Russian society during this period. Anton Chekhov, for example, produced a stream of stories and plays from the 1880s until his death in 1904, continuing the realist tradition of Leo Tolstoy and Fyodor Dostoevsky in the 1860s and 1870s. By the early twentieth century the nineteenth-century classics of Russian literature could be obtained in cheap mass-produced editions, and these too were readily sought by the newly literate, as well as the traditional readership of the educated elites.
Culture 1894-1914- censorship
The relaxation of censorship controls from 1905 produced the ‘silver age’ of Russian culture, dominated in particular by poets. There were experiments in modernism, for example Igor Stravinsky’s music, Serge Diaghilev’s ballets, Marc Chagall’s pictures and Kazimir Malevich’s paintings, which offered new and often ‘shocking’ challenges to convention and showed that, for all its deficiencies, Russia was culturally as much a part of the modern world’ as its more advanced economic neighbours.
By 1914, Russian culture had certainly broadened and diversified to encompass a much wider group than the intelligentsia elites, and to some extent it mirrored the many other changes running through Russian society.
Nevertheless, some aspects of Russian culture and behaviour seemed to exhibit little change. The year 1913 was the tercentenary year of the Romanov dynasty, and Nicholas and Alexandra revelled in the traditional jubilee rituals organised to celebrate the permanency of the Romanovs, encouraging the wearing of traditional Muscovite costumes and Orthodox ceremonies to mark the occasion. Touring his Empire to jubilant and obsequious crowds, Nicholas returned convinced that my people love me.
Alexandra added, We need merely to show ourselves and at once their hearts are ours
Culture 1894-1914- Maxim Gorky
Another hugely important writer of this period was Maxim Gorky (born Alexei Peshkov). An orphan at eight, he had a harsh upbringing of poverty and cruelty which he described in his book My Childhood (1913). As a boy and young man he roamed the countryside and towns, working in a host of jobs such as dishwasher, icon painter and baker. He took up with a Populist revolutionary in the late 1870s and was bitterly disillusioned by the way they were rejected by the peasants. Gorky turned to writing and started to write short stories which appeared initially in newspapers and journals. His stories were immensely popular and in 1898 his first collection of short stories was published.
Gorky became one of the country’s most read authors and a celebrity, the first writer of quality to emerge from the lower levels of Russian society. His stories were consumed voraciously by workers who could identify with his heroes and themes because they drew on the concerns that filled their everyday lives.
He emerged as the champion of the poor and the oppressed. His adopted pseudonym Maxim Gorky (gorky means ‘bitter’ in Russian) tuned in with the workers’ spirit of defiance. He started writing about politics and the hardships, humiliations and brutal treatment of workers, peasants and Jews. He joined political groups and associated with the emerging Marxist Social Democrats, becoming a personal friend of Lenin. He was very influential in the opposition to the Tsar and later played an important role in and after the 1917 revolution.
Culture 1894-1914- Chekhovs The Cherry Orchard
By the time he wrote The Cherry Orchard in 1904, the year of his death, Chekhov’s reputation was second only to Tolstoy’s. The play is a satire of the old-world gentry and the cult of rural Russia. Ranyevskaya’s feckless family are forced by debt to sell their prized possession, the cherry orchard, to Lopakhin, a merchant whose grandfather was a serf and whose father was a peasant. This social rise was possible after 1861. Lopakhin plans to clear the land and build dachas (country homes) on it for the middle class of Moscow and even tries to persuade the family to develop it themselves. They will not, he buys it and the play ends with the sound of the axe.
Lopakhin is the first merchant hero to be represented on the Russian stage and, as Orlando Figes has written, Chekhov, in his last play, ‘embraces the cultural forces that emerged in Moscow on the eve of the twentieth century.
Culture 1894-1914- The Russian Avant- Garde
The younger generation of merchant patrons collected modern art and Moscow became the centre of the avant-garde at the beginning of the twentieth century.
