Russia. A History полностью

A fifth reform was the reform of city government in 1870. The main problem with the existing urban system was that it excluded important residential categories (above all, the nobility) from tax and other obligations, thereby weakening the social and fiscal basis of city government. A commission established in 1862 first conducted a massive survey of public opinion (obtaining formal reports from commissions in 509 cities and towns) and then designed a new self-governing order based on the election of a city council (with curiae weighted according to property ownership). Like the zemstvo, the city council was to provide basic social services, promote commerce and industry, and generally assume responsibility for the development of its own city.

A sixth reform was censorship, which had exercised so notorious and pernicious an influence in pre-reform Russia. The late 1850s had already witnessed a gradual relaxation of censorship (as the regime tolerated public comment on serf emancipation and other reform plans), but the pressure for reform accelerated with the proliferation of journals and newspapers in the 1860s. To a considerable degree, the government found it practically impossible to engage in pre-censorship. It therefore issued the ‘Temporary Regulations’ of 1865, which abolished most pre-censorship in favour of punitive measures (involving suspensions or closing). Although censorship was by no means eliminated, the new regulations significantly enhanced the ability of the press to publish quickly and, within limits, to exercise some freedom of expression.

The seventh reform concerned the Russian Orthodox Church, which had internalized many norms, structures—and problems—of state and society. Critics emphasized the deplorable condition of seminaries, the caste-like profile of the parish clergy (who had to marry and whose own sons replaced them), the corrupt and inefficient condition of ecclesiastical administration and courts, and the poor support accorded most parish clergy. Special commissions designed a broad range of reforms, including the establishment of parish councils in 1864 (to raise funds for local needs), the reform of ecclesiastical schools in 1867 (modernizing curriculum and opening the schools to youths from all social classes), the formal abolition of the clerical caste in 1867, and a radical reorganization of parishes in 1869 (essentially combining small, uneconomic parishes into larger units). Still more reforms were in preparation, including a liberalization of ecclesiastical courts and censorship.

These Great Reforms thus affected a broad set of social, administrative, and cultural institutions. Most reflected a common set of principles—vsesoslovnost′ (‘all-estateness’, i.e. all estates were to participate), glasnost (‘publicity’, i.e. with societal participation in planning and implementing reform), and clear willingness to draw upon Western models. Moreover, most reforms aspired to shift power—and responsibility—from the state to society or particular social groups. Aware that the state lacked the capability or even financial means to modernize, the reformers endeavoured to liberate society’s own vital forces and to create structures (from the zemstvo to parish councils) where local initiative could sponsor development.

Economic Development

Although the government appeared to have won the political struggle, in fact deep structural changes were dramatically reshaping society and economy—and not necessarily in the direction of stability or controllable change. By the late 1890s the realm would be shaken by profound unrest—from the factory to the village—that ultimately derived from the pattern of economic and social change in the preceding decades. The key dynamic here was the explosive combination of agricultural crisis and industrialization.