WHO ABOLISHED SERFORMITY?*
Lev Anninsky, critic
Inheritors on earth
It would be interesting to know whether modern historical thought finds any grain of truth in the judgments of Alexander Melikhov?
Modern historical thought has already sorted through, shoveled and rinsed so many subjects and opinions that are little compatible with each other that there are enough grains of truth in Melikhov’s judgments on the abolition of serfdom. His article concentrates (and brilliantly illustrates) contemporary doubts that the liberation of the peasants in Russia was a solution to the problem. The problem is how to keep the population on this Eurasian saucer and how to encourage people to work on the ground, without running away from this earth wherever necessary. Our land is claimed by hundreds of owners who have inherited it at different times, but few people know how or want to manage it. Why? From fear of neighbors. From fear of the authorities, keeping neighbors from aggression. Out of fear, one cannot understand what is worse and what one should be more afraid of.
Although it is even more important to understand: what was the reason for the lack of preparation for “emancipation”, which ultimately led to the October catastrophe? To what extent did objective circumstances play a role here (the excessive complexity of the issue, the pressure of some social forces, the lack of sufficient resources), and to what extent were collective phantoms, collective illusions in which both the top and bottom lived?
What led to the October catastrophe was not “emancipation,” but double German aggression and invasion, the causes of which were rooted in the geopolitical rhythms of history, and not in the concepts of Dubelt and Herzen.
Is there any similarity here with our perestroika?
There is a similarity here not with our perestroika, but with our current “transition” to an unknown destination, because it is unclear whether a new geopolitical existence will be established through the resettlement of peoples, and whether this resettlement will be bloody. And it is still unclear what will happen to humanity if it avoids the horrors and, having settled into consumer life,
emancipation, will go crazy from the incomprehensibility of why to live.
Or maybe acts of this magnitude cannot, in principle, be “well prepared and thought out in advance”?
Acts of this magnitude cannot be prepared due to the mystery of the meaning of human presence in the Universe, but can be implemented in a frantic attempt to escape when the next catastrophe looms, but has not yet collapsed.
Mikhail Kuraev, writer
HISTORICAL RESPONSIBILITY AND SERFORMITY
The 150th anniversary of the proclamation of the Decree on the Abolition of Serfdom is a good reason to once again think about our history.
The question “Who abolished serfdom?” does not seem significant, although credit should be given to the young emperor.
Who freed Rus' from dependence on the Horde? Dmitry Donskoy? Ivan III? Ivan IV?
Who overthrew the autocracy? Miliukov? Shulgin? Kerensky? It overthrew itself, became obsolete, about which Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy directly and clearly wrote on January 16, 1902 to the last tsar: “Autocracy is an outdated form of government that can meet the requirements of the people somewhere in Central Africa, separated from the whole world, but not the requirements of the Russian a people who are more and more enlightened by the general enlightenment of this world. And therefore, this form of government can only be maintained, as is now being done, through all sorts of violence: increased security, administrative exile, executions, religious persecution, banning books, newspapers, perversion of education, and in general all kinds of bad and cruel deeds.
And such have been the affairs of your reign until now.”
Replace the word “autocracy” with the word “serfdom”, and the words of the great Leo will be just as true. It is said directly and clearly - they have become obsolete!
But let's return to the anniversary topic.
We must be aware that “serfdom” and “serfdom”
system” - phenomena are certainly related, but not identical.
“Serfdom” is a legal fact. You can name the documents and dates when slavery in Russia acquired a legal basis, and name the document and date when serfdom lost its legal force. This statement can give points in the game “What? Where? When?”, but will hardly help us understand the historical
the uniqueness of our path.
The “serf system,” which took shape long before the legalization of “serfdom,” existed even after its abolition. With a “condescendingly benevolent” view of serfdom, it only lasted 147 years, from Peter’s decree to the decree of Alexander II. But there is another account, from 1485, from the restriction of the transfer of peasants from one owner (!) to another until 1905, when peasants, during the First Russian Revolution, were equalized in rights with other classes and redemption payments for land were abolished. There are already 400 years and more here. This is the “age” of the “serf system”. Hardly in one hundred and fifty years the servile spirit, the slave consciousness and the slave psychology could, like coal into the lungs of a miner, enter our souls.
Today, a respected writer, asking himself a rhetorical question why Pushkin and Leo Tolstoy “virtually did not touch upon the horrors of serfdom,” dreamily answers himself: “Perhaps it seemed to both that every world was harmonious in its own way.” (!!! - M.K.) that is easy to break, but extremely difficult to improve.” If we look at historical facts, it was extremely difficult to break, and slavery was “improved” by anyone who was not too lazy. And only Chekhov’s Firs, a slave in spirit, blood and conviction, sighed about the “harmony” of the serf system: “The men are with the masters, the gentlemen are with the men, and now everything is in disarray, you won’t understand anything...”
Today, for some reason, I really want to look at the history of Russian slavery somehow condescendingly, “in a kind way,” so, they say, both the mature Pushkin and the mature Tolstoy “practically did not touch the horrors of serfdom.”
One can, of course, consider Pushkin’s poem “Village”: “Here skinny slavery drags along the reins of an inexorable owner...” - “immature”, Alexander I did not think so, but one can, if desired, in “Eugene Onegin” one can hear a slave blessing the fate of everything - then for transferring from corvee to quitrent. Leo Tolstoy, of course, is not Radishchev, but in 1855 he also wrote about crowds of “oppressed slaves obeying thieves, oppressive mercenaries and robbers.” Only those who do not want to know do not know about Tolstoy’s attitude not only to “baptized property,” but also to landowner property in general.
The French emigrant and caustic memoirist Marquis de Custine, who came to Russia, rightly noted: the ability to endure may be the dignity of one person, but the endless patience of a nation is shameful! And this was said by the aristo-
Krat, who fled the horrors of the Great French Revolution. In our country, patience has been elevated almost to the highest Christian virtue. Why on earth? Why do we allow any nonentity to dominate us? We can defeat Napoleon, but we are afraid of the Belikovs. “We teachers were afraid of him. And even the director was afraid. Come on, our teachers are all-thinking people, deeply decent, brought up on Turgenev and Shchedrin... Yes. Thinking, decent people read Shchedrin, and Turgenev, various Bokleys and so on, but they obeyed, endured... That’s what it is.” This is already the end of the nineteenth century. And Chekhov’s conversation is not conducted by downtrodden men, but by two intellectuals.
They can tell when it was! There are closer examples. Let us remember Stalin, who recklessly trashed people, his first toast at a banquet in honor of the Victory, a toast to the Russian people... for their patience! Egyptian executions were endured with slavish obedience, and to endure Gorbachev’s “coupons”, Yeltsin’s “noodles” about the CIS with a common currency and borders, the monstrous theft with the appropriation of people’s property for Chubais’ “vouchers”, as they say, God himself ordered. And “shock therapy”, which turned out the pockets of millions and gave birth to a class of grabbers and freeloaders who created nothing, but bought yachts, mansions in the capitals of Europe, estates on the Mediterranean islands... and cheerfully spit on the worries of “this country” that made them happy, as they put it. . And the “new Russian”, the “lumpen-bourgeois”, the product of unrest, is a slave in freedom, a limited being, rushing to satisfy his insatiable needs, who has not heard of such concepts as duty, responsibility, and finally, the fate of the fatherland, culture...
It is much better to look at the tragic and shameful pages of our history in the context of discussions about the “struggle and decline of collective illusions and collective dreams.” Seeing the serfdom in the flesh is so boring. The picture is sad. Here is the testimony of a historian: “The growth of the serf population in the northern half of the state began to fall, and from 1835, instead of growth, there was already a decline, explained not only by the movement of the population to the south, but also by exhaustion from backbreaking work.” The people began to die out, and we are talking about illusions and dreams, and whether the peasants were given freedom too early, we had to sit on their backbone for another three hundred years in order to properly prepare for “emancipation.”
And another question, just to take up time: is there a connection between “unprepared emancipation”, the abolition of serfdom, and the preparation for the “October catastrophe”? Here it is reasonable to ask, who prepared the “disaster of 1905”? And who prepared the “February catastrophe”? Nicholas II? Rasputin? Queen? Lenin in Zurich?
Let's face it, “emancipation” was not prepared, but was delayed for a century, delayed until the last day! In the first projects of peasant reform in 1858, there was talk of liberation with land, but the serf owners stood up to death. Who knows, if Alexander II had been more persistent and firm, he could have suffered the same fate as his predecessors...
And the connection between “unprepared emancipation” and the “catastrophe of 1905” and the “October catastrophe” is the most direct. It is in the “liberation of the peasants” without land that the beginning of the “proletarian revolution in a peasant country” lies.
It’s a strange thing, when we talk about “serfdom”, the conversation is more and more about peasants, but the slave owners generated by the “serf system” seem to be in the footnote. But it would be nice to look at this audience calmly and carefully. At the same time, let us not forget about the contribution of the nobles to science and culture, to education. Let us not forget those who fought for their fatherland on the battlefield. But they did not have the power, they did not have the strength, but those who, in inescapable self-interest, were ready to preserve their “historical”, or God-given, well-being at any cost...
And it was not only the peasants who paid this price.
The ill-fated Emperor Peter III, who took the first decisive step towards the abolition of serfdom, was brutally killed by the slave owners, so that, for good measure, he would not take the second step. Moreover, they glorified him, turning the ruler of European training, who during his six-month reign prepared the most serious transformations, into almost a clown. And at the funeral they carefully hid not only the mutilated face of God’s anointed, but they also buried well the documents of his short reign. (Instead of lengthy evidence, I will refer the reader to the documentary chronicle of S. N. Iskyul “The Fatal Years of Russia. The Year 1762.”)
And so it went, almost all Russian autocrats were approaching the abolition of serfdom, which, after the decree of Peter III on the freedom of the nobility, lost its socio-economic and legal justification. The Great Catherine, who gave thousands of peasants to her lovers, was, of course, prevented by the impatient Pugachev. Paul I, who did not know that his people were being trafficked, was not even allowed to look around properly, his skull was broken and he was subjected to a “control strangulation” with an officer’s scarf. Alexander I, who managed to abolish serfdom in Poland, was so intimidated by the “greedy crowd standing at the throne” of the slave owners that he himself became frightened. Nicholas I created a “harmonious world in its own way,” which was cracked at all the seams from contact with the “harmonious world in its own way” of Europe.
Why, they ask, is there such a rush, why did Alexander II order the Decree on the abolition of serfdom to be placed on his table precisely on the sixth anniversary of his accession to the throne? Yes, because all orders for the preparation of a decree at an earlier date were successfully sabotaged. This could continue until the carrots. He saw that they were setting up a crayfish for a stone, and not preparing a decree. Now my patience has run out! The highest commanded, and that’s it! The end of the tricentennial banquet!
We remember how the autocrat, the monarch, not limited by anything other than knowledge and conscience, signed a document of the greatest significance in the history of Russia.
There is nothing to compare with this document, which put an end to the centuries-long conquest of the majority by the minority. It would seem that such a document should be signed, if not on Red Square, then in the Assumption Cathedral, in the Chamber of Facets, in St. George's Hall at a gathering of the first people of the fatherland, to the cries of the happy people in the streets and squares. But no! Alexander II clearly understood that he snatched this decree from the serf owners. Let us remember his trip to Moscow, this last stronghold of slave owners, how he shamed and admonished the Moscow nobility!.. That is why he signed an act of the greatest historical significance in his office - alone! He even kicked out the nobleman who brought him the text. Why alone? Knowing what kind of resistance the serf owners, living and powerful, he had to overcome, it seems that he was simply afraid that his loyal slave owners would push him under the elbow, knock over his inkwell, and prevent him from accomplishing at the last minute what they had been preventing all his life. Or, worse, like Peter III or Paul I...
On the issue of serfdom and its legacy, in my opinion, the main thing after its abolition is not the fate of the peasantry; it was not they who determined the country’s course towards a new split, towards fratricide.
So, if the fate of the peasants is not important when considering the consequences of the serfdom, then what is?
And here the reasoning of the author of “Selected Passages from Correspondence with Friends” about peasants orphaned without the care of the landowners is worth less to me than the remark of the perceptive Rudoy Panka, who noticed a social type that he called “the highest lackey.”