Merchants helped fund the Jack of Diamonds’ exhibitions. Larionov and Goncharova were key founders of the group and Malevich showed at the first exhibition. One of the organisers regarded the title Jack of Diamonds’ as a symbol of young enthusiasm and passion, ‘for the Jack implies youth and the suit of diamonds represents seething blood’. They declared war on the realist tradition and shocked the public with their art. By this time Malevich believed in the radical reduction of painting to nothing but shape and colour. His revolutionary contribution was The Black Square in 1915. It was first shown as part of a group of abstract paintings in a dramatic display in Moscow in December 1915, and was hung high and across a corner, connecting two walls, just as icons were mounted in homes all across Russia. Characteristically immodest, he said The Black Square marked “the beginning of a new culture’, which he called suprematism.
Russification 1894- 1904
The census of 1897 revealed that only 43 per cent of the Russian population could be called ethnically Russian; the regime’s overt identification with this group, as well as its commitment to the Orthodox Church, continued to alienate ethnic minorities. Nicholas Il continued Alexander Ill’s heavy-handed policy of Russification, which sought to discriminate against minority languages and religions. Nowhere was this discrimination more intense than in Poland: Nicholas even installed a large garrison there to ensure the mass uprising of 1863 was not repeated. The tsar, church and traditional nobility supported the nationalist and anti-Semitic Black hundreds’ organisations which emerged from 1900. Continued Russification drove non-Russians towards opposition groups. A young Stalin attended a school in Georgia where children were beaten for lapsing into their mother-tongue: he later joined the Georgian Social Democrats
Anti semitism 1894-1904
The regime did not attempt to ‘Russify’ the Jews (the Jewish population numbered approximately 5.5 million by 1900): they were simply persecuted. As under Alexander III, efforts continued to prevent Jews from acquiring land or accessing higher education, and they were still forced by law to live in the Pale of Settlement. By the end of the 19th century there were over 1400 regulations against the Jews. Pogroms continued with the most notable in Kishinev in 1903 (see below), when the Okhrana and state police not only turned a blind eye but also seemed to endorse the violence. Nicholas saw the pogroms as acts of loyalty from Russians. Massive Jewish migration to the United States and elsewhere, drained a fifth to a quarter of the Jewish population from Russia between 1881 and 1914. Those who stayed were often drawn in disproportionately high numbers to radical socialist groups, which were playing an increasingly important role by 1905 in drumming up proletarian unrest: Trotsky, Martov, Zinoviev and Kamenev are all examples of ethnic Jews who took up the revolutionary cause.
Government and opposition 1894- 1904 - Nicholas approach
Nicholas Il had been brought up to take his duties as a ruler seriously, and to believe that any concessions or signs of weakness would be indications of cowardice and failure on his part. No doubt such attitudes had been instilled in him by Pobedonostsev, his tutor. As he declared shortly before his coronation, he was resolved ‘to maintain the principle of autocracy just as firmly and unflinchingly as it was preserved by my unforgettable dead father.’ Nicholas continued with the policies of his father. The emergency powers of 1881 (Law on Exceptional Measures aka Statute of State Security) were kept more or less intact and the policy of Russification was pursued vigorously. Nicholas’ commitment to Orthodoxy also ensured that the Church maintained its powerful influence.
Government and opposition 1894- 1904 - Beginnings of unrest
The years after 1894 were a time of serious unrest. Russian society had become more politicised in the years after the Great Famine of 1891-92. The failure of the government to cope with the crisis, which had left the zemstva and voluntary organisations to provide relief work, had bred scorn and despair. As a result, there was not only greater public mistrust of the government’s competence, but also a firmer belief in the power of ordinary members of society to play a role in the nation’s affairs. Witte’s Great Spurt had also threatened the stability of the regime: it had resulted in increased peasant migration to urban areas, a bigger and more educated workforce and the growth of the middle classes. These conditions presented more pressure for political change.
Government and opposition 1894- 1904 - Government dealing with initial uprisings
As the 1890s progressed, urban workers became more militant.
They resented deeply the conditions they had to endure as well as the way they were treated. The textile workers in St Petersburg mounted massive strikes - 30,000 spinners and weavers - in 1896 and 1897. The strikes were brutally suppressed, with the arrest of over 1000 workers. Yet, this action also forced the government to concede the only significant piece of factory legislation in this period - restricting the working day to eleven and a half hours. More worrying for the government was that local Marxist Social Democrat groups were active in encouraging workers to take strike action. The peak for strikes was reached in 1899 and involved nearly 100,000 workers. The government could only deal with them by police repression, arrests, imprisonment, exile and even execution. A special factory police force was established in 1899 and its units stationed permanently near large industrial works.
