The Crimean war had weakened Russia’s entire economy and exposed its flaws and inefficiency. As the Slavophile Yuriy Samarin said “ we were defeated not by the external forces of the Western alliance but by our own weaknesses.” Recognising a change in the army strategy the new war minister introduced 6 year war plans for greater efficiency and to keep the average age of the army lower and fitter. This meant that more men returned home as free men and so as to neutralize the threat of large number of trained and prepared men mounting a revolution, the tsar decided to make them free men and provide them land. The new rules meant that even nobility needed to serve the 6 years which helped reduced the division of classes. Keeping an army for a smaller number of years was more efficient and economical rather than keeping a million people standing. The changes in the military structure had certain implications on serfs that did not benefit the autocracy, as they could not allow free men to return home after 6 years well trained and good enough to start a revolution. As most army men would now survive the 6 years they would come home as free men which would form two separate classes. This system can under scrutiny as these men could not be sent back without being given freedom. Thus if the tsar wanted to reduce the time of service they would need to give the peasants freedom(emancipation).
The people were tired of the lack of Duma and wanted a national parliament. In turn the tsar made Zemstvos, in every province who took care of primary education, roads and other municipal issues of every district. As the tsar could not govern the whole of Russia he set up these Zemstvos who took care of the day-to-day cares of a province. This meant that the whole country was better governed and that everyone was given primary education. Such a reform was needed to better govern the large country of Russia to maintain law and order and so as to quench the people’s thirst for a Duma.
The reforms that were made in 1861 earned the tsar Alexander 2 the title of the “tsar liberator” were possibly the most significant reform made in the whole world in the 19th century. Censorship was reduced in Russia as all books were now not censored which ironically led to the tsar’s death and the start of many failed revolutions. All trials were open to the public and were much more fair and just which meant that less innocent peasants were sent to Siberia for the wrong reasons. The local zemstvos made Russia a better-governed body and medical care and many more benefits were provided. Even railways tracks were built all over the country to make Russia better connected and easier to travel through. Some forms of industrialization was done which all helped contribute to Russia’s growth.
The reforms were not as successful as the tsar had expected them to be due to many shortcomings. The Zemstvos were mainly the nobility who saw this as another way of making money and did not really know about the plight of the common peasants. Most of these nobles were made Zemstvos on account of their fortune and the richer they were the more chance they had of becoming a Zemstvo. The land was first given to the Mir who divided the land into portions depending on size of family. The peasants did not like having to take land from Mirs and were given small strips of land which was redistributed almost each year. Due to a hole in the reforms the size of land given was according to the size of the family. This led to population growth as peasants produced more babies to get bigger land. As the land was redistributed peasants did nothing to keep the land fertile but instead used it carelessly as they did not own the land for very long and did not use the land very wisely. This meant that the agriculture suffered as crops were not as good and strips of land were too small for the peasants to make a profit or pay the dues. This meant that many peasants fell behind in paying Redemption dues which were too crippling for the peasants to pay. In many cases the land was not even worth as much as the peasants would pay in the 49 years. These cracks in the reforms meant that the reform was not very sensational.
The reform tried to set a midpoint between the liberals and the hardliners but it only made things worse as none of the parties were happy. Many traditionalists saw these reforms as a threat to the autocratic way of living. They believed that the tsar should have stayed strong and not have given under the pressure. They openly opposed the tsar’s decision and thought this as a weakness in the tsarist regime of Russia but as the tsar once said in a private speech to the nobles also know as the “Moscow Speech” “only by shaking russia’s very foundations could military power be restored and it’s great power return.” The nobility were not happy about giving up their land to the peasants that they had so recently “owned”. They believed it to be unfair that they had to give their land and were given bonds in return. Having a large number of peasants was also believed to be a status symbol and then losing all of them meant a drop in the status of many nobles, who did not take this easily. The liberals were not happy with the reforms as they wanted more. There was a great increase in the population of Russia as everyone tried to gain more land. This meant that there was less food for the peasants to eat as the crops were meager due to the small size of land and the extra mouths to feed. Due to the failings of the reforms there was civil unrest as many people who read previously banned books started to try to form plans for a revolution. These books inspired the youth to mount many revolutions against the tsar. The inability of meeting the demands of any one showed the tsar as being weak and incapable thus caused more revolutions. Furthermore he lost sympathy and support from the nobles due to the reforms who had held with him through out.
The reforms led to a hunger for more such changes from the peasants which would cause problems later. When the tsar had shown them life with reforms and then started to curtail them made the youth and many protest demand for more reforms. By mid 1860s the tsar started to a halt these reforms. There was unrest in all of Russia as there was an outburst of ideas from reading books and there were several attempts made to murder the tsar. The tsar was caught in his own fire as his introduction of reforms made the people demand for more. Due to the lack of more reforms many people resorted to Nihilism and Anarchy. Liberals and radicals who had been demanding for a parliamentary democracy and freedom of expression were left ruing as this was something that was starting to grow in the Western states. When the tsar had shown them life with reforms and then started to curtail them made the youth and many protest demand for more reforms. Having given hope for radical changes and then halting them made the people angry and raised the chances of a revolt. Thus he was not able to stop the movement started by him.
The domestic reforms also failed in another form. These reforms improved foreign problems such as the army they failed to solve the internal problems that had been Alexander’s goal. The emancipation did not bring many significant changes in the lives of the peasants as they still lived in bad conditions and in some places it took them about 20 years to get the land promised to them. This failure domestically meant that the peasants were still poor whereas the nobility still had the most and the best land. Corruption also increased after the reforms as Mirs and Zemstvos started to make a lot of money by unconventional methods. Many historians argued that the tsar made many of the reforms not to improve Russia but to improve and strengthen Tsardom. As he did not do much for helping Russia into industrialization and firmly disagreed to forming a Duma as he saw it as a liquidation of his own power that had been given to him by “GOD”. He believed that by strengthening Russia he was strengthening Tsardom and its very core. The reforms certainly helped make the peasants equal to the rest of Russians and also changed Russia’s military policy, which would benefit later. These reforms did not meet with the success that the tsar had hoped for, but if anything made matters worse for Alexander 2 and in the end resulted in his assassination.
