Social Development

• The urban population had increased by about 21 million in between 1867 and 1917
• There was a three-fold increase in the number of people working in factories
• Accommodation for urban population

  • Barrack-like accommodations rather than homes
  • Communal canteens and baths
• The initial waves of people moving to towns and cities were generally men going to earn money to send back to their families in the villages
• Less than half of houses had the basics of running water or sewage
• 30,000 people died of cholera in St. Petersburg in 1908-1909
• About 75% of St. Petersburg and Moscow were actually pleasant born
• Peasant markets, including in major squares in big cities, were common
• Working conditions in towns

  • Often very poor
  • Workers generally poorly paid, though this varied by skill and occupation
• The number of women in the workforce increased from 1 in 5 in 1885 to 1 in 3 in 1914, though they earned on average 50% less than men
• There was an economic depression from 1900 to 1908, and wages did not keep up with inflation of around 40%
• Attempts by the Tsarist regime to help workers

  1. 1885: No night-time employment for women and children

  2. 1886: Enforcement of contracts overseen by factory boards

  3. 1892: No women and children allowed in mines

  4. 1897: 11.5 hour work day limit

  5. 1903: More effective factory inspections

  6. 1912: Sickness and accident insurance for workers
• These pieces of legislation did not go far enough to ensure safe and healthy working conditions and decent pay
• There were over 3,500 strikes in 1914, and from 1905 onwards political activists tried to stir up workers and get involved in trade unions
• Most workers were not interested in changing the political system, they just wanted better pay and conditions
• Lena Goldfield Massacre


  • Miners went on strike over being fed rotten horse meat
  • Bolshevik agitators involved
  • Over 1,000 miners marched to present a petition, 500 were killed when guards opened fire
• The Lena Goldfield Massacre led to sympathetic strikes across Siberia and Russia, with over 3 million workers involved over the next two years
• Conditions in the countryside

  • Strip farming used on 90% of land, an inefficient method
  • Kulaks (better-off peasants) made use of loans and modern techniques, but only 3.5 million out of 97 million population
  • Farmland in Baltic, Ukraine and Caucasus better, but central Russia remained very poor
  • Diets and medical care very poor, over 50% illiterate
• Impact on different social groups

  • Nobility - some thrived, some lost land and failed to adjust lifestyle
  • Middle class - growing rapidly with demand for professionals and skilled workers
• Middle classes


  • Fairly new and growing rapidly as a new industrial society emerged
  • Included those who'd worked themselves up from peasant backgrounds through hard work and entrepreneurial skill
  • Included some from noble backgrounds, particularly younger sons who entered the world of business and industry
• In about 1914 there were about 28,000 doctors and about 20,000 teachers in Russia
• Middle class


  • Organized themselves by creating professional associations, scientific societies, and voluntary sector groups
  • Played an important role on councils of the state and town doomers
  • Were an increasingly powerful group intellectually leading demands for reform and greater democracy
• Social groups


  • Middle classes
  • Workers
  • Peasants
• Peasants


  • Faced a great deal of upheaval as the ties that had held Russian society together started to break down
  • Many left the village but the village didn't leave the people, and they were slow to take on new identities
• Most peasants actually stayed in their villages and saw very little change in their way of life or standard of living
• Cultural changes in Russia

  • Russia was a patriarchy based on male dominance
  • Opportunities for female education grew, with 45% of university students in 1914 being female
  • Levels of independence for women increased through wage factory work
• The first all-Russian congress of women met in 1908 with over 1,000 attendees and started to campaign for female votes
• Primary education


  • Government spending on primary education increased from 5 million rubles in 1896 to 82 million in 1914
  • 44% of 8-11 year olds were receiving primary education in 1911, with higher numbers in towns and cities and lower in the countryside
• Secondary and higher education

  • Remained very much for the elite, though university places reached 69,000 in 1914 (up from 5,000 in 1860)
• The improvement in education, even at primary level, led to a boom in popular press and literature as more people could read
• The relaxation of censorship led to a period known as the Silver Age of Russian culture, with aspects of modernism in poetry, music, and art
• Significant composers and artists

  • Stravinsky
  • Diaghilev's ballets
  • Malevich's paintings
• 300th anniversary of Romanov power

  1913
• The 300th anniversary celebrations were a huge nationwide propaganda exercise, with no expense spared on pomp and ceremony, to give the impression that the Tsar and Tsarina were much loved