There were new outbursts of trouble in Russian universities.
These were met by the increased use of the Okhrana, whose activities ensured rebellious young people were expelled, exiled or drafted into the army and, when necessary, submitted to military force. In 1901, for example, a squadron of mounted Cossacks charged into a crowd of students in St Petersburg, killing thirteen, and in the aftermath of the incident, 1500 students were imprisoned. The middle classes were horrified by the police brutality and many students were radicalised.
Thousands joined the Socialist Revolutionaries.
Government and opposition 1894 - 1904 - Instability beginning to spread
As Russia moved into the twentieth century it was in a volatile condition. There had been another famine in the Central Volga region in 1898-9. And then things got worse. An international recession after 1900 caused a deep depression in Russia. It affected all areas of the economy and workers were hit by falling wages and unemployment, resulting in widespread industrial action. Workers returned to their villages to stir up peasant revolt where there was already huge anger about taes and high rents. Peasant revolts ripped through the countryside
1902-04.
There were so many instances of arson in the rural communities, 1903-04, that the nickname the years of the red cockerel, referring to the leaping flames which resembled a rooster’s comb, was coined. The unrest was at its worst in the central Russian provinces, where the landlord/peasant relationship was still at its most traditional, but it also spread into Georgia, the Ukraine and Poland. Peasants set fire to their landlords’ barns, destroying grain, or vented their anger by seizing pasture or even physically attacking landlords. The government had no answer other than repression: prisons were filling up with political prisoners.
Government and opposition 1894 - 1904 - Use of the Orthodox Church
Imperial Russia remained a strongly Orthodox State and the moral domination of the Orthodox Church over the ill-educated peasantry was hugely beneficial to the regime as a means of control. Priests had close ties with the village would read out Imperial manifestos and decrees and inform the police of any suspicious activity. In 1902 the Holy Synod instructed bishops to get their priests ‘to explain to their congregations the falseness, according to the word of God, of the appeals of the evil-minded who urge them to destroy the authorities established by the tsar and to attack the property of others’. The Church made sure that the peasants got the message to support the regime clearly in church and in primary schools. So Church and State were bound up with each other and the Church acted as a prop for the autocracy.
Government and opposition 1894- 1904 - formation of unions
Industrial strikes escalated, numbering around 17,000 in 1894 to around 90,000 in 1904. In 1901, the Obukhov factory in St Petersburg saw violent clashes between armed police and whip-carrying Cossacks and such sights became commonplace. In an attempt to control the proliferation of illegal unions, in 1900 the Moscow chief of the Okhrana, Sergei Zubatov, began organising his own police-sponsored trade unions. The idea was to provide “official’ channels through which complaints could be heard, in an attempt to prevent workers joining the radical socialists. The experiment only lasted to 1903, when Zubatov was dismissed after one of his unions became involved in a General Strike in Odessa. However, another union on the Zubatov model, the Assembly of St Petersburg Factory Workers, was formed in 1904 by Father Gapon. The union was approved by Nicholas’ Minister for Internal Affairs, Plehve, and had the support of the Orthodox Church.
Liberals - Origins
it is the zemstva that have been identified as ‘the seedbeds of liberalism. These councils had created a class of people who became skilled in local politics. They included liberal-leaning members of the Russian nobility as well as representatives of the middle classes. Many middle-class professionals employed by the zemstva - the
‘third element’ - worked at the interface with peasants and workers and had a real desire to improve social conditions. The inadequacies and inefficiencies of government bureaucracy became very apparent to this third element’ during the 1891-92 famine and thereafter they wanted to see reforms, an extension of freedoms and civil rights, and more participation in government.
The idea of liberalism’ prevalent in western Europe took a different form in Russia. What Russian liberals agreed on was that reform rather than violence was the way to change the tsarist system and limit the tsar’s powers. Liberalism took on a more organised form at the beginning of the twentieth century. In 1903, the Union of Liberation was formed, demanding economic and political reform . The Liberals were the major opposition to tsarism before 1905 and in that year formed two major political parties - the Kadets (constitutional democrats) and the Octobrists