Bravo, beekeeper, you drew in two words the type of Russian serf owner and his relatives in a straight line.
Who knows whether the main consequence of three hundred years of serfdom is not the “highest lackey”, greedy and irresponsible, cultivated and introduced into the life of Russia for many years?
The peasant became free, for example, but the serf owner, and the slave owner, did he go to retraining courses and decide to master a related profession? By nature, not oriented toward creation or development, the slave owner, having lost the slave tribe that fed him, dreams of revenge.
No, it was not the harmless Gaevs, nor the frivolous Ranevskys who lived in their “cherry orchards” until the First Russian Revolution.
Why are there so many references to Chekhov? Not by chance. He raised his voice against the slave spirit that permeates our lives from top to bottom, he was not afraid to speak about the “little man” beloved by the liberals, who had lost his human appearance, the bitter truth, about the peasant, downtrodden to an unnecessary degree, about the intellectual and the official, about all of us, infected bacillus of slavery.
And now it would be good to remember who strangled the Great Reforms of Alexander-
RA II, zemstvo, financial, judicial? Zhelyabov? Perovskaya? Who stole half a million hectares of “Bashkir lands” from the treasury of Alexander III, buying up lands covered with timber at the price of the steppe? Zasulich? Who on the Kursk-Kharkov-Azov Railway poured slag into the roadbed instead of gravel, who did not change rotten sleepers for years, so that they could remove the “crutches” with their fingers? Kibalchich? Rysakov? So who derailed (what a symbol!) the train with the Emperor, the Empress, the Tsarevich and the Grand Duchesses, not to mention the two dozen killed servants and guards?
The testimony of the Chief Prosecutor of the Senate A.F. Koni (chairman of the commission to investigate the causes of the disaster), who reported on the work of the commission personally to Emperor Alexander III, sitting on an uncomfortable ottoman in the sovereign’s office in Gatchina, is significant: “In these eyes, deep and almost touching, a soul shone, frightened in its trust in people and helpless against lies... From him - the autocrat and ruler of all Rus', who could turn our entire civil and political life upside down with one stroke of the pen... - there was an air of such helplessness in relation to the deception and deceit of those around him ... "
Those responsible for the disaster of 1888 should have gone to trial, but the State Council covered up both socially and, one must think, morally close thieves and irresponsible nobles. “Higher servility” is a terrible force! And the all-powerful sovereign, although he promised the chief prosecutor a strict and impartial trial, this time he endured deception and deceit, just as millions of his subjects endured. What harmony!
Where did these deceitful, insatiable, unscrupulous and irresponsible adjutant generals, barons, princes, ministers and “new Russians” come from, rallying around the throne - Lazar Polyakov and company, managers and board members of the Kursk-Kharkov-Azov railway, who staged an unprecedented theft of the railway farms? When did they gain such strength that the “autocrats and rulers of all Rus'” are afraid and collapse before them in helplessness?
Crafty slaves, relying on nothing but their own dexterity, cunning and luck, “masters of the Russian land”, looking at it as a prey acquired by chance - isn’t this a product of the slave-owning system!
Today, no, no, there is talk about historical responsibility, of course, when it comes to the seventy-year rule of the Bolshevik Party. But beyond conversations, and then almost idle ones, nothing moves anywhere. The thought does not move. Why? Yes, because there is no skill to think about historical responsibility, much less demand it while there is still someone to do it.
Is this not a direct consequence of the existence of a huge part of the nation in slavery for centuries?
Boris Mironov, historian
Social institution as a social need
Why did serfdom exist? I agree with K. Leontyev that “serfdom was at one time a saving institution for Russia.”
The institution of serfdom arose and developed largely spontaneously and was an organic and necessary component of Russian reality. Its emergence was determined by the weak development of individualism, the breadth of Russian nature, the people's understanding of freedom and was a reaction to economic backwardness, in its own way a rational response of Russia to the challenge of the environment and the difficult circumstances in which the life of the people took place. Serfdom was used by the state as a means to solve pressing problems - meaning defense, finance, keeping the population in places of permanent residence, maintaining public order. It was not serfdom that was the cause of the country's backwardness, but backwardness that was the cause of serfdom.
The institute's ability to satisfy the basic needs of the population was an important condition for its long-term existence. This is not an apology, but only a confirmation of the fact that all social institutions are based not so much on arbitrariness and violence, but on functional expediency. The peasants received modest but stable means of living, protection and the opportunity to organize their lives on the basis of folk and community traditions. For the nobles, both those who owned serfs and those who did not own them, but lived in public service, serfdom was a source of material benefits for life by European standards, and in this unique way it contributed to the Westernization of the country.
The most important factor in the long existence of serfdom was the work ethic of the people. Until the beginning of the twentieth century, the overwhelming majority of Russian peasants saw the purpose of life not in wealth, success and fame, but in saving the soul, in simply following tradition, in reproducing established forms of life. In order for the peasant to work more, the state authorities in the state-owned village and the landowners in the proprietary village were forced to resort to coercion, otherwise he simply stopped working after his basic biological needs were satisfied. Here is data on the balance of working time of peasants before and after emancipation.
1850s Early 1870s 1902
abs. % abs. % abs. %
Number of working days 135 37 125 34 107 29
Total number of non-workers
days, 230 63 240 66 258 71
including holidays 95 26 105 29 123 34
Contrary to expectations, after the abolition of serfdom, the number of working days began not to increase, but to decrease: on average, one holiday, and therefore a non-working day, was added every year. The increase in the number of holidays occurred everywhere and quite spontaneously, despite the efforts of the crown authorities to stop this process. And this happened because the tax burden weakened, and peasant incomes increased. This is also evidenced by the increase in costs for vodka. From 1863 to 1906–1910 they increased nominally by 2.6 times, and taking into account the general rise in prices, by 1.6 times.
The position of the serfs. In pre-reform times, 1796 -1855, the well-being of landowner peasants, as well as the entire working population, tended to increase. Judging by the average height (body length) for 1801-1860, then in terms of living standards, peasants of different categories practically did not differ, but were inferior to other social groups:
Social group Height, cm
Nobles, officials and officers 167.5
Honorary citizens and merchants 166.6
Freedmen 165.8
Lower military ranks 165.2
Tradesmen and shop workers 165.2
Free cultivators 164.8
State, economic peasants and single-yard owners 164.4
Appanage peasants 164.3
Landowner peasants 164.3
Having ranked social groups by average height, we obtained their hierarchy according to social status and financial situation: at the bottom are peasants of different categories, at the top are privileged groups.
Reasons for the abolition of serfdom. The supreme power, under the influence of the demands of the progressive public and the peasantry itself, as well as due to the state need for modernization and a deeper assimilation of European cultural, political and socio-cultural standards, abolished serfdom in the 1860s, although from a purely economic point of view its possibilities were not were completely exhausted. Serfdom was not unprofitable. That is why only a third of the landowners were ready to abolish serfdom, and two-thirds opposed it. The great reforms, in their meaning and content, summed up the past and present, learned lessons from the experience of Austria, Prussia and other European countries and created the opportunity for the gradual transformation of the country into a rule-of-law state with a market economy.
The conditions for the abolition of serfdom took into account the interests of the peasants. Taxes and payments were reduced compared to pre-reform ones, and the redemption operation was ultimately beneficial to them. The plots were redeemed at the price established by the “Regulations on peasants emerging from serfdom” - 26.87 rubles. per tithe, and in 1907-1910, immediately after the abolition of redemption payments, the average market price of a tithe of allotment land cost 64 rubles. - 2.4 times higher. However, the real gain or loss of the peasants from the redemption operation depended on inflation. From 1854-1858 to 1903-1905, nominal land prices increased 7.33 times, the general price index - 1.64 times. Consequently, adjusted for inflation (64%), real land prices increased 4.5 times, and the actual gain of peasants from the redemption operation by 1906 was real, not virtual. Even if we take into account that, in addition to the redemption payments (867 million rubles), they paid another 703 million rubles. percent, as a result of which a tithe (1.1 hectares) of allotment land cost them 48.5 rubles, they ultimately still won: 48.5 rubles. - this is 1.3 times lower than the price of peasant land in 1907-1910 (64 rubles). Let us not forget that for 45 years, in 1861-1906, allotment land fed, watered and clothed the peasants, and that at the beginning of the twentieth century it turned into huge capital.
The abolition of serfdom was carried out in an economic sense very competently: not in a shock mode, but gradually, as recommended by the modern theory of reform, which ensured the success of the reform. After the abolition of serfdom, a real economic miracle occurred. In 1861-1913, the pace of economic development was high: comparable to European ones, although lagging behind American ones. Over the past 52 years, national income has increased by 3.84 times, and per capita by 1.63 times. At the same time, there was an increase in well-being. In other words, industrialization was accompanied by an increase in the standard of living of the peasantry and, therefore, did not occur at their expense, as is commonly believed. The growth in well-being is evidenced by an increase in the human development index (from 0.188 to 0.326 - 1.7 times), since the index
takes into account (1) life expectancy; (2) literacy; (3) gross domestic product per capita. The production of consumer goods per capita increased 2.1 times from 1885 to 1913. The increase in living standards in post-reform times was clearly reflected in the fact that the average height of adult men from 1851-1860 to 1911-1920 increased by
4 cm (from 164.9 to 168.9 cm), weight - 7.4 kg.
From what has been said, it follows that the revolutions of 1905 and 1917 did not occur due to poorly carried out or untimely abolition of serfdom. The reasons are the difficulties of modernization, the war and the strong desire of the intelligentsia, firmly convinced that they could cope with the management of the country better, to take away power from the monarch and the elite who stood behind him. As studies have shown, modernization, even successful, contains many pitfalls, problems and dangers for society. Russia was no exception. Modernization proceeded unevenly, to varying degrees covering economic, social, ethnic, territorial segments of society, the city more than the countryside, industry more than agriculture. Collateral destructive consequences were observed in the form of increased social tension, deviance, violence, crime, etc. On this basis, serious contradictions and conflicts arose between industries, social strata, territorial and national communities. Economic growth was to some extent destabilizing, as it brought about changes in expectations, consumption patterns, social relations and political culture that undermined traditional foundations. If poverty produces hungry people, then improvements create higher expectations. Military difficulties, after a long period of rising living standards, also served as an important factor in the revolution.
Are there any similarities with our perestroika? The development of Russia after perestroika in the 1980s really resembles what happened in the country after the abolition of serfdom and the Great Reforms of the 1860s, when a market economy, civil society, and democratic institutions began to develop. It’s a paradox, but in the 1990s Russia returned to where it left off in
1917 - to the trajectory of its development interrupted by the revolution. True, in my opinion, the Great Reforms were carried out more subtly and much more effectively than the economic reforms of the 1990s. All economic institutions (in the sense of norms and standardized models of behavior, rules of interaction when making decisions) necessary for successful economic development were created gradually, with an eye to the West, but taking into account Russian specifics. By the beginning of the 20th century, liberal legislation on business activity that was adequate to Russian economic realities had developed and a strong institution of property was created, without which successful economic development is impossible. The bourgeoisie built its wealth with its own labor, and therefore cherished and valued its business, did not think about how to wind it up at home, transfer money abroad, and then, in case of unfavorable circumstances, go there itself. On the contrary, the modern Russian big bourgeoisie for the most part possesses property that was not earned by its own labor. For many, it is rather a “gift of fate”, which has not yet been firmly secured by law. There is no contract between large owners, the state and society. For the state, this may even be convenient: at any moment you can pull back an unwanted owner. The population, as it seems, is dreaming of the expropriation of the property of large owners. Hence the fragility of the latter’s position: they do not consider their property rights to be strong and inviolable, despite the assurances of the top officials of the state about the inadmissibility of nationalization. It seems to me that the insecurity of large property, the lack of roots of the current bourgeoisie, its uncertainty in the future prevent it from becoming a locomotive of modernization, and the lack of institutions adequate to Russian economic realities hinders the development of entrepreneurial activity.
WHAT IS THIS ILLUSION, WHAT IS THIS...
