How far do you agree that the 1905 revolution was a revolution without revolutionaries?
Before you start to look at weather the Russian Revolution of 1905 was a Revolution without revolutionaries you must first look at what a revolution is. It is then best to observe what the Russian society was like before 1905, during 1905 and after 1905, to establish whether or not, a complete revolution had in fact taken place in the so called ‘revolution of 1905’.
To identify what to look for in the Russian revolution of 1905, and to discover if it were or were not a genuine revolution, it is firstly important to define the true meaning of the word ‘revolution’.
In ‘The Macquarie Dictionary’ the word ‘revolution’ means,” a complete overthrow of an established government or political system.” In ‘The Oxford School Dictionary’ it also says a ‘revolution’ is an “overthrow of old government by force and replacing it by a new one”. The word revolution is essentially the same in both these dictionaries, they mean that if a revolution was to occur, in a country as a whole, the governmental system is to be abolished, and a new one is to be set in it’s place, which would in turn create a completely different social structure.
Before the 1905 revolution, the living conditions of the majority of the public were appalling, and many were unhappy. There were two sides to the Russian society, on one hand there was ‘privileged Russia’ including nobles, bureaucrats, the run of educated Russians, and even the merchants, (who often had risen from the peasants), -they owned most of the land. The peasants, on the other hand, were the bulk of Russian population, they worked the land that the nobility owned. Chekhov described the peasants in 1897 “… these people lived worse than cattle… The most insignificant little clerk or official treated the peasants as though they were tramps, and addressed even the village elders and church wardens as inferiors, and as though he had a right to do so.” Income for most was also severe, from October 1903 to October 1904 real wages declined by between 20 and 25 per cent. Rapid industrialisation caused a number of people to move to the cities and towns, which made them crowded. Many were unsatisfied with the major cultural barrier between Russia and Europe, as Russia was not progressing into ‘modern times’ like them. This was to do with the Tsars lack of effort for reforms.
The Romanov Imperial family had ruled Russia for more than three hundred years by absolute autocracy. In 1894 Nicholas became Tsar, he was determined to rule as harshly as his father did, but his character was weak, and incompetent. He did not posses the qualities needed to lead Russia through such Turmoil of revolutionary acts, and many revolutionaries saw this as an opportunity to act. Revolutionary parties were illegal up until 1905 but they had gradually becoming more popular in ‘the underground’. Nicholas and the government ignored the growth of Revolutionary parties through the 1890’s. In 1898 the Social Democratic Party was established, and in 1900 the Social Revolutionaries were formed. They both wanted reform in social and political sectors. The Social Democratic Party split into two groups in 1903, the Bolsheviks and the Mensheviks. The revolutionary word was beginning to escape from the underground, and an uprising of rebellion was starting to develop.
As the Russian economics were falling into a depression, widespread urban and rural unrest was aroused. Partly due to this unrest the government led Russia into a war with Japan. There were many Russian troops, but they performed very poorly, had insufficient equipment and inadequate clothes. The Russian army suffered a disastrous succession of defeats. The Russian forces were finally beaten. This defeat, in turn, led to the onset of the revolutionary events that were to come, and had already started to occur.
