Alexander II

• Background

  • Mid-nineteenth centry Russia was a large but economically underdeveloped empire
  • Around 85% of the population were privatley or state owned serfs
• Impact of Crimean War 1853 - 1856

  • Alexander II became Tsar in 1855
  • They were already loosing the war at this point
  • The final defeat highlighted the problem of Russias reliance on serf armies with harsh conscripts of 25 years
  • Highlighted the countries economic backwardness
  • Increased serf uprisings and caused humillation
• Political motives for Emancipation of the Serfs

  • Autocracy depended on the nobility, yet many of the nobels who relied on serfs to make money out of their estates were in debt
  • Many had been forced to mortagage their land due to a growing serf population and inadequate agricultural systems
• Economic motives for the emancipation of the serfs

  • Serfdom kept the peasants in the mirs, preventing them from moving to work in town factories, keeping the internal demand for good low
  • Rural poverty left many serfs unable to pay their taxes which meant that by 1859, the state faced a debt of 54 million roubles
• Moral and intellectual motives for emancipation

  • Westinisers believed Russia should abandon serfdom
  • Slavophines favoured refoming serfdom but wanted to keep Russias traditional peasant society
  • Some intellectuals felt it was immoral to treat people like animals
• Procedure of the emancipation

  • After the Crimean War ended, Alexander set up committees to examine the emancipation
  • The provicial nobels failed to agree to measures and Alexander was exasperated by the prolongued debate
  • The emancipation was proclaimed in Alexanders Edict of 1861
  • It only applied to privatley owned serfs, state serfs recieved their freedom in 1866
• Terms of the edict pt1

  • Serfs were declared legally free and had rights - The rights often remained theoretical because of other terms of the edict.
  • Serfs were given their own cottage and allotment of land - Enterprising peasants could buy up land, increase output and make money from the sale of surplus grain. Those who were prepared to sell land could move to an industrialising city and obtain regular wages. Land allocations varied and for some, it was insufficent to live on.
• Terms of the edict pt2

  • Landlords were granted government bonds as compensation - Landowners could use the compensation to redeem debts and invest in industrial enterprises. Some could just pay off debts and were forced to sell their remaining land.
  • The obruk (labour service) remained for a two year period of 'temporary obligation' - Peasants were resentful, there were 647 riots in four months after the decree.
• Terms of the edict pt3

  • Serfs were required to make 49 annual 'redemption payments' for the land they were given - Provoked unrest. Land prices were sometimes fixed above market value, leaving freed serfs in considerable debt. Some peasants had to work for their old masters or rend land from them (paid back with crops) to survive. The 'purchasing power' of the peasants remained low, some became drifiting landless labourers.
• Terms of the edict pt4

  • The mir was responsible for the collection of taxes, including redemption dues
  • Freed serfs had to remain within the mir until the redemption payments were complete - Mirs constrained the peasants, preventing them from leaving the countryside
  • The mir supervised the farming of allocated land - Mirs tended to promote restrictive and backward farming practices
• Terms of the edict pt5

  • Landowners were allowed to retain meadows, pasture, woodland and personal land - Some former serfs struggled to make a living without the use of additional land
  • Communal fields were controlled by the mir for use by everyone - Serfs lost their landlords 'protection'
• Reasons for further reform

  • There was disappointment at the emancipation which caused unrest in the countryside
  • The emancipation left issues needing resolution - eg conscription and control of local government
• Military reforms 1874

  • Conscription was made compulsory for all classes for everyone over 20 years old
  • The length of service was reduce from 25 to 15 years
  • Welfare improvements - eg the abolition of corporal punishment and army service was no longer to be given as a punishment
  • Military colleges were established to train officers
  • Modern weaponry was introduced
• Military reforms evaluation

  • A smaller but better-trained army was created
  • Costs of the military to the government were reduced
  • Literacy was improved through army education campaigns
  • Officers were still mainly aristocrats and the upper classes served less time or 'bought' their way out of service
  • In the war against Turkey from 1877 to 1878, victory took longer than expected and in 1914, Russia suffered defeat
• Local government reforms

  • Rural councils (known as Zemstva) were established at district and provincial levels (1864)
  • Councils were to be elected through an indirect system giving an initial vote to the nobels, townspeople, Chuch and peasants but weighted in favour of the nobility
  • Zemstva were given power to improve public services, including relief for the poor and to develop industry
• Local government evaluation

  • Zemstva offered some representative government at local level
  • They were dominated by nobels and 'professionals' - peasants had limited influence
  • They made significan improvements in welfare and education
  • They provided a forum for debate on and critisim of government policies
  • They had no control over taxation and law and order. Tsarist appointed provincial governers could overturn their decisions
• Judicial reforms 1864

  • The reforms established a single system of local, provincial and national courts
  • Criminal cases were before barristers and a jury
  • All classes were judged equal before the law and proceedings were open to the public and reporters
  • Judges training and pay were improved
• Judicial reforms evaluation

  • A fairer and less corrupt system was created
  • The jury system could undermine government control - eg in the case of Vera Zasulich, who was aquitted of terrorism, alough guilty. As a result, from 1878, political crimes were tried in special courts
  • Ecclesiastical and military courts continued and the reform was not applicable to poland
• Educational reform (1863-64)

  • Improving living standards of literacy and numeracy were necesary for Russias modernisation
  • The liberal-minded minister Golovnin led some important changes
  • The Zemstva took reponsibility for primary education, replacing the church
  • Primary education was made free to all, regardless of class and sex
  • New vocational schools were set up at secondary level
  • Students from both types of secondary schools could progress to uni
  • Universities were made self-governing in 1863 and began offering broader and more liberal courses
• Strengths of educational reform

