Preview

How Stable Was Russia on the Eve of Ww1?

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
1691 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
How Stable Was Russia on the Eve of Ww1?
How stable was Russia on the eve of World War 1?

There are several arguments concerning Russia’s stability on the eve of World War 1 and many of these arguments have counter arguments which show a different side concerning the same events. The first argument which supports the idea that Russia was indeed stable on the eve of World War 1 is that Tsarism managed to get through the crisis of the 1905 revolution without being overthrown.
This was due to the fact that various groups were bought off by the Tsar, including the Liberals and Peasants.
The Liberals were the first group to be appeased as the tsar issued the October Manifesto, on Witte’s advice, in which he accepted the creation of the legislative Duma. The Liberals were excited by this as they would finally be granted civil rights, freedom of speech, assembly and worship and trade unions would be legalised. To an extent, the Liberals were satisfied.
Stolypin also aimed to be supported by the peasants. He therefore introduced measures in 1906-7 which would help restore the peasants’ sense of security.
Stolypin’s main aim was to create a class of rich land owning peasants who would support the Tsar. Therefore, the Peasant Land Bank was set up in which All State and Crown lands were made available for purchase. Funds were introduced such as ‘Wager and the Strong’ which particularly appealed to the Kulaks (the richer peasants).
Peasants were also allowed to withdraw from their commune and redemption payments were ended. Moreover, Stolypin stopped the redistribution of land to every member of the family and made all the land hereditary property of the head of the family.
The peasants were temporarily content The second argument which supports the idea that Russia was stable on the eve of World War 1 is the one which agrees that the Tsar continued to have the loyalty of the army. The event which came to be known as ‘Bloody Sunday’ supports this. The marchers who were protesting outside the Winter

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Tsarism thrived for hundreds of years but as Russians became more educated they decided that communism and a dictatorship was too harsh and after a few revolutions Tsarism was a thing from the past. In the years 1881 to 1905 many things changed in Russia for the better and for the worse.…

    • 824 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Firstly, the opposition groups of the Tsar were known as the Populists, the Liberals and the Marxists. Each group had its own ideas on what was needed for Russia and each group wanted change, however, there were many problems within the groups and none of them were willing to work with each other. The Populists who were mainly concentrated on establishing a democratic government used violent tactics such as terrorism and assassinations, the most famous being the assassination of Tsar Alexander II. However, the Liberals, who also wanted to establish some sort of democracy did not agree on using violent tactics, they preferred to discuss things in meetings and banqueting campaigns. The Liberals were the most moderate of the opposition groups and wanted to keep the Tsar, but remove autocracy and have his current power shared between a democratic government. The Marxists, like the other two groups, also wanted to establish some sort of democracy; however, once again, they did not agree on using violence, they preferred to use propaganda campaigns, as did the Populists and Liberals, but not violence. These divisions meant that each opposition group’s strength alone was not enough to achieve their own specific goals and even though the groups did have some tactics such as propaganda in common, it was not enough. If each group had considered changing their tactics or been slightly more lenient, they may have succeeded.…

    • 800 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    While this was happening, World War 1 was not going well for Nicholas, who had still not won a large battle which he could tell the people about. This meant that most of the Russian moral had gone and the war effort had lost all of its momentum first gained. Also the severe winter did not help, it meant that there was a shortage of food for all classes of people, and the means of transport were disabled.…

    • 735 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    In early 1906 the October Manifesto was published as a result of the 1905 revolution and as a way to appease the peasants and appear as a revolutionary change, when truly very little was changed by this. Political activity was now legal so political parties now no longer needed to remain secrets; freedom of speech was also introduced along with the introduction of a state elected Duma. Most of these changes were made as a bid to make the peasants content and prevent the chances of another revolution; however this also banned trade unions and newspapers. The introduction of the first Duma was short lived due to to the disapproval of the Tsar, who dissolved it under the Fundamental Law, after only 73 days. This was due to the number of members that were revolutionaries, who wanted to push through more moral ideas and reforms than the Tsar was willing to do, only 2 out of 391 made it into the law. This then led to the Vyborg manifesto, which was a group of frustrated Duma members teaming up to go against the Tsar’s action of raising taxes - unfortunately this backfired, leading to all 200 members being banned from standing in the next Duma. The next Duma followed a similar suit, just with the gaining of the Social Revolutionaries and the Social Democrats gaining seats, it was the third and fourth Dumas that raised the most change within Russian society, but this may have been due to the Electoral Reform. In order to make sure…

    • 1012 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    From the years 1906 – 1914, Peter Stolypin was pushing to de – revolutionise the peasantry and put into place economic reform, and there is evidence of this working. During these years large amounts of agricultural reform were set in motion. In 1906 45.9 million tonnes of agricultural production was produced, by 1913 this had grown significantly to 61.7 million tonnes. The massive change in the amount of product shows that agricultural and therefore economic reform had taken place. Farmers, at this time, had also started paying higher taxes, which is sign of higher income, again strengthening this idea of economic reform occurring. Stolypin, however successful he was in his endeavours, was pushing fiercely for a more independent and de-revolutionised peasantry. During November 1906, huge action was taken to change the way the peasants lived. They were freed from the constraints of commune control and land banks were set up to give money to those peasants who chose to leave. Many were also encouraged to move to Siberia, all of these reforms were starting to lay a foundation for a more independent peasantry. Economic reform was being pursued desperately by members of the government such as Stolypin, this can been seen by the copious amount of law, for example peasants leaving commune control, being put into place. The fact these laws were coming about shows that Russia was undergoing economic reform to some extent during this period, whether it was successful or not.…