I agree: to see in any historical event only a struggle for “material resources” and interests is unforgivable naivety! But to put “collective illusions” and “the invisible influence of fiction” in place of the decisive factor is, in my opinion, even greater naivety. If it were all about literature, what would be simpler: “in order to stop evil, collect all the books and burn them!” And if any power were eternal, and the people would be eternally happy in blissful ignorance... Alas, it won’t work! This path has been tried many times in world history and has never led to anything other than unnecessary blood. For literature does not so much sow “collective illusions” as it grows from them.
To be convinced of this, it is enough, in my opinion, to look at the abolition of serfdom a little more broadly. Serfdom is by no means a Russian invention; all European peoples passed through it, everyone was somehow freed... J.M. Trevelyan testifies that already under Henry VII in England “few traces remained” of serfdom. And Henry VII is the end of the 15th - the very beginning of the 16th century; and now - I just can’t remember: which of the English authors before that time described the “horrors of serfdom”? Perhaps the poet and preacher John Ball is remembered, but he did not describe the horrors, but only asked: “When Adam plowed and Eve spun, who was the nobleman then?” And yet serfdom disappeared...
In France, it almost disappeared by the beginning of the same 16th century, only “remnants” remained, mainly in the form of noble banalities. True, it took the bloody convulsions of the French Revolution to put an end to these relics, but again I can’t remember: who described the “horrors of banalities”? Beaumarchais, the most popular author of the pre-revolutionary period, was no fool himself for profiting from the slave trade.
If we return to our native aspens, the problem of serfdom began to be discussed in our country in 1766, when Catherine II posed the question to the Free Economic Society: “Does a peasant farmer, for the benefit of the whole people, need to have landed immovable property or only movable property?” And whose descriptions of the “horrors of serfdom” made her do this? There was still a quarter of a century left before the publication of Radishchev’s “Travel”, and Sumarokov, the most popular author of that time, fiercely argued that his peasants
Captivity is as necessary as a dog needs a chain, or a canary needs a cage.
So there is no need to talk about the role of literature and the “collective illusions” it creates in the abolition of serfdom. Much more interesting, if we look at the liberation of the peasants as a pan-European process, the question seems to me: why do we say about some countries that serfdom disappeared in them around that time; about others - that the remnants of serfdom were eliminated at that time; Regarding the third, we can name several dates for its gradual liquidation (in Prussia, for example, peasants received personal freedom in 1807, the decree “On the regulation of relations between landowners and peasants” appeared only in 1850, and redemption payments continued for almost 30 years!) , and only in Russia did the abolition of serfdom require the Great Reform, which shook the entire system, the entire political system of the country?
But there is no big mystery here either! Among European peoples, serfdom both developed and began to decay on the basis of customary law. Parallel to this decomposition there was another process - the creation of centralized states. At some stage, he caught up with the former, the remnants of serf customs were recorded in written, state-protected law, and “a completely different song” began. For here neither the changing social views on personal freedom and property rights, nor even economic expediency played the first fiddle anymore. It is clear: what is not beneficial to society as a whole, because, say, it slows down the development of industry, is still very beneficial to someone. And the closer this someone is to centralized government power, the more difficult it is to advance his private interests in the name of the common good. First of all, it is more difficult for the authorities themselves.
In Rus', a centralized state was created at the stage of formation, and not the decomposition of the serf system. It was completed, starting with the abolition of St. George's Day in 1497, not by force of custom, but by the iron hand of the state. Therefore, only the state could abolish it, although it was infinitely difficult for him, because those who benefited from serfdom stood in a “greedy crowd” at the very throne, and the throne had no other support except them. Catherine II understood this very well, which is why she never uttered a word about revising serf relations after members of the Free Economic Society clearly demonstrated to her that rich landowners were against any progress in this area. To carry out the reform, the need for which the authorities had understood for almost a century, they needed very special circumstances. They were created by the shameful defeat in the Crimean War.
There is no point, I think, in praising the intellectual fearlessness of Konstantin Leontyev, who declared that “serfdom was in my time a great and saving institution for Russia.” If we remember the simple truth that all nations went through serfdom, then there is no doubt: at some time (for each nation - its own) it was necessary and salutary. One can seriously argue only about which one exactly time. But the second part of Leontief’s statement confuses me much more: “with the establishment of this special kind of feudalism, caused by the need to tighten, stratify and thereby discipline too broad and too monotonous Russia, our state began to grow.” The “inconsistencies” here, excuse me, are quite enough to cast doubt on the depth of our conservative’s historical knowledge. For, firstly, our state began to grow much earlier than the serf system was built, and secondly, what is the “specialness” of our feudalism, since all European peoples without exception went through serfdom? Little island England, I suppose, there was no need to pull together? Why didn’t she pass this stage? As we see, Konstantin Nikolaevich’s ends meet are not very well.
And with all my love for Gogol, the quotation from him cited by Melikhov does not really impress me, because, alas, I know and remember that less than 1% of Russian landowners managed to be “educated at the university”, and the majority of the “self-interested officials” with whom he scares , were also part-time landowners, albeit small ones.
But these are all particulars. The main thing, as I understand it, is whether revolutionary Russian populism and Russian terrorism are by-products of the Great Reform? I will answer without hesitation: yes, they are! But precisely – “by-products”. That is, a product not of the reform itself, but of certain circumstances and features of its implementation. Which ones? To answer this question, you need to ask yourself a number of others, and first of all: what made the government agree to these reforms? In Soviet historiography, this issue was resolved “finally”: liberation became necessary due to the ineffectiveness of serfdom and the impoverishment of the peasants; the reform was carried out “predatory”, impoverishment accelerated, which gave rise to the revolutionary movement. Is it logical? Very much... But in recent years, more and more historians (for example, I will refer to the work of B.N. Mironov), studying statistical data, come to the conclusion that there was no impoverishment or increased exploitation. And in the second half of the 50s there were more peasant riots than usual, but not enough to frighten the government. What prompted Alexander II, immediately after the signing of the Paris Peace, to announce to the Moscow nobility: “We live in such a century that over time this (the abolition of serfdom. - VC.) must happen. I think you are of the same opinion with me, therefore, it is much better for this to happen from above than from below.” And most importantly, what a haste: the reform has not yet been prepared, not even really conceived, and he – bam! - posted. For what?
I dare, however, to think that this was not impulsiveness at all, but a subtly, successfully calculated political move: defeat knocked out of the hands of the opponents of emancipation their eternal argument: “Our fatherland has always remained and will remain calm!” - and the national consciousness, shocked by defeat, not only accepted the new shock more easily, but also found in it hope for renewal! One involuntarily agrees with the Moscow historian L. Zakharova: “Alexander II took the path of liberation reforms not because of his convictions, but as a military man who realized the lessons of the Eastern War.” These lessons consisted, first of all, in the fact that the cheapest professional army in the world was created by Peter on the basis of conscription, that is, the fact that a soldier forever broke with his class and became a “sovereign’s man.” And this army, once in which there was no escape, for a century and a half it became overgrown with disabled teams, soldiers’ wives, orphan units, etc., etc., becoming more and more cumbersome, clumsy, expensive and less and less combat-ready . Meanwhile, the main European armies had long been formed on the basis of conscription, their numbers were easily increased and just as easily reduced as soon as the war was over. A citizen, a subject, can be called up for temporary service and then demobilized, but not someone who is someone else’s property.
The liberation of the peasants, and urgently at that, was urgently required by the task of renewing the army! So we had to hastily loosen the tongues of those who had been taught to remain silent for centuries, because with the silence of society, you can suppress any rebellion, shoot and hang as many rebels as you like, but it is impossible to carry out reform! Any reform is a compromise between the interests of different groups of the population, but how to achieve a compromise if these interests are not voiced by anyone? An extremely complex compromise was required - after all, a significant part of the property had to be confiscated from the ruling and, moreover, the only educated class in the empire. It was necessary not only to give relative freedom to newspapers and magazines, but also to create special “talking shops” - provincial committees.
But here’s the problem: someone whose mouth has been covered for a long time cannot speak calmly; when they release him, he screams! So there was a lot of screaming, and - naturally! - mostly stupid. Here, it seems to me, it’s time to remember Dubelt and his diary. You say he is “a practical person and is used to thinking more about consequences than principles”? Wonderful! But why didn’t he, like other government figures, think about the consequences in the spring of 1848, when the participants in Petrashevsky’s “Fridays” were captured and thrown into the fortress? This is an amazing thing: what did the supreme power care about at the end of 1847? Liberation of the peasants. Yes Yes! Nicholas I, receiving the elected Smolensk nobility, says a phrase surprisingly similar to the phrase of his son before the Moscow nobility: “It is better for us to give voluntarily than to allow it to be taken away from us.” And what do the “state criminals” who are gathering at Petrashevsky’s at the same time care about without five minutes? Liberation of the peasants! Moreover, from exactly the same point of view as Nikolai Pavlovich: how to carry out this liberation without causing any social upheaval! And when, following Liprandi’s denunciation, these intellectuals began to be seized (and the composition of “Fridays” was the envy of any academy!), why would Leonty Vasilyevich, “accustomed to thinking about the consequences,” not think about what consequences the final break in power with intellectual elite? Alas, I didn’t think... Because he was an official to the core, and an official, in essence, doesn’t give a damn about the future of the government as much as he does about the future of society.
So - more than a decade before the reform - the main circumstance arose that gave rise to its so undesirable “by-products”. When the future of the country is thought out either in secret committees created by the authorities, or in underground circles created by society, with the complete silence of everyone else, it cannot be prosperous. Any isolated groups are inevitably marginalized and radicalized. In this case, there is no fundamental difference between the authorities and the underground - both inevitably come to the idea of violence.
Russia was lucky with the Great Reform. Due to various unique circumstances (for example, the fact that the most effective group for developing future reform was created completely privately in the salon of Grand Duchess Elena Pavlovna...) it was possible to unite a narrow group of government officials with an equally narrow group of public figures and within this random community develop completely acceptable terms for the desired compromise. But this turned out to be not enough! The society was not ready - it did not discuss, did not think about it, did not try out different options, and therefore not a single group of it accepted the reform. Everyone was dissatisfied: nobles, peasants, industrialists, conservatives and liberals... - everything, everything! How can one not recall Petrashevite Kuzmin, who argued that first it is necessary to carry out a judicial reform that will not affect anyone’s material interests, let the society around it speak out, discuss the whole range of its problems, and only then take on more fundamental reforms...
However, such a procedure for carrying out reforms was still possible in the late 40s, but by the beginning of the 60s there was simply no time for it - it was, in fact, impossible to leave the country without a combat-ready army for several decades! Carrying out very late and not seriously thought out reforms is generally an extremely dangerous matter, as we ourselves saw in the 90s of the 20th century.
Let me just remind you of one point in the preparation of the Great Reforms: almost everyone practically involved in this matter, one way or another, changed their positions in the process of work. General Rostovtsev, at first a supporter of the liberation of peasants without land, later contemptuously called such liberation “bird freedom”, N.A. Milyutin, a principled opponent of the community, agreed with its preservation, Yu. F. Samarin, who idolized the community, agreed that the decision of its fate was “left to time and to the people themselves,” etc., etc. This is very typical! For harmonious and strictly logical social theories are a product of the intellectual underground. The lot of practitioners is compromises. Why was he a theorist?
N. Ya. Danilevsky: he lectured the Petrashevites about Fourier, reported to the Geographical Society about the eternal values of the Russian community, and defended them in “Russia and Europe,” but in 1868 he was sent to the Arkhangelsk province to find out the causes of the famine, and he recommended to the government to give newly cleared areas “for long-term and hereditary possession,” that is, to destroy the community in the name of economic expediency.
So if we can draw any lesson from the Great Reform and the emergence of its “by-products,” then only one, but, in my opinion, an extremely important one: only a society that strives to avoid the emergence of marginal groups within itself can develop normally. intellectual underground, involving all social groups and interest groups in the discussion of common problems of a desirable future. We must remember that the gap between the power and intellectual elites is extremely dangerous, as it leads to the marginalization and radicalization of both. And it is especially important to remember this now, when the modernization of the country is once again on the agenda.
Igor Yakovenko, culturologist
What happened; What will happen; what you don't expect...
