Nation and Memory in Eastern Europe

Lecture 4Russian History II

Week 5

Outline

1.Expansion and Repression2. Between Reform and Reaction3. Views of Russia‘s Past and Present4. Conclusion

Alexander I1801-1825

1772-1795 Partitions of Poland Acquisition of eastern Georgia

1806 Conquest of Daghestan and Baku

1809 Annexation of Finland

1812

1815

Napoleon's invasion of Russia

Congress of Vienna and Holy Alliance

Holy Alliance

• Inspired by Alexander I 1815• Russia, Prussia, Austria• Christianity in European political life• Bastion against revolution

The legitimacy of established governments and territorial integrity of existing countries

1801 • Acquisition of eastern Georgia

1806 • Conquest of Daghestan and Baku

1809 • Annexation of Finland

1812 June 241815

• Napoleon's invasion of Russia• Congress of Vienna and Holy Alliance• Kingdom of Poland (Congress Poland) in personal union with Russia

1830/31 • Polish rebellion (November uprising)

1848 • Intervention in Hungary

1853-1856 • Crimean War

Foreign and Imperial Policy 1801 - 1856

Autocratic rule,

but

Tsar and nobility were mutually dependent on each other.

1801 • Sale of serfs without land prohibited

1816-1819 • Abolition of serfdom in Baltic provinces

1819 • University of St. Petersburg founded

1825 • Decembrist uprising

Domestic Policy 1801 - 1856

Nicholas I1825-1855

Decembrist movement, 1825

1801 • Sale of serfs without land prohibited

1816-1819 • Abolition of serfdom in Baltic provinces

1819 • University of St. Petersburg founded

1825 • Decembrist uprising

1832 • Uvarov's three principles enunciated:pravoslavie, samoderzhavie, narodnost´- orthodoxy, autocracy, nationality

1820 ff Birth of Russian intelligentsia

Domestic Policy 1801 - 1856

Autocracy, Orthodoxy, and Nationality/National Character (narodnost’)

Count Sergey S. Uvarov, Minister for Education 1832

“narodnost’” underlines the originality and uniqueness of the Russian people, the fundamental values of Russian culture and society, as opposed to Westernization. "To turn Russians back to Russian ways", ("возвращаO ть ру́Oсских к ру́Oсскому́"). Uvarov

Ilya Repin, Religious procession in the Kursk Province, 1880-1883

Feodor Vasilyev, Village (1869)

Outline

1.Russia in the 19th Century: the „Gendarme of Europe“

2. Between Reform and Reaction3. Views of Russia‘s Past and Present4. Conclusion

1801 • Sale of serfs without land prohibited

1816-1819 • Abolition of serfdom in Baltic provinces

1819 • University of St. Petersburg founded

1825 • Decembrist uprising

1832 • Uvarov's three principles enunciated: autocracy, orthodoxy, nationality

1833 • Code of Laws

1834 • Kiev University founded

Domestic Policy 1801 - 1856

Alexander II1855-1881

Imperial and Foreign Policy 1856 - 1881

1858-1860 • Acquisition from China of Amur and Maritime provinces

1859 • Surrender of Shamil; conquest of Caucasus completed

1863/64 • Polish rebellion (January uprising)

1864-1885 • Conquest of central Asia

1867 • Alaska sold to the United States of America

1877-1878 • Russo-Turkish War

Alexander II1855-1881

Domestic Policy 1856 - 1881

1860-1873 • First railway boom

1861 Feb 19 • Emancipation of the serfs

1863-1865 • Law (courts) and education reform, Zemstvo instituted

1873

1874

• Populist movement To the People (V narod)

• Universal Military Training Act, military reforms

1879 • People's Will Party – terrorism

1881 March 1 • Assassination of Alexander II

Outline

1.Russia in the 19th Century: the „Gendarme of Europe“

2. Between Reform and Reaction3. Views of Russia‘s Past and Present4. Conclusion

Nikolai Karamzin, 1766-1826History of the Russian State, 10 volumes, 1816-1826

Petr Chaadaev

Ivan Kireevsky (1806-1856)