  • Between 1856 and 1880:
  • The number of primary schools tripled
  • The number of children in primary education more than doubled
  • There was a greater selection of subjects - for girls as well as boys
  • The number of students at university tripled
• Problems with education reform

  • The primary curriculum was still based on religion and offered basic reading, writing and arithmetic
  • Secondary education was still fee paying so was limited to the better off
  • More radical students joined opposition movements committed to violence
• Reform and the spread of opposition

  • Alexander IIs reforms in the 1860s stimulated both excitement and the emergence of opposition
  • The relaxation of censorship laws encouraged the spread of more radical books
  • Educational changed led to the growth of more independent, radical student organisations
  • Legal reforms promoted legal carreers and attracted the educated middle class who were critical of government
• Opposition groups in the 1860s

  • Young Russia - set up in 1862, a student organisation which was hostile to both the Tsar and the church
  • The Organisation - set up in 1863 by students at Moscow university to coordinate revolutionary activities
• Alexanders reaction

  • Following assasination attempts on the Tsar in 1866 and 1867, a period of reaction set in
  • Alexander appointed reactionary ministers such as Tolstoy who agreed that westernising changes were weaking Russia
  • Therefore, although military and economic reforms continued, Alexanders other reforming impulses were halted or even reversed
• Educational policies following attempted assasination

  • Authority over primary schools was returned to the church and activies of the zemstva were restricted
  • Secondary schools were ordered to remove from the curriculum the sciences they had introduced
  • Students from vocational schools could only go to higher technical insitutions, not university
  • Subjects though to encourage critical thought, such as literature and history, were banned in universities
  • Student organisations were banned
  • University appointments could be vetoed by the government
• Results of stricter educational policies

  • Religious control was reasserted
  • The curriculum was restricted
  • Female education declined
  • Many students escaped restrictions by studying abroad - here they were influenced by radical Russians living in exile
• Police and law courts tighter restrictions

  • The work of the third section (secret police) was increased
  • Until 1878, political offenders could face show trials
  • 1878 - political crimes were tried in secret in military courts
  • 1879 - governer-generals were given emergency powers to use military courts and impose exile
• Results of police and law restrictions

  • Critics and opponents thrived underground
  • The 'show trials' were abandoned after sympathetic juries acquitted the accused
• Loris-Melikov constituion

  • The Russo-Turkish War (1877-78), famine (1879-80), the beginnings of an industrial recession and further assasination attempts in 1879 and 1880 led Alexander II to establish a commison under Count Loris-Melikov to investigate the spread of revolutionary activity
  • This lead to:
  • The release of political prisoners
  • Relaxation of censorship
  • Lifting of restrictions on the activities of the Zemstva
  • Removal of the salt tax
  • Abolition of the Third Section (replaced by the Okhrana)
• The spread of opposition 1870-81 (part 1)

  • 1874 - Peter Lavrov encouraged around 2,000 young people, mainly students, to 'go to the people'
  • These Narodnicks (populists) tried to dress and talk like peasants to gain acceptance in the villages and spread their socialist ideas
  • However, ignorance, loyalty to the church and Tsar and fear that the Narodnicks were secret police agents led peasants to reject them and sometimes hand them over to the police
  • There were 1,600 arrests
• The spread of opposition 1870-81 (part 2)

  • 1876 - A second Narodnik movement was attempted but, like the first, it failed with many arrests
  • 1877 - The remaining Narodniks established Land and Liberty, which had similar aims but also a commitment to assasination
  • Their efforts included - the assasination of General Mezemstev, head of the Third Section, 1878 and several attempts on the Tsars life
• The Black Partition

  • In 1879, Land and Liberty split and The Black Partition was one of the groups
  • It was organised by Plekhanov
  • Aimed to 'partition the black (fertile) soil' provinces among the peasants
  • Worked peacefully among the peasants
  • Spread radical materials among student workers
  • Weakened by arrests in 1880-81 and broke up
  • Plekanov later became a Marxist
• The Peoples Will

  • In 1879, Land and Liberty split and The Peoples Will was one of the groups
  • Lead by Mikhailov
  • Larger than The Black Partition
  • Advocated violent methods and assasination (particularly of the Tsar)
  • March 1881 - succeeded in assasinating Alexander II with a bomb as he was travelling by coach to the Winter Palace in St Petersburg
• Radical thinkers

  • Chernyshevky spread the view that the peasants had to be made the leaders of revolutionary change
  • Bakunin was an anarchist and socialists who suggested private ownership of land should be replaced by collective ownership and that income should be baed on the number of hours worked,
  • Marx believed that society had evolved through a series of class struggles and that a final struggle between an industrial working class and capitalist middle class would, after a short 'dictatorship of the proletariat', lead to a perfect society in which all would be equal
• Significance of the spread of opposition

  • Government failures (eg the show trials) and assasinations helped suggest the Tsarist regime lacked authority
  • Demands for 'reform from below' had grown and spread socially and geographically
  • The conservative bureaucracy, nobles and landowners who had opposed Alexanders reforms forced him to adopt a more reactionary stance by linking reform to growing opposition
• Economic reform under Von Retuern

  • Minister of finance 1862-78
  • Tax-farming was abolished (companies could no longer buy the right to collect taxes)
  • The Treasury was reformed and budgeting and auditing systems were made
  • Credit facilities were made available through the establishment of banks
  • Subsides were offered to private railway companies and other industrial initiatives
  • Government guaranteed annual dividents were provided for foreign investors
  • Tarrifs on trade were lowered and trade treaties were negotiated
• Strengths of Von Retuerns reforms

  • The cotton industry and mining both expanded
  • There was some improvement in agriculture
• Weaknesses of Von Retuerns reforms

  • Transport and labour mobility remained limited
  • Growth was slow
  • The Russian currency was unstable and much income went towards paying off debts