Alexander Melikhov wrote a highly professional provocative text. That's why he is a brilliant writer and editor of a serious literary magazine. The problem is that in the introductory reflection offered to us, a dozen pro-
problems that deserve independent consideration. Let's touch on some of the
them. One of the ideas dear to the writer is that history “is also, to a huge extent, the history of the origin, formation, struggle and decline of collective illusions, collective dreams.” Here I will allow myself to speak as a philosopher. Alexander means phenomena of an ideological nature, beliefs and convictions, calling them collective illusions and dreams. Human ideas about existence can be framed in two systems - beliefs and knowledge. Knowledge by its nature is objective (describes some reality that does not depend on the subject of knowledge), verifiable, and is universal in nature. The scientific picture of the world that sums up knowledge develops through a change of paradigms, but quite consistently. In the space of knowledge, it is legitimate to ask: whether this or that judgment is true or false. Beliefs and convictions are fundamentally plural and fundamentally subjective. There is not, and cannot be, a true philosophy or a true religious doctrine. If someone tells you that he knows what true faith is, shoot him down or run from him like the plague. For he believes and passes off his faith as knowledge. In this space, a person makes an existential choice of certain doctrines. Responsibility for this choice falls entirely on the person himself. The believer is convinced that the truth of his choice will be finally verified after death, and nothing more.
There is no objective criterion to distinguish between true and illusory beliefs. Therefore, talking about collective dreams loses its meaning. The author can be understood in two senses: either all beliefs and beliefs are illusions, or in all beliefs and beliefs there is a moment of illusion. The first interpretation is boring and philosophically sterile. In the history of philosophy, only solipsism is sadder and more hopeless than skepticism. You can agree with the second, but this, sorry, is trivial. Indeed, it is human nature to alternate reliable and objective knowledge with myths and illusions, to mix dreams and reality, to believe as true what one likes and what one wants. People do the same thing with religious systems and ideological complexes. But the ideas themselves are not responsible for the transformations that occur to them. Transformers are responsible for this. Moreover, they answer not in a moral sense, but, so to speak, with their own skin. There are rational cultures in which the logic of thinking is brought up, a healthy skeptical principle lives, and the tendency to mythological constructions is suppressed. There, doctrines with powerful mythological potential do not take root, and what is accepted by society is minimally transformed into collective illusions. This is how Western Europe, in particular, works. And there are cultures with gigantic mythological potential. The bearers of these cultures find it cramped and boring to live in the world of objective reality. So they indulge in everything that Alexander Melikhov writes about. Yes, in particular. Russia is organized.
Melikhov’s idea is that in critical eras, fiction participates in the unfolding of these illusions, seducing a gullible society, and therefore bears responsibility for this. In this logic, an extremely narrow-minded, romantically inclined provincial young lady, who has read a lot of French novels, for some time jumps into the arms of the next gentleman, being convinced that he is “the one” and true love has broken out between them. And then, having survived an inevitable catastrophe in life, he begins to blame everything on the writers and performers of soul-stirring romances, who sang and seduced with unrealistic hopes. The world turns out to be completely different! And in general, all men
we are bastards. I guess I'm a callous person. You can certainly feel sorry for this girl. But the first remark that such a situation gives rise to in me is: it’s my own fault, I’m a fool.
You and I live in Russia. If we talk about the deep typology of consciousness, then the Russian intelligentsia (and all sorts of “masters of thought”: writers, poets, publicists are entirely intelligentsia) are not far from the provincial young ladies we have identified. Commitment to the sacred Ought, a painful craving for the creation of idols, worship of the people, the aspiration of “absolute good” (do you understand what this is? I have lived on earth for sixty-five years and I don’t understand. The construct of “absolute good” does not fit in my head), faith in the fact that give free rein to the Russian people, and he will build a wonderful, magical world in which everyone will be happy - all this and much more reveals in the classical Russian intellectual the brother of our heroine. So, the Russian intellectual created illusions not the way a modern political strategist and image-maker, who understands everything and works off his fee, does it, but completely sincerely. He sincerely mythologized reality, because the poor fellow is not capable of perceiving the world rationally. This is his family trait. He soberly perceives reality and automatically realizes what his interests are, a wingless Western bourgeois. In critical epochs, the Russian intellectual becomes deluded and gives birth to radical ideas.
Further, as Melikhov rightly notes, the leaders of public opinion are “unselfish, but irresponsible figures, inclined to reason in terms of ethical principles.” So it's not their fault. This is the nature of Russian culture. She is in critical times will claim exactly this type of understanding peace. In all normal and prosperous countries, various radicals occupy marginal positions, are published in publications with tiny circulations, and go out to noisy demonstrations. Society listens to a solid and balanced mainstream. The one who is devoid of illusions and inclined to see the whole range of direct and remote consequences.
Now let's talk about the problem of the abolition of serfdom. The introductory text counters the intellectual belief that “this question is simple and does not require careful thought and long-term precautions.” I can remind Alexander Melikhov that the secret committees, created by the highest order, carefully considered the problem for decades, until the thunder of Russia’s military defeat finally struck. There was no point in this. Melikhov blames the Russian intellectual for his lack of inclination to seriously think about what will follow the abolition. The intelligentsia listened to the liberal thinker Herzen, and not to General Dubelt, who predicted: the proletariat will appear and revolutions will begin. For some reason, Alexander does not ask a much more pressing question; What would have happened, what would have been the consequences, if the abolition of serfdom had not occurred?
The emergence of the proletariat and “revolution, as in France,” is immeasurably better than the cemetery peace of Nicholas Russia, for this is life and development. I am aware that today “healthy conservatism” is in use, and regarding Nikolaev’s Russia one should speak with emotion. However, this is my principled position. There was an alternative to reform, and it was collapse of Russia. The authorities in Russia are always, with rare exceptions, not conservative, but reactionary1. It seeks to reverse the course of world history, which is moving in a direction that is decidedly unsatisfactory to the Russian authorities, and to shift the situation back to some past idealized by the reactionary authorities. Therefore, Russia is embarking on major reforms literally on the verge of collapse. When all the deadlines for reasonable reform have long passed and, as they say, it’s locked up. This applies to 1861, 1905, and 1988-1991. Serfdom could be abolished either by the ruling regime, revolutionary conventions, or the colonial administration. The fortress should have been abolished sixty years earlier.
But what really touches Alexander Melikhov’s text is the quoting of Alfred and Saint-Clair. Behind the question: “Who will take care of them, who will teach them to use the freedom given to them for their own benefit?” - there is a burning selfish interest. This is a strategy as old as time, filthy from being used a thousand times, for the pseudo-moral justification of immoral practices on the part of the subject of the immoral action. All the tyrants and serf owners proclaim that the people are cattle and are decidedly not ready for a free life. Give him free rein, he will instantly become drunk and die. I am absolutely not convinced by the paternalistic humanism of the serf owners, since I see here a pronounced conflict of interests.
Okay, let's forget about the conflict of interest. Neither I nor Alexander Melikhov have serfs. Which means we have moral right discuss the problem stated by St. Clair. The problem of “emancipation of the peasantry” has both a moral and pragmatic dimension. The need to abolish serfdom was set by a historical imperative. Behind it were purely pragmatic considerations. However, since we are dealing with an Orthodox post-medieval society, just emerging from the Middle Ages, the spiritual elite of this society was able to recognize and formulate this imperative exclusively in moral categories. There were simply no other ways to rationalize social reality in Russian culture. For the classic Russian intellectual, considerations of benefit/disadvantage, efficiency/ineffectiveness, increases/reduces competitiveness are actually incomprehensible, and, in addition, endlessly vulgar and wingless. These are landmarks from another, alien and ontologically hostile cultural universe. Thus, the actual culture, that is, its own nature, moved Russian society towards moral maximalism.
Contrary to the illusions and latent hopes of Russian ideologists, our country does not live on the continent of “Russia”, but on planet Earth. This means it must constantly compete with neighboring societies. In such competition, any state remains exactly as long as its level of competitiveness does not drop below a certain critical threshold. As soon as this happens, the “forest orderlies” come running and tear the poor fellow apart. This is how the fate of Byzantium, beloved by Russian traditionalists, unfolded in 1453, and this is how Russia itself tore the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth into pieces at the end of the 18th century.
Another aspect of the same problem is historical dynamics. A strict pattern is being realized in history. A society that has not had time to master the new technology that revolutionizes the world (a new technological structure) leaves the historical arena. At the beginning of the 16th century, about six hundred Cortes warriors armed with muskets
destroyed the huge Aztec empire, whose population is estimated at 10 -
15 million people. In the 19th century, the era of steam began. Countries capable of creating factory production based on the steam engine, building and operating railways (even with the involvement of foreign specialists) gained/maintained independence. Those who were not capable of this became colonies. In Russia, steam engines and railways appeared in the 40s of the 19th century. However, both the first and second were extremely rare and eked out a miserable existence. Technological lag behind the enemy became obvious to the political elite as the reason for the lost Eastern War (Crimean campaign)
1854-1856. And this technological lag was determined by an insurmountable, truly iron law: the steam engine doesn't match with serfdom or slavery. Where the era of steam is established, both serfdom (as in Russia) and relict slavery (as in the USA) collapse.
There is a strict connection between the nature of the technology and the culture of the subject using this technology. A Paleolithic hunter cannot become a farmer. To do this, he must radically change his consciousness, die as a hunter and be born again as a farmer. Historians call this transition the “Neolithic revolution.” Likewise, industrial technologies based on the steam engine do not combine with the patriarchal privately owned peasant. The partially modernized state serf, who received a primary education and was forcibly integrated into the early industrial plantation economy within the framework of the ideocratic state, is combined not only with a steam locomotive, but also with a primitive electric drive and a DT-54 tractor, while the patriarchal peasant is not combined. The defeat in the war conveyed the truth to the political elite of the empire: the economic and technological backwardness was determined by serfdom. It had to be canceled urgently.
The public debate around the issue of “emancipation” is interesting and significant. It expresses the self-awareness of society in the era of a qualitative leap. But this polemic did not solve anything; decided by the logic of world history. If we are talking about fundamental decisions, Russian rulers begin to take “society” (that is, subjects, little people) seriously only when these subjects take to the streets in tens of thousands and power begins to slip away from under the feet of the designated rulers. Perestroika was also started by the authorities, and it began under the pressure of a general historical imperative. The liberal intelligentsia perked up and cheered, but the initiative came from the authorities. So in this aspect, Herzen and Belinsky are not at fault either.
Melikhov finds courage in the position of Konstantin Leontyev, who called serfdom “a great and saving institution for Russia.” In a country where at all times there has been an abundance of whip connoisseurs, poets of the Russian ulus and defenders of Bukhara justice, to see intellectual courage in the glorification of slavery, in my opinion, is tricky. We have before us the normal position of a classical reactionary, who does not conform to the liberal discourse that was dominant at that time, but takes advantage of the aggravation of his position. This is what Prokhanov or Dugin write. All these guys are driven by a secret idea: to cancel the course of world history, starting at least from 1453, and to replay the fate of Orthodoxy, Russia and all humanity. That's all. You give a cross to Hagia Sophia. As for the content of K. Leontyev’s statement, I will say the following: once upon a time both cannibalism and human sacrifice were natural and historically inevitable. Fortunately, the cultures and societies that shared these practices have disappeared and become history. If Leontyev is right and the Russian Empire was truly constituted by serfdom, then thank God that this country has disappeared.
The humanism of the serf owners, who grieved over the dim prospects of yesterday's serfs, deserves extensive commentary. Freedom in its ontology presupposes that those endowed with freedom can drink themselves to death, become a drug addict, etc. This distinguishes him from a slave or a young child, who is looked after by parents, masters and captains, police officers. Man freely chooses between good and evil. This is the burden of freedom and the greatness of a free person. Alexander Melikhov knows all this as well as I do. What makes him sympathize with the ideologists of slavery? For me freedom is a religious value. From these positions, Gogol’s reasoning that “the rule of one landowner can be more profitable” than the rule of many officials is absolutely unacceptable. The benefits Gogol talks about are fictitious. But even if he were right, choosing the yoke is a rejection of the God-given nature of man. Of course, centuries of slavery deformed the human material and created a dead-end inertia, which is all the more difficult to overcome the later it is taken up. Here we come to the sad plot of paying for moving society to the next stage of historical development.
