The opposition to the Tsardom and revolutionary movement in Russia began with the Decembrists in 1825. Many of the agitators were Jacobin in politics and avoided advocating constitutional aims with the majority remaining loyal to the Tsar and Nicholas the II _ his government. Further along we see the rise of the populist movement (Narodnichestvo) with inspiration from Herzen’s writings (1812-70), a leading revolutionary writer, and a more severe Chernyshevsky (1828-89) they both resolved that Russia must never become westernised. Directly after the emancipation of the Serfs we can see signs of agitation including that of the temporary Zemlia I Voila (Land and Liberty). Later in this decade (1866) there was another attempt at the Tsar’s life however the thinking behind this was not well thought out and the group only had a small following. Around this time Tkachev (1844-85) advocated that an effective ‘revolutionary minority, or party, must first seize political power, and then transform society’ (Shapiro) and laid out his method of revolution; include a small conspiratorial group of professionals, organise a national uprising with the support of the people, seize power and then transform society. These views are the basis of Bolshevism, as it was about to become and are often know to be the origin of many of Lenin’s idea’s. A new party who coined the old Zemlia I Voila (Land and Liberty) name in 1876, yet their policies took on a political view rather than the earlier social view of the party before. A small sanction of this group, The People’s Will, assisgnated Alexander II in 1881, the lack organisation and ‘political immaturity’ (Shapiro) was clear as it gave an adverse effect of helping their aims as Alexander II had agreed to a consultative government which the party were unaware of this at the time.
The first copy of Marx’s ‘Das Kapital’ appeared in Russian translation in 1872, ignored by the censorship officials, the academic community debated this ‘legally’. The main question was: can Western capitalism, with its consequences both good and bad, develop in Russian conditions’ (Shapiro). Plekhanov translated Marx into Russian terms but there were three key problem areas the first being the lack of any proletarian majority (they were still peasants). The second the peasants were interested in land not socialism and thirdly there was no political or civil freedom in Russia. Nevertheless two key supports of Marxism were to form the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party in 1898 Martov and Lenin both held similar views with a key distinction. Martov was not the typical Politian; he was upfront and honest and had specific morals and principles on the other hand Lenin was able to plot behind other’s backs and was able to hide his true emotions in the political arena.
‘Martov could never emancipate himself from his innate moral cannon. Lenin could veer, prevaricate, intrigue and sow confusion, seeking support from the devil itself if it offered’ (Shapiro)
At the second congress of the Social Democrats party (1903) these differences were highlighted with a dispute regarding who had the right of membership to their party. In basic terms Lenin wanted a smaller party and Martov wanted it to be open to all. This resulted in a split, after a series of votes, in the party becoming two separate parties the Bolsheviks and Mensheviks. This decision proved a big step into the beginning of the authoritarian reign of Lenin with the stark contrast of Martov’s decorum in the background. This Lead Martov to the radical International Bolsheviks who were opposed to any coalition with the propertied classes, yet unwilling to accept the Bolshevik concept of the dictatorship of the working-class.
Unfortunately the Russian Empire was not the country of great strength it was often portrayed as; in reality it was a difficult to govern. The country included a variety of different races, languages, religions and cultures which left Russia disunited. At this time it owned 800,000,000 square miles of land and covered two continents however to the ever-growing population this idea of a the great Russian empire was misleading. The census below shows that the country consisted of disproportionate amount peasant workers (82%) to other social classes, this equated to the lack of Russia’s economical development. In such a vast country it was unable to maintain good communication in all its territories and the countries infrastructure was poor. Michael Lynch comment on the industry in Russia was that ‘the sheer size of and her undeveloped roads and railways had proved an important limitation on industrial growth,’
Ruling class (tsar, court and government) 0.5%
Upper class (nobility, higher clergy, military officers) 12%
Commercial class (Merchants, factory owners, financiers) 1.5%
Working class (factory workers and small traders) 4.0%
Peasants (land dwellers and agricultural workers) 82%
Russian Census 1897
Other countries at this time such as England, Ireland, Spain and Italy were able to avoid revolutions that did occur in Russia. What made them so different? One common view that was held was that the reason many citizen’s revolted was because they were not land owners however the truth is on the contrary, the Russian peasants had far more privately owned land than in England were the nobles owned the majority of property.
‘In England in 1873, for example, four fifths of the acreage was the property of fewer than 700 persons; in 1895, only 14 percent of land cultivated was tilled by it owners’ conversely in ‘1916 peasant cultivators in European Russia owned nine tenths of arable land. (Pipes).
