To what extent did Russia undergo economic and political reform in the years 1906-14?

The instant consequences to the emancipation of the serfs left Russia crippled, ironic, when alleged that it intended to advance Russia’s status. Many historians argue that despite abolishing serfdom, the means in which it was carried out didn’t coincide with reality. Subsequently, there were many riots which caused a rise of political groups such as Narodnik movement whose existence proves that Russian society was changing. Disorder spread with calls for change within Russia like In May 1862 where a number of pamphlets were issued including the radical Young Russia. Such propaganda aimed to gain support and create challenging individuals which would pressure the Tsar to make further changes. One could argue that as a result this led to the 1905 revolution and the end of Tsardom.

By 1916 russia had 4 and a half times more men captured than killed. In contrast England had 5 times more killed than taken prisoner. This was mainly due to the lack of equipment and weapons the Russian troops had.

Russia struggled to provide food for its populations. Citizens took control into their own hands, Ludovic Naudeau wrote in October 1917, “One morning recently I was awakened by the cries of my neighbor in the next room. His boots had been stolen. The same day the manager of a newspaper office told me that he had been robbed six of pairs of pantaloons, … “Four hundred thefts every night!” he cried; that is the average for the last two weeks,”(One Aspect of Bolshevist Liberty). Russia could not even uphold itself because the economy was not successful compared to other countries. This led people to desire a change in the government; therefore this led to the Russian Revolution. People went to different maters to get what they wanted such as stealing since they were not getting the aid that they needed and they needed financial support. This caused them to protest against their government because many people from the lower class could not take care of their families. This cause led to a greater impact compared to Tsarist weak authority.

The October Manifesto 1905 gained the Tsar back some of his support by promising reform; however the Tsar failed to abide by his promises and did not satisfactorily address the problems of Russia. To ensure his long-term survival the Tsar needed to address the problems that had caused the 1905 revolution. The action of Nicholas II to introduce reform saved his position in the throne s, though not for long as he took the wrong approach and chose to please some groups in Russian society and ignored the demands of others. Some changes were made that did temporarily satisfy his people such as the creation of a duma and the cancellation of the redemption payments. The creation of a duma meant the Tsar now had to delegate authority to parliament and could no longer consider himself an autocrat, however although it may of appeared that the Tsar now did not have ‘absolute’ power he didn’t really give the duma much power at all and he restricted their influence on the Russian government.

In 1905, the social and economic tensions building up within Russia boiled over into Revolution. It was described by Lenin as the “Great Dress Rehearsal” for the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 and may give us clues as to why the 1917 revolution started. The suggestion that Tsar Nicholas II and his actions were to blame for this revolution is debatable and there are many factors such as the repressive Tsarist system, the growth of opposition from the time of Alexander II and the defeat in the war with Japan to consider. These events can be separated into short and long term effects on the revolution. Bloody Sunday and defeat to Japan would be short term effects whereas the

The reforms Stolypin introduced did have an immediate impact. 15% of the peasantry took on new opportunities. In fact by 1914 10% had consolidated their holdings and 25% had left the communes However after their initial rush, the significance and success decreased quite considerably. Moreover black earth regions were still very backward. As well, it made the Marxist unhappy. Making the Peasant content meant no revolution. Subsequently there was only a certain extent that Russia could be stable to.

These effects however were more severe under Lenin and Stalin as they sought to increase grain production by coercion. While Lenin under War communism used grain requisitioning to forcefully collect peasant surpluses from them Stalin used collectivisation to force peasants to collaborate to produce as much food as possible. Similarly in both cases the peasants refused to conform; knowing that any surplus would be confiscated the peasant produced the barest minimum to feed themselves and their family and even less food was available for Russia. One of the greatest impacts were the famines that occurred in 1921 under Lenin where the grain harvest produced less than half the amount gathered in 1931 and Russia had international help from countries such as the USA. However these impacts were the greatest under Stalin. The amount of bread produced fell from 250.4 (kilograms per head) in 1928 to 214.6 in 1932. The impacts of collectivisation were at its worst in 1932-32 when occurred what many people describe as a self-made national famine. Stalin’s ‘’official silence’’ of the situation meant it wasn’t addressed and thus collectivisation killed between 10-15 million peasants and failed to increase agricultural output. Though a similar devastating famine occurred under

The opposition included the intelligentsia which involved Miikhail Bakunin, the populist which involved Mikhail Romas, black partition and the Peoples Will. These groups were successful to a certain extent between 1861- 1881 in achieving its aims. These groups had both long term and short term objectives some of these groups were successful others not.