The history of mankind is structured in such a way that at turning points the layer of “yesterday’s people,” who are acutely inadequate to the changed conditions, are marginalized and die out. The peasant, unable to effectively manage his freedom, should have died out. This is absolutely normal and represents one of the mechanisms of historical dynamics. Marginalizing fathers breaks a dead-end tradition. Children choose a different scenario – one that is adequate to the new conditions, an adaptive one. This is the price to pay for the transition to the next stage of historical development. In history, such a drama has been observed dozens of times. What a story. One day, dinosaurs became extinct, but mammals remained. At the next revolution, the Neanderthals died out, but the Cro-Magnons (that is, you and me) remained. Let us note that if all this had not happened, there would have been neither the Neva magazine nor this controversy. Moreover, there are serious reasons to believe that both mammals and Cro-Magnons, as best they could, helped their historical alternative become extinct. It is foolish to evaluate the above in ethical categories. This is the nature of things.
Thus, the abolition of the “fortress,” like any revolutionary transformation, included a mechanism for stratifying the traditionalist masses into people of yesterday and today. Yesterday's people become drunkards, at best they live quietly, today's
nie - fit into the “new and furious world”, rise up, build their future. We have been observing these processes for the last twenty years.
Next, we need to understand how the reform was implemented and what policies were pursued until August 1914. Melikhov’s thought boils down to the following: “collective phantoms, collective illusions in which both the top and the bottom resided” (these are the very illusions for which liberal-minded Russian publicists are responsible) determined the insufficient preparedness for emancipation, which “ultimately led to the October catastrophe." This is absolutely not the case.
Let's start with the question: what goals did the reformers set for themselves? The thesis was stated above: the political wisdom of the Russian elite, its philosophy is opposed to the logic of the world-historical process. Therefore, the so-called “conservative modernization” is being implemented here. The point of this strategy is to master the necessary Western technologies, but categorically cut off from them everything that gives rise to these technologies: norms, values, social dynamics, the spirit of freedom, etc. And then, relying on Western tools, resist this very thing The West and, if possible, rake it under itself. The strategic goal of modernization: not to let history into Russia. We have a special path and sovereign democracy.
Therefore, reforms in Russia are carried out according to one algorithm: reform in such a way that, if possible, nothing is changed. It is necessary to preserve all the system-forming parameters of the whole. Touch up the facades, change the signs, let in the most energetic and ambitious people from below into the select circle, and after that firmly cement the situation. You see, everything will work out and go as before.
This task determined the parameters of the reforms. The authorities did everything to preserve class society, save the nobility from erosion, leave the peasants in the ghetto redistribution rural community and not allow all these millionaires, journalists, lawyers, bankers (they are also Jews!) to rise to the top. The Russian government abandoned serfdom, but did everything in its power to ensure that capitalism did not come to Russia. What was previously called “class interest” was at work here: the desire for self-preservation of class society on the part of the privileged class. But there was something beyond this. Bourgeois society caused a metaphysical protest among the Russian nobles. It was something infinitely vulgar, encroaching on the sacred foundations of existence and absolutely unthinkable here in Holy Rus'. As a cultural historian, I testify: the historically subsequent is always perceived by the ideologists of the historically preceding as a challenge to sacred values, a marketplace of immorality and the death of the Universe.
But if only the ruling elite had stood on the side of historical inertia, nothing would have worked out for them. History was opposed by an alliance between the upper and lower classes. The elite - tsarism, the Orthodox Church, the nobility. The lower classes are the traditional patriarchal peasantry and partly God-fearing urban inhabitants. The patriarchal peasant is vital to Asian despotism. In it – its ontological
skoe foundation. The kulak is an agent of the market and capitalist relations. He needs guarantees of private property, trade in land, abolition of estates, etc. A kulak and a farm laborer will get along well with the president, the junta, and the parliamentary republic, as long as they don’t interfere with making money. But the patriarchal peasant fears and hates the city, and with it everything that embodies the forces of historical dynamics. He needs a “tsar-father” as a guarantee that fists with merchants will not destroy the motionless world of age-old tradition. And therefore, the peasantry, standing on the positions of primitive communism, rejecting the city, mature market relations, commodity production, a real state and history as a force that draws the archaic world dear to them away from the ideal of the Opon kingdom, had to be mothballed. The forces that destroy this element should be crushed and spread rot.
All the forces that blocked the movement of history in our country got their due. They were destroyed after 1917. The forms of destruction and the sequence of events varied. The last to disappear, in the 70s of the last century, was the traditional Russian village. Country writers sang a majestic departure for her. The half-century delay is due to the gigantic size of the Russian peasantry. And then, for half a century, Soviet power fed on historical energy extracted from the destroyed world of the traditional peasantry. When this world ended, the food cycle of the Soviet ghoul broke down, and he literally disappeared from the historical arena within a decade.
The agents of the historical process in Russia were: the bourgeois strata of the city, the liberal intelligentsia, the kulaks in the countryside, the Old Believer industrialist, and the trade and entrepreneurial element growing out of the peasant environment. The weight proportions of these forces were obviously unequal. The forces of historical reaction dominated. Through the combined efforts of the upper and lower classes, the formation of a bourgeois society in Russia was blocked. That is why, and only why, the Bolsheviks won in 1917.
In order to guarantee a decent future for the country, it was necessary to: destroy the class society, carry out land reform in such a way that a wide layer of private owners would appear in the countryside with an allotment sufficient for successful farming, and consistently develop the economic infrastructure. A frontal attack on illiteracy was vitally necessary - universal primary education, a broad program of economic and agronomic education. Such a policy guaranteed an economic and general social effect, but it meant the death of the “old regime” and the transformation of the country into a normal capitalist society. One of the largest Slavic scholars of the second half of the 19th century, Slavophile and pan-Slavist V.I. Lamansky, in a speech delivered in 1894, stated that the wars against revolutionary France of the late 18th - early 19th centuries and the Hungarian campaign of 1848 were unnecessary interventions in the affairs of European states . “It would be a hundred times better if we... spent at least part of this enormous money in the first years of our century on the liberation of the peasants, public education and on improving our means of communication”2. There is little to add to this.
From 1861 to 1917, a consistent policy of conservation of the patriarchal peasantry as an integral socio-cultural phenomenon was implemented. The reform itself was designed in such a way that the peasant would remain dependent on the landowner. The landowners retained ownership of all the lands that belonged to them, but were obliged to provide the peasants with a house plot and field allotment for use. Field allotment lands were provided not personally to the peasants, A for collective use by rural communities, who could distribute them among peasant farms at your own discretion. The community was responsible for taxes with “mutual responsibility,” which means it led the peasant. The “redemption operation” with an installment plan of 49 years tied the peasant to the landowner, delayed the departure of the poor to the city and slowed down the development of capitalism. Redemption payments hung like a dead weight on the farm and made it difficult to rise. Moreover, not only serfs, but also appanage and state peasants had to buy back land.
To summarize, two legal systems have emerged in post-reform Russia. People from “decent society” were in a legal framework that guaranteed private property and normal market relations, but the smerds never became subjects of market relations and remained in the community, from which they could leave after fifty years3. Does this remind you of anything? Try opening and registering your small business first. This venture will add to your life experience, and maybe even lead to some thoughts.
And then state policy consistently stifled the sprouts of capitalism in the countryside. The Regulations on Employment for Rural Work of 1886 took a step back to non-economic coercion of the worker. The Family Division Law of 1886 blocked the natural processes of disintegration of the patriarchal family, which was faced with the need to conduct commercial farming. The division could occur with the consent of the head of the family and was sanctioned by a decision of 2/3 of the village assembly. Adult family people who had children had to wait for the death of the “bolshak” in order to have your own farm. The authorities prescribed for the peasant a school of obedience to his father and the village gathering. Further, the authorities consistently supported the community and resisted the processes of its erosion. She banned intra-community land redistribution in 1893. The law of December 14, 1893 prohibited leaving the land community without its consent, even with early redemption of the plot. The sane K. H. Bunge, who categorically objected to the ban on the sale and pledge by peasants of their land, who saw a huge danger for the state in such a policy, warned that this ban “would destroy the peasants’ concept of property rights, thereby a threat is being created to Oryan land ownership”4. The senile dignitaries from the State Council thought differently.
A special topic is the deliberate conservation of ignorance. On a report from the Tobolsk province about the low literacy of the population, Alexander III imposed a resolution
tion: “And glory to God!” This attitude gave rise to the famous “decree on cooks’ children” of 1887, which prohibited the children of commoners from entering gymnasiums. Social dynamics are inseparable from education. By blocking these channels, the authorities drove the common people into the ghetto. Schooling was not compulsory. Universal primary education was introduced only by P. A. Stolypin. While a third of the budget went to the army and navy, public education suffers from chronic underfunding. The parish and zemstvo schools covered at first an insignificant, then obviously insufficient part of the rural population. According to the 1897 census, two out of five men and one out of five women could read.
A completely separate plot of the Russian drama is the destruction by the system of large officials who propose reforms that can lead the country out of the deadlock. In 1881, God gave Russia a talented Minister of Finance, Nikolai Khristoforovich Bunge. Bunge developed the resettlement movement, which was necessary in connection with the construction of the Great Siberian Railway and solved the problem of land shortage. However, communal orders, mutual responsibility and the passport system hindered the growth of the resettlement movement. In the conditions of the agrarian crisis, the Minister of Finance called on the government to build agrarian policy not on the conservation of the communal system, but on private peasant land ownership. Bunge established the Peasant Land Bank, which issued long-term loans to peasants to purchase land. The minister believed that with reasonable policies the community would quietly die out. He planned to abolish mutual responsibility, revise the passport charter, reduce redemption payments... In the fall of 1885, “conservative” forces launched a campaign in the press and government circles and achieved the resignation of the Minister of Finance.
In 1905, the chief manager of land management and agriculture, Nikolai Nikolaevich Kutler, developed a project for a liberal agrarian reform, which involved the alienation of part of the landowners' lands and the distribution of them to the peasants. It was proposed to alienate leased lands for compensation (up to 40% of landowners' land). The land was transferred to a state-controlled land fund. These lands are then purchased through the Peasant Bank on the basis of private property rights by landless peasants.
Some clarification is required here. By the end of the 19th century, the rural population in Russia was growing. The socio-cultural consequences of the abolition of religious
Lenten law. Developments in obstetrics, vaccinations and other measures have reduced infant mortality. The patriarchal village suffered acutely from land shortage. The traditional peasant saw one solution to the problem - “black redistribution”. The entire land fund is distributed to peasant societies, which, as before, manage this fund, allocating and redistributing land at their discretion.
Conservation of the community and preservation of the archaic way of life hindered the growth of marketability of peasant farming. Productive grain farming developed on large estates with agronomists, modern technology and hired labor. Commodity production was created by the fist, which was hated by the peasant and denounced by the Russian intellectual. The way out of land shortage lay through the intensification of production. Simply put, the subsistence-oriented traditional peasant was to be replaced by the capitalist farmer. But this required a different infrastructure, capital, a different socio-political climate and, finally, acutely lacking land. The liberal project of agrarian reform gave a chance exchange loyalty to the communal attitudes of peasants for private property. This would be a genuine revolution in the consciousness of a huge part of Russian society. The movement of people from prehistoric times into the space of the state and civilization. Kutler's project was proposed at the height of the First Russian Revolution, when the situation favored realism and required one to look into the future. It was only necessary to sacrifice a part in the name of preserving the whole. The empire's political class had a chance to set the country's history on a path in which the granddaughters of the tsar's dignitaries would avoid the fate of an Istanbul prostitute, and the grandchildren of a Parisian taxi driver. The court clique achieved Kutler's resignation.
The more you delve into the history of our country, the clearer it becomes: Russian-
The Russian elite was driven by absolute, unmistakable instinct. Without being distracted by unnecessary body movements and discarding saving ideas, she steadily walked towards her own death.