The prime reason for this was the emancipation of the Serfs in 1861 when they were given their own piece of land to be paid for with a loan to the government. For the emancipated serf, who was producing fruitful crops and benefiting financially from it, was able to purchase more land. Unfortunately this meant that some serfs who had land for their own personal use had to sell their land, this in turn left 7.3% of the population without any land. The poorest peasants who did own land (often only a narrow strip) used ineffective and out-of-date methods of farming which was also commonplace around the rest of Russia. This method combined with the poor quality of the land showed how the disparity of a similarly large country as USA with similar square mileage requested immigrants to its fertile plains while Russia struggled with only one square mile of land out of five only suitable for agriculture. The Russian population literacy level was no where near the level of other European countries. However the literacy levels were 21% in the general population but 45% in males aged ten to twenty-nine were recorded as literate this would not provide universal literacy any time in the near future. Russia had often tried to put off educating the peasants as they thought it would be unsettling effect and made them uncooperative, this was maybe true but still if Russia wanted to compete with other countries it was necessary to keep a competitive edge that they were no where near attaining. Also worth noting is the rise of trade unions and strikes in some parts of western Europe which left the citizen’s of Russia with little hope of political liberty. This unjust and unfair feeling was voiced within the peasantry communities and can be attributed to the need for agitation as agreed by Pipes:
‘These differences along with the growing literacy, unaccompanied by proportionately expanding opportunities to apply the knowledge acquired from reading, within the peasant communities probably contributed to the to the restlessness of the lower classes.’ (Pipes)
This investment from overseas was key in understanding Russia’s reluctance towards war. Prior to the October revolution the country was running on low resources and poor moral due to the Russo-Japanese war. Russia had been reluctantly drawn in to fighting against Germany and Austria-Hungary but after the assassination of Franz Ferdinand it became impossible to for Russia to avoid being drawn into a European conflict. This was to prove costly for Russia in many ways firstly the financial stability that Russia had achieved before 1914 was destroyed by the war. Between 1914 and 1916 the average earnings doubled while the price of food and fuel quadrupled. (Lynch). Secondly the production and distribution of food had been harmed as the army had needed the farm horses and 15 million men were taken from the countryside during the war. The peasants were also reluctant to sell on their crops due to inflation. Thirdly the transport links were often closed, there were was an inherent problem with the train tracks in that if one part broke down in could ultimately halt a large part of the network. There had been reports of a pile-up undistributed food and a prime-minister at the time admitted ‘There were so many trucks blocking the line that we had to tip some of them down the embankments to move the ones that arrived later.’ The army fought a courageous battle but were under-fed and Ill-equipped. As Rudzyanko, the president of the Dumas wrote. ‘General Rusky complained to me the lack of ammunition and the poor equipment of the men. There was a great shortage of boots. The soldiers fought bare footed.’ (Lynch).
Sergei Witte, the minister of finance form 1893 to 1903 had invited foreign experts and workers to advise how to modernise Russia. They agreed this was through the state controlling the economy; capitalism. This proved a success and this along with the worldwide industrial boom provided a growth in the economy. However the trade went into recession and Russia struggled to cope with its effects.
Comparative growth in national income 1894-1913
Italy 121% Austria-Hungary 79% France 52% Germany 58% Britain 70% European Russia 50%
An interesting debate still rages regarding the Russian economy; if the war had no intervened would the economy have prevented revolution? An interesting debate, that’s still ongoing however the Russian economist Alex Nove opinion is;
‘If the growth rates characteristic if the period of the period 1890-1913 fir industry and agriculture were simply projected over the succeeding 50 years, no doubt citizens would be leading reasonable existence… however this assumes…..that there must be surely a limit to the game of what-might-of-been’.
In conclusion we can see that the revolution was in fact pointing to the signs of revolution; the country was ruled in a rigid and out-of date with poor communication, backward farming methods, uneducated lower classes and poor foreign policy. The great reforms of De Witte were too late in the day to save Russia. The nail in the coffin had been the second Russian Congress of Soviets that undermined the Bolsheviks to create a multi-party and socialist democracy but instead facilitated the rise of Lenin’s authoritarianism. Many historians views before the dissolution of the USSR was that Lenin inspired the working classes and produced a mass uprising. However when the archives were declassified we they showed that the coup d'état in October 1917 provided only a change of government and Russia still remained under a dictatorship therefore it is difficult to say whole-heartily whether or not the October revolution was inevitable.
Bibliography
Lynch, A1992, Reaction and Revolutions: Russia 1881-1924, London
Schapiro, L 1985, The communist party of the Soviet Union, Cambridge
Wood, A 1986, The Russian Revolution, Harlow
Pipes, R 1992, The Russian Revolution, London
Miller S 1997, Mastering Modern European History, Basingstoke
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