Russia was a country rich in raw materials that had been undisturbed by modern extraction and refining techniques until then, however, the majority of the countries resource rich areas were nowhere near any railways, with the bulk of the heavy materials such as steel, iron, coal and copper being in the Urals, almost 1,000km away from the nearest railway system in 1860. Oil, another key ingredient in industrialisation was almost 1,500km away to the south, in the Caucasus area3. This lack of transportation in a period when steam powered machines were producing the goods and steam powered trains were delivering them and leading the industrialisation in other countries like Britain, the USA and a future foe in Germany is an indicator of the distance that Russia was behind its rivals under the leadership of the Tsar. So the Tsar’s Russia was largely an agrarian one, but even in the agricultural sector Russia was lagging far behind the rest of the West in terms of the methods employed by farmers, little fertiliser was used and the labour saving machines used in countries with enormous agricultural output like the US were nowhere near as widespread in Russia. The weaknesses of the Tsar’s management of the agricultural sector were highlighted in 1891 when famine hit. Due to the heavy tax on consumer goods, peasants had been forced to sell more of their

Historians argue that the 1917 Russian Revolution represents a major turning point in world history. Two specific pieces of evidence that support this argument is that the Revolution led to the spread of communism with the formation of the USSR and the emergence of Russia as a world power. Both of the pieces support the argument. The Revolution led to the formation of the USSR, otherwise known as the world’s first nation to base its government on the teachings and writings of Karl Marx. This event would not only be groundbreaking for Russia, but the entire globe. The formation of a communist nation meant a new battle was about to start -- the battle between communism and capitalism. The formation of the USSR would directly lead to the Cold

The main point of those developments, was imporoving Russia's finances and buliding up the gold reserves.

The October revolution is established to be a social revolution that was enacted through the leadership of Vladimir Lenin. It has evidently proven to be a voluntarist revolution through the methods used to gain power. In this essay, the following will be looked upon, first, the comparative aspect and critical analysis of structural theory, and how it does not fit the components of the October revolution. The essay will look at both the voluntarist and structural theory, however, it will emphasize the importance and relevance of the voluntarist perspective. Second, the essay will focus on the argument proving that the October revolution is voluntarist. The October revolution demonstrates a voluntarist structure through the leadership of Lenin

The Russian Revolution of 1917 set the country on a course that few other countries took in the 20th century. The shift from the direction of a democratic, parliamentary-style government to a one party communist rule was a drastic change that many did not and could not predict. Looking back on this key moment in Russian history, many historians ask the question ‘why did the political power in Russia shift to the Bolsheviks’? Since the revolution in 1905 Russia was becoming progressively more democratic, distributing power throughout the political sphere. This came to an abrupt halt when Vladimir Lenin was put into power by the Bolshevik takeover of the Provisional Government. Many authors have had different takes on this event. Two particularly interesting ones were Arthur Mendel and John D. Basil. Their pieces On Interpreting the Fate of Imperial Russia and Russia and the Bolshevik Revolution give various perspectives on the Russian Revolution and attempt to answer the question of the power shift. This key point in Russia’s history sets the tone for the next 100 years. Russia became a superpower, an enemy of the United States, started multiple wars directly and indirectly, and started using an economic system used by various countries around the world. Today we still see the effects of the 1917 Revolution. Looking at both Mendel’s and Basil’s attempt to answer why the power shifted to the Bolsheviks. Since both historian 's account of the events is different they cannot

In the years leading up to the revolution, Russia had been involved in a series of wars. The Crimean war, The Russo-Turkish war, The Russo-Japanese war and the First World War. Russia had been defeated in all except the war with Turkey and its government and economy had the scars to prove it. A severe lack of food and poor living conditions amongst the peasant population led

One of the many questions that revolve around the 1905 Revolution in Russia is whether the Tsar himself or other factors were responsible for the creation of the revolution. While all the passages emphasise the point throughout that there was huge discontentment in Russia, the Interpretations disagree as to the reason for this discontentment that formed the revolution. Interpretation A persuasively demonstrates that the Tsar himself and his weakness as an autocrat was the main reason for the Revolution. The argument is Passage C is also convincing to a large extent, but as will be discussed, merely supports the view of A. Interpretations D and B are able to be severely criticised, Passage D attempts to argue that the revolution was caused by the existence of long term resentments against Tsarism. Passage B, on the other hand, attempts to argue that the revolution was driven by the proletariat force. However both D and B, as we shall see, are unconvincing arguments. It is difficult to contradict the fact that the Tsar and his own failings were responsible for the 1905 revolution. More succinct