It is hardly worth describing in detail the agrarian reform of Pyotr Arkadyevich Stolypin. It included: permission to leave the community for farms, strengthening the Peasant Bank, forced land management and strengthening the resettlement policy aimed at eliminating the peasant land shortage. The reform ensured the establishment of private ownership of land, stimulated the intensification of economic activity and increased marketability of agriculture.
The reform was based on the indivisibility of the landowners' land, and therefore did not solve the agrarian question. The peasants were forced to make up for the lack of land by renting from landowners and village societies. This was the main flaw of the Stolypin reform. The reform met with opposition in the countryside. In 1911, exit from the community decreased sharply. Nevertheless, Stolypin's reforms provided some chance to avoid catastrophe and evolutionarily lead the country out of the impasse, resolving the conflict between the imperative of modernization and the class character of Russian society. This policy met with a fierce wave of opposition. The Prime Minister's house is blown up by the Socialist-Revolutionaries-maximalists (August 1906). At court, a fuss begins to remove the prime minister. The court environment, which opposed the prime minister, convinced the tsar: since the revolution had been defeated, no reforms were required. This was the level of state thinking of the ruling elite. In September 1911, the prime minister was assassinated by terrorist Dmitry Bogrov, an agent of the Kyiv security department, under extremely dubious circumstances.
The final chord of suicide of the class monarchy in Russia was the outbreak of the First World War. The reforms were extremely difficult and painful. The patriarchal mass refused to be cut off. The twenty years of peace that Stolypin dreamed of were needed for the majority of the peasants to leave the community and for the bourgeois model of sociality to establish itself among the peasants. In 1914, Russia was less than a decade removed from a lost war with a modernizing Asian state, followed by revolution. Entry, and almost full-fledged participation in starting a war in the name of the incomprehensible interests of the “brothers of the Slavs,” the existence of which either 90% of the subjects either did not suspect or had the vaguest idea of, was pure madness. Russia was opposed by three empires: Ottoman, Austro-Hungarian and German. If the Ottomans were breathing their last, then Austria was no weaker than Russia, and Germany obviously surpassed Russia in its potential.
The war required a monstrous effort and resulted in casualties and hardships on an unprecedented scale. Society could not stand it and the state collapsed. From February 1917, the “agrarian, or peasant, revolution” unfolded, which lasted until 1922. It was the agrarian revolution that brought the Bolsheviks to power and marked the “October catastrophe” that Melikhov writes about.
If a normal bourgeois society had established itself in Russia, the Bolsheviks would have nothing to catch in this country. Let us repeat: at the beginning of the twentieth century, it was possible to exchange the peasant ideal of a communal world order for private property. But this required widespread land reform. Confiscation of estates, distribution of specific lands. The elite of the “old world” were honored with this in 1920, under Wrangel, when the lands had long been dismantled and it was too late. The practical implementation of the reform began in September 1920, a couple of months before the evacuation of the White Army from Crimea.
After Khrushchev’s removal, there was an anecdote in which the disgraced leader was credited with the initiative to award the title of Hero of the Soviet Union to Nicholas II “for creating a revolutionary situation in Russia.” The paradox is that in terms of content this premise is pure truth. Alexander III and Nicholas II did everything in their power to ensure that a peasant revolution broke out in Russia and the Jacobins came to power.
Now let's talk about the phenomenon of revolution. Today's good form involves spitting at the word “revolution” and making the sign of the cross. But since I am beyond the bounds of good manners and have nothing to lose, I report that my understanding of this essence is decisively at odds with the dominant one. One social thinker who is categorically unfashionable today called revolutions the locomotive of history. The history of European civilization has experienced three great revolutionary eras: the emergence of Christianity, spiritual liberation from the shackles of the Middle Ages (this revolution was embodied in the Renaissance and Reformation) and the Great bourgeois revolutions. My understanding of history is that these revolutions were milestones on the path to freedom. February 1917 and August 1991 lie in this cluster. Another thing is that very often good wins in the fourth act of the drama, and after the procession singing “La Marseillaise” the gentlemen Jacobins appear on stage. The rhythm of history does not coincide with the short human life.
Revolutions (not coups at the top, but revolutions) are determined by the logic of the world-historical process. In this sense, they are inevitable and healing. Even the most terrible ones, inspired by the archaic and objectively aimed at turning history back, like the Bolsheviks in Russia or the Khomeinists in Iran, solve certain historical problems that the previous regime could not cope with, and after implementing these tasks, they lead their societies to further progressive development. It is important to understand the nature of revolutionary consciousness. A revolution is a holiday in the strictest sense of the word. The time of ideal life. The era of universal belief that the old regime will collapse and after this a new happy life will come. A revolution is a phase transition during which most of society is plunged into illusion. But without this illusion, revolutions do not win.
In some ways, October 1917 was certainly a disaster. It is important to realize the iron conditionality of this event. It was determined by the qualitative characteristics of Russian society, which turned out to be unable to find the evolutionary path of development in the specific historical situation of the 19th-20th centuries. At the same time, the utmost responsibility falls on the modernized strata of society, immersed in high culture, who have gone through the school of rational thinking, but have not demonstrated the ability to respond to the challenges of history. The Russian elite showed itself not to be the “only European”, but to be Asian nobles, critically inconsistent with the realities of the era.
Perestroika indeed has many similarities with the era of the Great Reforms of Alexander II. The Soviet government began reforms when all the deadlines for saving the system and ensuring its smooth evolution to a new quality had passed. (For example, the pragmatic Chinese communists have been rolling out Deng Xiaoping’s reforms since 1979. The Soviets stood until the last.) Here, too, an inexorable historical imperative pressed: the Union lost the Cold War, the Afghan operation reached a dead end. The alternative to transformation also promised to plunge the country into uncontrollable turbulent events, which in a nuclear superpower was fraught with a global catastrophe.
The reformers at the top were more or less clearly aware of “what inheritance they were refusing.” There was no extensive positive program. It is important to emphasize that this was not anyone's fault. The history of mankind has no experience of emerging from the communist experiment. In the USSR there is a layer of people who understand the realities of the world economy, the political system of the West, having experience of life in a qualitatively different reality(and this is critically important) was negligible. There was no unanimity in the ruling stratum. The reforms took place against the backdrop of growing pressure from conservative forces.
Everyone who was sick of the stagnant reality took up the slogans and became supporters of perestroika. At the same time, convinced bearers of liberal values there was negligible. Spontaneous democracy, protest against partyocracy, and the need to destroy ideological dictatorship dominated. The desire to escape from a miserable existence, to find shops with full counters, to see the world, etc. In parallel, historically inevitable processes of national revival of the imperial outskirts unfolded.
The picture of positive expectations has been mythologized. The market will put everything in its place. Once the CPSU is removed, our people will finally live no worse than the Europeans. The collective historical subject was acutely inadequate to historical reality. The blame for this lies entirely with the communist system. Society lived behind a high fence, and a perverted picture of the world was formed by a powerful ideological machine. Soviet people did not feel the need to understand the nature of the historical alternative to the Soviet project. There were two mythologies in the mass consciousness: the Soviet ideological caricature of the West and the positive mythology about a well-fed and free society full of coveted goods, a society where even the unemployed had a better life than an ordinary Soviet worker. Under these initial conditions, one could not expect another, more rosy development of events. It could have been worse, like in Yugoslavia.
After 1991, the post-reform situation in Russia is slowly but consistently being reproduced. Over the course of two decades, the relatively loose Soviet class society was reformatted and formed into a post-reform bureaucratic pyramid. The emerging bourgeois strata are driven into the reservation. Their property is not guaranteed in any way. There is no independent court. Monstrous corruption is corroding society. The traditional masses do not like the rich, who are successfully robbed by “our” bosses. But the mole of history digs and digs. We'll wait until we see how this round ends. One thing is more or less clear: the forces that have relied on the restoration of class society and the formation of a reserve are in for big surprises.
Vyacheslav Rybakov, writer
The strength of our victories
For where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.
I am not a professional historian of Russia.
Having been studying China for many years and, moreover, from time to time stumbling upon
passionate discussions of amateurs about the intricacies of Chinese history and culture, I can best imagine how much nonsense quite intelligent and decent people can produce, arguing about something that they do not understand, but are guided by the most general considerations and the best intentions.
It is the reasoning about special issues from the transcendental positions of “in general”, from the positions of “good is better than bad”, “it would be good and fair to light up, but at least the grass wouldn’t grow there”, that have so filled our information space that it’s time to call its disinformation. Oddly enough, it is precisely with the current freedom of speech that it is becoming more and more difficult to discuss anything on the case, specifically, with the aim of finding a real way out of real difficulties.
I would really not like to turn out to be another Herzen; There are already so many of them in England.
Having decided to think aloud about Russian serfdom, I will quite deliberately not go into specifics. Any specialist with one phrase: “But in the village of Pustye Scrotums in March one thousand eight hundred and sixty-two it was not like this, but like this...” - will not leave any stone unturned from my amateur research.
Therefore, I will try to tackle the matter in an orientalist way. The orientalist has a habit: there are much fewer reliable facts, but the time frame of history is much longer, and the pace is much lower; and willy-nilly you have to almost touch it, closing your eyes and carefully touching with your fingertips the fifth eyelid, then the fifteenth, to look for similar roughnesses. The habit of measuring history over at least centuries helps us sometimes to see the forest for the trees.
So, did serfdom play any positive role in Russia, and do you have to be a hero like Konstantin Leontiev to even try to look at the problem from this angle?
The second question can be answered immediately with complete certainty. You don’t have to be a hero, you just need to honestly say what you think. If you think so, of course.
But regarding the first...
And what? And it very well may be.
We have an example that is much closer to us in time, much more visual, much more terrible - and which left in Russian history no less harmful deformations than serfdom.
Yes, yes, everyone probably already understood what we were talking about. Exactly. Stalin's Gulag.
I recently re-read an article by my respected senior colleague Vladimir Aronovich Yakobson, a brilliant expert on all kinds of Akkadian-Sumerian affairs, any Ur and Uruk, and, in particular, the laws of Hammurabi, published in the eighth issue of “Zvezda” for the tenth year.
“And the future, built at such a cost, cannot be bright, because, I am sure, there is some still undiscovered historical law of the preservation of good and evil, if you like, something like historical karma for each people and for humanity as a whole. There is no mysticism here, I am a pure materialist, and that is why I am sure that we are paying and will continue to pay for a long time for the massacres of Ivan the Terrible, for the “successful management” of Joseph the Bloody and for all the evil that happened before them, as well as in between and after. And, finally, a completely prosaic remark: as the historical experience of many countries shows, well-fed, healthy, well-educated and satisfied people work much better and more efficiently than the Pavka Korchagins, and even more so than the prisoners at the logging site or at the White Sea Canal.”
What can I say? Everything is exactly like that. There's nothing to cover it with. The pepper is clear: it is better to be rich and healthy than poor and sick.
Now let's do a thought experiment. We take Herzen with his impeccable karma and put him in the pre-war Kremlin as general secretary. A rare chance, your honor! Show the fools how it really is!
Brotherly, but not for us, Poland sleeps and dreams of returning the Lithuanian and Ukrainian lands right up to the Black Sea. And in the twenties. And the thirties are already in the yard, Hitler has already eaten Czechoslovakia and loomed over the entire surrounding Europe, and in Warsaw, having taken several Czech crumbs from under his table, they are still dreaming of, with a weak wave of the hand, annul three centuries of European history and return to to the sweet mess “odd mozha do mozha.”
The most powerful European powers, England and France, are now planning the bombing of Baku and the seizure of Transcaucasia. And in the twenties. And the thirties are already here, Hitler has already attacked Poland, and they are still striving from the airfields of the mandated Middle East to destroy the large cities of the Caucasus and annex the south of the USSR to...
No, not to a free Europe, as some probably thought hopefully. Just to the same mandated territories.
There is nothing to say about Japan and the Russian Far East.
And there is absolutely no point in saying platitudes about Hitler himself, who back in the twenties, with an open heart, assured the world community that he would squeeze out the blinkers of anyone for kind lebensraum, and even with a feeling of deep satisfaction on Slavic subhumans.