    • 1040 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Another way the state was more stable by 1881 was because judicial reforms made in 1864 resulted in Russia becoming a fairer country, and also made it easier for the newly…

    • 613 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Considering that in 1881 Russia was incredibly underdeveloped and mainly based on agriculture, there were many changes made. The first finance minister of Alexander’s reign was Nikolai Bunge and he introduced laws which reduced the tax burden on peasants in 1882, and also established the Peasant Land Bank offering loans to peasants to help increase their holdings and increase productivity. The “Great Spurt” under Witte between 1892 and 1903 was a period of great economic transformation. Much emphasis was placed on the production of capital goods like iron and steel, coal and machinery. Also, much investment was made from abroad mainly France, Britain and Belgium: within Russia the peasantry was also further taxed to pay for this. The result of this was incredibly dramatic. Over half of the industrial workforce was employed in factories with more than a thousand workers by 1900 as industrial growth was concentrated in industrial areas like Moscow and Ukraine. The population also rose dramatically due to this rapid industrialization for example the population of St Petersburg doubled between 1890 and 1940 from 1 to 2 million. The completion of the Trans-Siberian also meant that influence in the East was increased and the economic potential of Siberia was opened up. In some respects Stolypin was an economic reformer, as he wanted to create a prosperous peasant class to be loyal to the Tsar. In November 1906 he passed a law that freed peasants from the commune and later redemption payments were abolished. This had been a huge weight on the peasants since 1861 and could be argued to be a…

    • 1181 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    “How far were divisions among its opponents responsible for the survival of Tsarist rule in 1881-1905?”…

    • 1091 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Agriculture was a crucial area which needed to be reformed if Russia was to ever be modernised. At the root of the inherently backward Russia was the peasant workforce, who mainly worked in the agricultural sector, which left Russia a world away from other European Countries in terms of industry. ‘Out of the 60 million people in European Russia in 1855, 50 million were peasant serfs’1; this was a huge obstacle to modernisation as it limited. The goal of Emancipation was to release the peasants from the land that they were bound to in order to create an industrial workforce that would drive modernisation. The predominantly agricultural workforce would now work in factories thus changing Russia into an industrial juggernaut, which would be key in modernising Russia. The reform was also crucial as it was the first step in the deconstruction of the Ancien Regime within Russia. Emancipation was key in establishing support for the monarchy, ‘in other countries Serf emancipation took place as a consequence of social and organic change’2, this meant that in Russia the monarchy had…

    • 1981 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Another factor that helped lay the foundations for the destruction of the Tsar was the industrial development. The person most related to the rapid industrialisation of the world’s biggest country in the 19th century was the Finance Minister, Sergei Witte. His aim was to make the Russian economy strong enough to maintain its position as a Great Power and expand the country’s business class, which was central to the development of the British and other European economies in the 1890’s. However, Russia did not possess certain factors which were essential for the success of the ‘Witte system’. The majority of the peasants…

    • 540 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    unitisation of the left and right wing of the Duma and the apparent cooperation between the…

    • 896 Words
    • 1 Page
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    However there was a significant change in the agriculture of Russia in 1906-14. Stolypin succeeded in creating a more prosperous class of peasants free from the restrictions of the commune. To leave a commune, a peasant no longer needed permission from the majority of its members. The Peasant Land Bank was instructed to loan money to freed peasants and redemption payments were cancelled in 1907. In 1910, any commune where no land had been redistributed since 1861 was…

    • 1067 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Tsar had made an enemy of his people while simultaneously entangling Russia in a war that they were unequipped to handle. World War 1 appeared to be a complete disaster for Russia in 1917. The Great Retreat of 1915 brought the Austrian-Hungarian Army to Russia’s doorstep and Nicholas II decides to abandon the home front to command the Russian army in the borderlands. This left the unpopular Tsarina in charge of the country contributing to the anger and discontent of the autocracy. 1916 brought widespread demonstrations, strikes, and conflicts with police as the people desperately expressed “calls for bread” and continued to openly express their hatred for the autocracy’s authority.…

    • 550 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Describe the Reforms of Stolypin: His aim was to build up the propertied classes as friends of the state. He believed that a state actively supported by widespread private property had little to fear from doctrinaire intellectuals, conspirators, and emigrants. He therefore favored and broadened the powers of the provincial zemstvos, in which the larger landowners took part in administering local affairs. For the peasantry he put through legislation more sweeping than any since the Emancipation. He wanted to replace the ancient institution with a regime of private individual property. He abolished what was left of the redemption payments for which the mirs had been collectively rights and to leave the common at will. He authorized peasants to buy land freely from the communes, from each other, or from the gentry. He thus favored the rise of the class of “big farmers,” the later kulaks who obtained control of large tracts, worked them with hired help, and produced cash crops for the market. He created a mobile labor force and a food supply raised by big farmers, which advanced the industrialization of…

    • 1016 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    RUSSIA IN WAR AND REVOLUTION: 1914-1921. By: Freeze, Gregory L. and Orlovsky, Daniel; Russia: A History, 2002, p. 231, 32p. http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=khh&AN=39029448&site=hrc-live…

    • 2034 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Powerful Essays