1) The Russian Autocracy 1855 Flashcards
What was the political context of Russia in 1855?
- 13 ministries🎩 part of Tsarist govt, competed w/ each other🥇. Reported directly to Tsar + their policies had to be authorised by Tsar🤴🏻.
- Tsar🤴🏻 annual reports from ministries🎩 failed attempt to help w/ administration📑.
- Govt unrepresentative, no popular participation👨🏼🌾🚫.
- Westernisers wanted same representation in politics in R as in West🧭.
- Only 1 ‘marshal of the nobility’ ruled each of R’s 20 districts, elected by nobles, loyal to Tsar👑, inefficient.
- R = 1/6 world’s landmass (poor communication).
- Third Section secret police🕵🏻♂️ enforced censorship, used informants + spies, banished political opponents - repressive + feared.
- Tsar👑 supported by + closely linked to R Orthodox Church ⛪️ (v influential over peasants).
What was the social context of Russia in 1855?
- 50%+ pop serfs, owned by nobles + tied to land they worked on👨🏼🌾, provided their lords with labour, cash💴 or share of crops. Primitive working + living conditions. Peasants illiterate, deeply religious, hostile to change⛔️.
- Nobility -1% pop.
- Arrangement of nobles ruling districts on behalf of Tsar mutually beneficial, loyal.
- No middle class but minority of educated elite ‘intelligentsia’💼 more liberal, wanted change on society’s behalf.
What was the economic context of Russia in 1855?
- R = agr economy👨🏼🌾 90% pop (mainly peasants) living in countryside following communal farming patterns - economically backwards vs. GB, F + G industrially advanced🏭📈.
- Mir = peasant commune, responsible for ensuring peasants fulfil obligations, led by old peasants who resisted change.
- After deaths mir redistributed land but inefficiencies due to strip farming + crop rotation (peasants can’t invest as have to surrender land for repartition, no incentive to improve strips) - discouraged new agr methods➡️underdeveloped agr sector⚠️.
- Consistently low yields, R v bad compared to European powers📉. Rapid pop ⬆️ + slow grain production = need to reform economy.
- Closest R had to factory industry = spinning mills (backwards tech).
- Barriers to industrialisation⛔️ = serfdom (❌workers)⛓ + underdeveloped banking system🏦🚫 (❌foreign investment).
- Little incentive to seek alternative ways of making money💵: no internal market demand (goods exchanged, not purchased➡️money irrelevant) + landowners got what they needed from their serfs (feudal dues).
What was the military context of Russia in 1855?
- Inc 1.5m conscripted serfs.
- 25 years service - govt worried about peasants returning home, using their training to cause discontent.
- Soldiers few rights, bad living conditions, pay v poor, mostly grew own food.
- Lack of soldiers💂🏻♀️🚫 poor health🦠 or needed elsewhere in empire.
- Inferior equipment - R same weapons Napoleonic Wars 40 years prior, 1 musket between 2 while GB + F modern equipment (e.g. steamships🚢). Poor infrastructure (few paved roads, little railway)➡️hard to transport soldiers safely🚂🚫.
- Inflation - Warfare technologically demanding➡️expensive. 1854 Crimean War used 45% govt expenditure. Levying of local taxes in south for army provisions💰📉.
The Crimean War 1853-56
NI’s attempts to access Mediterranean in a Ottoman territory for warm-sea port led to war. GB + F allied w/ Turkey to protect trading interests. R no match for West, suffered defeats.
AII became Tsar 1855. R defeated in Russian Crimea, own land. R shocked.
1856 AII no choice but surrender➡️humiliating Treaty of Paris🗼terms prevented R warships⚓️from using Black Sea, its only warm-sea port (v important for trading + defensive purposes).
Equivalent of 3 years of income had been spent on war💰.
Impact of Crimean War
Revealed R’s weaknesses: outdated technology, poor transport, inadequate leadership + problems of having a conscripted army.
Trade disrupted, peasant uprisings ⬆️, intelligentsia wanted change to close gap between R + West.
Huge debt from Crimean War, finances already strained from continual expansion of empire. Inflation 1855 when R printed more money to cover war expenditure, doubling money in circulation.
Defeat damaging to Romanov dynasty which identified w/ military power.
Consequences of Crimean War
R v high casualties, but only 1 in 5 died in battle (disease). Poor accommodations➡️diseases spread easily🦠. Harsh discipline, low morale. Modernisation of military needed to maintain R’s world status.
Slow to mobilise soldiers in war, so railway became priority. R used foreign loans to construct 20,000km track➡️R had transport system to help expand, protect + maintain empire🚉.
War showed how underdeveloped R was - industrialisation needed. Serfdom preventing this, no workforce.