Meanwhile, the factories that were able to be built under the tsar in defiance of the grabbers in epaulettes have collapsed. There is nothing to make weapons on. And not from anything. There aren't even any raw materials. That is, it is there, but the jester knows where. Where where? In Karaganda! In the permafrost! Where there is no Norilsk yet, where, in fact, there is not even Magadan yet. There is nothing, there is snow for hundreds of kilometers, that’s all the property of the republic.
How can you be lured to work there, in the white desert, in the icy silence, with a good salary, your own cottage in the garden, swimming pools with heated water, a developed network of roads? So that nickel, molybdenum and chromium are finally mined for the Motherland by “well-fed, healthy, well-educated and happy people” who, who can argue, “work much better and more efficiently than Pavka Korchagins and especially prisoners”?
And besides, every year is worth its weight in gold. It's not those who are about to attack, it's these. The bomb carriers of the rich and well-fed, who work better, are about to fly through with fire and sword, about to fly towards long-calculated targets. The blond, black-haired, and even red-haired heads of innocent Soviet children who have only just managed to be shoveled (which now for some reason is not possible) from the grimy are about to be felled by shrapnel, high-explosive, incendiary and chemical weapons criminal street children in clean, very mischievous pioneers.
What does the smart, noble, kind Secretary General Herzen do, having seen enough of this disgrace from the Kremlin?
For some reason, it seems that in horror he pulls off the jacket known to the whole world for general secretaries over his head and with all his soul, as well as his whole body, runs, as usual, to England.
Clean hands, unsullied conscience. Let anyone who wants to deal with such nightmares. And then I will finish him off with all the temperament of an intellectual with an excellent style and considerable wealth. From London, I can definitely see that the Kremlin has no outside world and all the tricks of the cannibals there have no reasonable explanations. Just the crazy whims of fanatics who have seized power...
When the problem is to reduce the sea of tears that will be shed one way or another, it is not inspiring. Somehow small. It’s better not to have anything to do with it one way or another. To talk about the fact that not a single tear should be shed even for the sake of complete world harmony - yes, that’s our way. Hangover-like. There is no greater happiness than to wake up after a week-long binge and, with trembling hands, with eyes like frozen fish, swear: no more! Not a single one!
Tears.
And really - no, no. Not a single one. Until the next binge.
This terrible, hopeless squaring of the circle confronted Russia every time the situation in the surrounding world required it to make another breakthrough in its endless catch-up development. And any objectively necessary overstrain led to another increase in oppression and at the same time - to another sublimation of the hangover humanism of the fleet-footed intelligentsia.
Where does this curse come from - endless convulsions of catching up development, historical epilepsy? They say that epilepsy is a disease of geniuses, but something is too painful, really... Maybe, well, that kind of genius?
And here it is appropriate to move on to the next questions posed by Alexander Melikhov. What was the reason for the lack of preparedness for the “emancipation” of the peasants, which ultimately led to the October catastrophe? And at the same time, is there any similarity here with our perestroika? Could it have been accomplished with fewer losses and greater achievements?
What now to complain about the fact that when in Europe Charlemagne was already at the head of a perfectly organized armored army, I’m not afraid to even call a spade a spade - chivalry, burned the Polabian Slavs alive and drove them from their native Slavic Elbe far to the east, in the very east of this Krivichi and Vyatichi could only reason with each other with roughly shaved wood. It's a long time ago. And irrevocable. Let's not pay attention to this at all; two or three centuries of gap in technical and military development - just think, is there happiness in war? You just need to be kinder and more tolerant, no matter what happens. It’s only the generals who have gone crazy from their uselessness in life who have only war on their minds. And what will a humanist tell us when an enemy comes, whose military skill and equipment has surpassed his people by three centuries? There is only one thing: there is no need to resist at all, you need to lie down, spread yourself wider and join the advanced culture. Kinder and more tolerant, understand? And whoever didn’t lie down - ugh, savage!
But they didn’t go to bed. They beat them with their own weapons. And they fought back. And again they caught up in all combat aspects, when someone again was haunted by the Eastern Lebensraum. And there was no end to it. “It’s great that you, Your Majesty, thanked your teachers!” - Field Marshal Renschild said to Peter after the Poltava battle. If people had retained at least more formal nobility in people, Keitel could have said the same thing to Zhukov on May 9, 1945. And many more to many others, perhaps starting with Ivan the Third.
And with almost every victory over external invasion, we lived worse and worse, uglier and uglier. And they rebelled more and more often.
No mystery.
Here, along the way, it’s time to answer a very simple question for complete clarity: is a country worthy of existence, in which from time to time it is necessary to do this? Maybe her? It's about time she... did that?
But if you stick your nose to the very bottom, to the very root, it becomes obvious: simple questions have very simple answers.
For whom this country is theirs, for that it is worthy.
And for those who are not their own, it is, of course, easier.
For those who are not their own, their kindness is like this: how can it finally fall apart - and then, in patches, everything will improve and become humanized.
And for those who have their own, those have a completely different one: how can they finally improve and humanize it - and, moreover, not ruin it.
A compromise between these two elementary positions is apparently impossible. So let us remember the optimism of the unforgettable comrade Sukhov and repeat in more or less harmonious chorus: it is better, of course, to suffer. The rest - with their things on the way out.
To freedom! With a clear conscience! From Russian hell, from the prison of nations!
Is something wrong again?
Oh, there are too many things to fit on a personal yacht, or even on a specially chartered cruise ship?
Well, then I don’t know... What about confiscation? Will it suit you?
My generation remembers by heart both Lenin’s definition of a revolutionary situation and all the parodies of it. But for the young, I’ll give you a refresher: this is when those above can no longer do it, but those below no longer want to. That is, the upper classes cannot govern in the old way, and the lower classes cannot live in the old way.
There is an opinion that this is not entirely true.
There is an opinion that, theoretically, it is possible to get out of any situation without revolutions, exclusively peacefully through gradual reforms. From any. No matter how far the crisis has gone, no matter how many mistakes have accumulated. Slowly, thoughtfully and carefully unravel knot by knot, tear by tear, scooping out the ocean of centuries-old sobs...
But for some reason, in some countries it works at least sometimes, but in others it doesn’t work at all.
Where do all the reforms fail, or at least turn out to be almost their opposite, depriving those they were meant to make happy? Where, no matter what you do, everything only leads to harm and only brings the terrible all-encompassing bloody spasm closer?
I would venture to say that I know at least a large part of the answer.
This is where the ruling class is so stupid, selfish and irresponsible that no reform can be pushed through it.
For more than a century, a crisis had been brewing in the richest, most educated, most noble France. Everyone who lived with even a little open eyes understood already seventy years before the guillotine that the country was sliding into the abyss. That there will be a nightmare if everything goes on as it is going. Already from the beginning of the century - which at the end was destined to see the august heads on the scaffold, the infants of the Vendee pierced by republican bayonets (fraternite, vu compren?), the flight of Napoleons drunk with blood -
sky eagles and other romantic miracles - the royal power hesitantly and timidly, as if testing cold water with bare feet, from time to time tried to change something, improve it, save itself. And then she pulled back. Wet!
All it took was for some sensible minister to come and at least start doing something - that was it, the end. Well, if only resignation. And then it fell. Link. All the nobles stand in orderly rows, their tongues bristling, - and the person of the sovereign, an upstart and hard worker, an apologist for bloodless corrections, is overshadowed and undermined by the royal authority, and does not respect princes, and is preparing a revolution, and a villain, a molester, of course, an enemy of the time-honored order , encroaches on holy stupor, probably bribed by an enemy, external or internal...
It's wet!
The usual life is under threat! The right to arbitrariness, already ingrained in basic reflexes, is under threat! Carelessness and carelessness, the only life that is truly worthy of a nobleman, will have to be replaced by at least some meaningful work and responsibility for the country and the crown; work and responsibility, which, as insolent plebeians are trying to teach blue blood, do not at all come down to gambling adrenaline and heroic swinging of swords, mostly in boudoirs.
One step forward - two steps back. For almost a century!
We jumped. Alonz enfan.
The same thing happened with us under Alexander and Nicholas the First. And under Alexander the Second Liberator. And before the seventeenth year. And right before our eyes - from Kosygin’s shy innovations to Gorbachev’s daring pandemonium.
Where the inertia, laziness and short-sightedness of the ruling class exceed a certain critical, maximum permissible level, reforms are always late and always go awry, one step forward, two steps back.
Revolutions occur when even the most urgent and most careful transformations are blocked or distorted by the mass stubbornness of the ruling class.
When there is no other way to carry out these transformations except by first exterminating and expelling at least the minimum necessary portion of this accursed class-ruler, and depriving the rest of it in such a way as to deprive even the slightest blocking capabilities.
It’s a joke with her, with France, it’s not for us to figure out why her nobles in a century that was crazy and wise turned out to be not so much wise as crazy. Arrogance ingrained in flesh and blood? Gallantry, which has become a universal sport and straightened everyone’s brain convolutions to a state of constant erection?
It's none of our business.
But the Russian blue princes? Our St. Petersburg salons and rublev-
Chinese dens?
The jerkily increasing inertia of the Russian elites, almost always forcibly replacing one another, is inextricably linked with the same catching-up development.
Few people think of a simple thought: each victory over the enemy, which required extreme mobilization and extreme self-sacrifice from the people, made the victorious elite less and less concerned about what was happening to these people, and made it more and more dependent on what is happening and what is being produced in the once again triumphantly defeated West.
The Poles were repulsed - and soon their own nobility desired to be gentry. They put the people in danger, so that there would be enough fire gear, ships and cloth, and they repulsed the Swedes. Napoleon was repulsed - and they themselves were forced into the Freemasons, getting rid of their own country with non-binding affection: and let our faithful people receive what they deserve in God. They repulsed the interventionists and at the same time gutted the country so much that later they had to simply use rifle butts to drive some into collective farms and some into camps. Hitler was repulsed - and it started to roll again: got spoiled at the front? They played a victorious draw with the richest and most powerful America in Korea - and taxes on personal farming completely strangled the village, otherwise, you know, vestiges of private property began to stir; it is necessary that the peasants themselves cut down every apple tree and slaughter every cow... Or take current science. The main thing is that the reporting is in order. To the right, smerdy, to the right! Who needs your discoveries? In America, anyway, everything has already been opened a long time ago, and your destiny, since we tolerate you for now, is approximate attendance and heaps of useless papers that are correctly filled out and submitted to the authorities on time!
The more the power took from the people for each successive victory, the less the people could give to the ruling class in their everyday life. Each successive victorious push for a technologically and economically more powerful enemy, over and over again, more thoroughly and more sophisticatedly, devastated the peaceful economy of the country and discouraged the masters from any desire to engage in any worthy business.
And from life such as with furunculosis, riots and revolutions have swelled in Russian history every now and then with bloody ulcers.
But during each revolution and each post-revolutionary devastation - exactly the same as during each post-victory devastation - the comfort of life behind the cordon went even further.
And therefore, every failed reform and every successful revolution caused by its failure (let us remember Gorbachev’s perestroika and Yeltsin’s coup as the closest example of such a combination) again and again widened the gap between the quality of life that the infrastructure of one’s country could provide - and that could be taken from those whom reforms tried to catch up with, whom revolutions rejected and whom armies defeated.
And therefore, each failed reform and each successful revolution made the next victorious elite more and more indifferent to the life of the subject country and more and more interested in the prosperity and favor of those who were overthrown, then expelled, or simply defeated.
By the way, each old elite could still, for some reason, put up with relative discomfort. It may not be as comfortable, but it’s cozy, like home. Like on my grandfather's estate. I walked under this table, and the nanny pretended to have lost me and called loudly: “Grishenka! Grishanya, it’s time to eat the dragon!” Even then this table was already drying out and creaking, oh, how I love it, my grandfather said that Pankrat the Craftsman himself got along...
Each new elite is completely devoid of these prejudices. There is nothing sweet and dear to her. She just needs the most modern, the most luxurious, the most prestigious.
Have fun, brave Ross... Yeah, just this second. But what vineyards did Radishchev warm his darling with? Chaadaev?
Where were the fabrics from which the Decembrists sewed their pants?
In Ivanovo, perhaps? In Vyshny Volochyok? Or is it still in Paris?