Discussions on Russia’s Past, Present and Future

Slavophiles• Unique Russian civilization• Based on orthodox church, village

community (mir), ancient popular assembly

• Superior to Western culture• Support autocracy• Pro emancipation of the serfs• Freedom of speech and pressReforms of Peter I alienation from

true Russian national characterIvan Kireyevsky, Aleksey Khomiakov,

Ivan Aksakov

Many slavophiles later supported• Panslavic Movement• Russian Nationalism

WesternizersOriented towards Western cultureAdoption of Western culture and

technology necessary for future of Russia

Inferior to Western cultureMostly pro-constitutional, liberal,

rationalisticPro emancipation of the serfsFreedom of speech and pressReforms of Peter I basis for

modernizationP. Chaadayev, Aleksandr Herzen,

Vissarion Belinsky

Many westernizers stayed liberals, others later became socialists or political radicals

Mir, Obshchina – Peasant community

• 16th c. – 1929 form of organisation in villages• Corporate body with an assembly, obligations and rights• Responsible for allocating the arable land to its members and for

reallocating such lands periodically (size dependent on number of hands

in peasant household)• After abolition of serfdom – land owned jointly by the mir, not by the

individual peasant• Slavophiles saw it as specifically Russian form of organisation• Some socialists interpreted mir as Russian version of socialism

(industrialisation for Russia no precondition for socialism)• Marxist socialists, liberals, modernists-nationalists saw mir as backward

form of organisation – preventing innovation and amelioration in

countryside• Reforms of Stolypin: Creating an estate of individual, wealthy peasants

Sergei Solovyov1820-1879

History of Russia from the Earliest Times, 1851 – 187929 volumes

Vasily Klyuchevsky1841-1911

Course in Russian History, 5 volumes

Major Ethnic Groups in the Russian Empire 1897 (125,640,000)

Russians 44.31%Ukrainians 17.81%Belorussians 4.68%Poles 6.31%Jews 4.03%Other ethnic groups in the West 4.47%Ethnic groups in the North 0.42%Ethnic groups Wolga/Ural 5.85%Ethnic groups in Siberia 0.99%Ethnic groups in the Steppe 1.99%Ethnic groups in the Transcaucasus 3.53%Ethnic groups in the Caucasus 1.05%Ethnic groups in Central Asia 5.69%Diaspora groups (1.43% Germans) 1.91%

Outline

1.Russia in the 19th Century: the „Gendarme of Europe“

2. Between Reform and Reaction3. Views of Russia‘s Past and Present4. Conclusion

Problems of nation building• Serfdom until 1861• Liberation without land (peasants have to pay for it)• Non-Russian peasants in periphery of Empire have often more rights than Russian peasants• Gulf between nobility/elite and peasants• Weakness of Russian Orthodox Church – since 17th c. tool of autocracy• Late introduction of self-administration (zemstva)• Gulf between autocracy and educated elite• Empire vs. Russian nation (enormous role of non-Russians in imperial bureaucracy)• Great Russians are not absolute majority of population• National movements in periphery• Challenge by socialism• The Russian Empire is overstretched

Dilemma: to compete with the other Great Powers modernisation needed, effective modernisation co-operation of elites, education of population…But… end of autocratic rule, sharing of power, education also vehicle for ‘wrong’ – revolutionary or reformist ideas – scared of peasant uprising

The Russian narrative

• Moscow Tsardom and the Russian Empire are the legitimate

successors to the Kievian Rus (principality of Kiev)

• The population of the territory of the principality came under foreign

rule (Lithuanian, Polish), Belarussians and Ukrainians were alienated

from the Great Russians

• Ukrainians and Belarussians are not separate nations, they belong to

the Russian Nation

• The Russian Empire collected the land of the Kievian Rus and

liberated Belarussians and Ukrainians from foreign oppression

The integration of this territory in the Russian Empire is historically

necessary, legitimate and unites Ukrainians and Belarussians after

several hundred years of enforced

separation with their Russian brothers and sisters.