Where did the Speranskys and Loris-Melikovs order their outfits and furniture from?
Perhaps the leaders of the world proletariat were scurrying from People’s Commissariat to People’s Commissariat on their incredibly important matters in “Russo-Balts” or “ZISs”? Alas, to the bourgeois-
Russian Packards.
What technologies and what materials did the hasty benefactor Gorbachev use to build the new dachas vital for perestroika in Crimea and Abkhazia?
But he was not yet from the new elite, just a newcomer to the old one - and even then the Stavropol machine operator no longer liked either the Livadia or Pitsunda dachas of the departed leaders. New mansions were needed with the latest in Euro-Atlantic technology and capitalist comfort. And let’s admit, without fear of flattering the elderly reformer too rudely: in six years of power over the emptying shops year after year, he really really and well built this. I managed to do both. Got ready for the putsch. Despite all the efforts of the CIA to collapse the Soviet economy.
Or maybe the humanist Raisa was wearing boots from the “Red Triangle”?
Or else the fiery oppositionist Nemtsov, having failed to transfer the State Duma to domestic cars, at least got into them himself?
Somehow not. Unless the terrible totalitarian Putin tried it. And even then, for this he was mercilessly ridiculed by the progressive democratic public and accused by the free media of cheap populism and flirting with the darkest instincts of the crowd.
Okay, these are all officials. Bureaucrats. Bureaucracy. Bribes from them in Rus' have always been smooth. But these are the personification of the progressive system, the hope of the economy, the new strong people of a free Russia?
Oh, they - wow!
Only it’s not capitalism that happened. This, as often with our reforms, was not a step forward; on the contrary, we were brought back into feudalism. It’s just that modern people disdain to get involved with agriculture, who needs it, all this manure. And therefore, the newly-minted emperor, having gathered those who had seated him on the throne, did not at all distribute land holdings into fiefs. No. You, Count, will be fed from communications, you, Duke, from energy, you, Marquis, from strategic metallurgy...
But it was brilliantly noted by the Strugatskys in “It’s Hard to Be a God”: “You will begin to distribute lands to your associates, but what will your associates need land without serfs?”
Here are the reasons for fatal inertia. It never mattered to them what was happening to the gray-paws! What we say will happen will happen!
The nobles are not in the least dependent on our condition. There are no feedback connections - sleep well, Grandfather Wiener, even in your mortal nightmare you will not dream of this cybernetics in one gate. Even the thought that our life or death could somehow affect their well-being and comfort is wild and absurd for them. Is it possible that an unsuccessful war, threatening to shake them off the helm of power, could for a moment make them turn around and glance over their shoulder: how are they doing, defenders of the Motherland? Are they still moving? Shouldn't we throw them a couple of boxes of American stew and a bag of Lend-Lease egg powder, so that they won't stretch their legs at all? This reform, they say, is quite enough for the stinkers. Moreover, after the victory, anyway, those from whom we find empty tin cans with non-Russian letters will be jailed for espionage...
One step forward - two steps back.
This is both simpler and more reliable than giving up something, being limited in something, calculating something and thoughtfully, consistently changing it. Selifan, get my Bentley ready, before going to street racing, I’ll decorate it with the tricolor! Let the rednecks, if they manage to dodge, know: we are patriots too!
And, let's be fair, you can't blame them for this. The ruling class needs some kind of comfort in order to calmly think about Serious Things. About geopolitics, about the fate of the country, about Russia's image abroad, about joining the WTO, about controlling stakes, about the NASDAQ index... Once in a while you think about it - and then, as luck would have it, the hot water will be turned off in the cold. This is like death, don’t you understand, slaves? The Duke will be distracted by hot water, miss NASDAQ - and the country will be finished!
And so it turned out that nothing was and was not done for a peaceful life. Even the habit of such work disappeared, even the skills melted away. For what? We will find three imported junk cars at the landfill, one of them is working...
What can we demand from them if we ourselves...
Children, raise your hands: who has domestically produced bathtubs and faucets at home? So... One, two... What, Ivanov? Are you not talking about the bath? Do you need to go to the toilet? It’s okay, just be patient, there are five minutes left until the bell rings. What about you, Rabinovich? Oh, should you go to the toilet too? Well, what should we do with you, go... And look, by the way, and tell us later: do the boys have domestic taps installed there or... What? In general, there have been no taps for a long time? And the pipes were handed over as scrap to a collection point?
Hmmm. Well, children, long live the abolition of serfdom and the triumph of demo-
kratii!
Mary Ivanna, has serfdom really already been abolished?
* Continuation of the discussion started by Alexander Melikhov in the magazine “Neva”, 2011, No. 2.
Servants who do not have a master do not become free people because of this - lackeyness is in their soul.
G. Heine
The date of the abolition of serfdom in Russia is December 19, 1861. This is a significant event, since the beginning of 1861 turned out to be extremely tense for the Russian Empire. Alexander 2 was even forced to put the army on high alert. The reason for this was not a possible war, but a growing boom in peasant discontent.
Several years before 1861, the tsarist government began to consider legislation to abolish serfdom. The Emperor understood that there was no longer room to delay. His advisers unanimously said that the country was on the verge of an explosion of a peasant war. On March 30, 1859, a meeting between noble nobles and the emperor took place. At this meeting, the nobles said that it was better for the liberation of the peasants to come from above, otherwise it would follow from below.
Reform February 19, 1861
As a result, the date for the abolition of serfdom in Russia was determined - February 19, 1861. What did this reform give to the peasants, did they become free? This question can be answered unequivocally, the reform of 1861 made life much worse for peasants. Of course, the tsar’s manitsest, which he signed in order to free ordinary people, endowed the peasants with rights that they never possessed. Now the landowner did not have the right to exchange a peasant for a dog, beat him, forbid him to marry, trade, or engage in fishing. But the problem for the peasants was the land.
Land question
To resolve the land issue, the state convened world mediators, who were sent to the localities and dealt with the division of land there. The overwhelming majority of the work of these intermediaries consisted in the fact that they announced to the peasants that on all controversial issues with the land they must negotiate with the landowner. This agreement had to be drawn up in writing. The reform of 1861 gave landowners the right, when determining land plots, to take away the so-called “surplus” from peasants. As a result, the peasants were left with only 3.5 dessiatines (1) of land per auditor's soul (2). Before the land reform there were 3.8 dessiatines. At the same time, the landowners took the best land from the peasants, leaving only infertile lands.
The most paradoxical thing about the reform of 1861 is that the date of the abolition of serfdom is known exactly, but everything else is very vague. Yes, the manifesto formally allocated land to the peasants, but in fact the land remained in the possession of the landowner. The peasant received only the right to buy that plot of land, who was assigned to him by the landowner. But at the same time, the landowners themselves were given the right to independently determine whether or not to allow the sale of land.
Redemption of land
No less strange was the amount at which the peasants had to buy out the land plots. This amount was calculated based on the rent that the landowner received. For example, the richest nobleman of those years, P.P. Shuvalov. received a quitrent of 23 thousand rubles a year. This means that the peasants, in order to buy the land, had to pay the landowner as much money as was necessary for the landowner to put it in the bank and annually receive those same 23 thousand rubles in interest. As a result, on average, one audit soul had to pay 166.66 rubles for tithes. Since the families were large, on average across the country one family had to pay 500 rubles to buy out a plot of land. It was an unaffordable amount.
The state came to the “aid” of the peasants. The State Bank paid the landowner 75-80% of the required amount. The rest was paid by the peasants. At the same time, they were obliged to settle accounts with the state and pay the required interest within 49 years. On average across the country, the bank paid the landowner 400 rubles for one plot of land. At the same time, the peasants gave the bank money for 49 years in the amount of almost 1,200 rubles. The state almost tripled its money.
The date of the abolition of serfdom is an important stage in the development of Russia, but it did not give a positive result. Only by the end of 1861, uprisings broke out in 1,176 estates in the country. By 1880, 34 Russian provinces were engulfed in peasant uprisings.
Only after the first revolution in 1907 did the government cancel the land purchase. Land began to be provided free of charge.
1 – one dessiatine is equal to 1.09 hectares.
2 – auditor soul – the male population of the country (women were not entitled to land).
Abolition of serfdom. IN 1861 In Russia, a reform was carried out that abolished serfdom. The main reason for this reform was the crisis of the serfdom system. In addition, historians consider the inefficiency of the labor of serfs as a reason. Economic reasons also include the urgent revolutionary situation as an opportunity for a transition from the everyday discontent of the peasant class to a peasant war. In the context of peasant unrest, which especially intensified during Crimean War, the government led by Alexander II, went towards the abolition of serfdom
January 3 1857 a new Secret Committee on Peasant Affairs was established, consisting of 11 people 26 July Minister of the Interior and Committee Member S. S. Lansky An official reform project was presented. It was proposed to create noble committees in each province that would have the right to make their own amendments to the draft.
The government program provided for the destruction of the personal dependence of peasants while maintaining all land ownership landowners; providing peasants with a certain amount of land for which they will be required to pay quitrent or serve corvée, and over time - the right to buy out peasant estates (residential buildings and outbuildings). Legal dependence was not eliminated immediately, but only after a transition period (12 years).
IN 1858 To prepare peasant reforms, provincial committees were formed, within which a struggle began for measures and forms of concessions between liberal and reactionary landowners. The committees were subordinate to the Main Committee for Peasant Affairs (transformed from the Secret Committee). The fear of an all-Russian peasant revolt forced the government to change the government program of peasant reform, the projects of which were repeatedly changed in connection with the rise or decline of the peasant movement.
December 4 1858 A new peasant reform program was adopted: providing peasants with the opportunity to buy out land and creating peasant public administration bodies. The main provisions of the new program were as follows:
peasants gaining personal freedom
providing peasants with plots of land (for permanent use) with the right of redemption (especially for this purpose, the government allocates a special credit)
approval of a transitional (“urgently obligated”) state
February 19 ( March, 3rd) 1861 in St. Petersburg, Emperor Alexander II signed the Manifesto " About the All-Merciful granting to serfs of the rights of free rural inhabitants" And , consisting of 17 legislative acts.
The manifesto was published in Moscow on March 5, 1861, in Forgiveness Sunday V Assumption Cathedral Kremlin after liturgy; at the same time it was published in St. Petersburg and some other cities ; in other places - during March of the same year.
February 19 ( March, 3rd) 1861 in St. Petersburg, Alexander II signed Manifesto on the abolition of serfdom And Regulations on peasants emerging from serfdom, consisting of 17 legislative acts. The manifesto “On the Most Gracious Granting of the Rights of Free Rural Citizens to Serfs” dated February 19, 1861 was accompanied by a number of legislative acts (22 documents in total) concerning the issues of the emancipation of peasants, the conditions for their purchase of landowners’ land and the size of the purchased plots in certain regions of Russia.
Peasant reform of 1861 On February 19, 1861, the Emperor approved a number of legislative acts on specific provisions of the peasant reform. Were accepted central And local regulations which regulated the procedure and conditions for the liberation of peasants and the transfer of land plots to them. Their main ideas were: the peasants received personal freedom and, before the redemption deal was concluded with the landowner, the land was transferred to the use of the peasants.
The allocation of land was carried out by voluntary agreement between the landowner and the peasant: the first could not give a land allotment less than the lower norm established by local regulations, the second could not demand an allotment larger than the maximum norm provided for in the same regulation. All land in thirty-four provinces was divided into three categories: non-chernozem, chernozem and steppe.
The soul's allotment consisted of a manor and arable land, pastures and wastelands. Only males were allocated land.
Disputed issues were resolved through a mediator. The landowner could demand the forced exchange of peasant plots if mineral resources were discovered on their territory or the landowner intended to build canals, piers, and irrigation structures. It was possible to move peasant estates and houses if they were located in unacceptable proximity to landowner buildings.
Ownership of the land remained with the landowner until the redemption transaction was completed; during this period, the peasants were only users and " temporarily obliged " . During this transitional period, peasants were freed from personal dependence, taxes in kind were abolished for them, and the norms of corvee labor (thirty to forty days a year) and cash rent were reduced.
The temporarily obligated state could be terminated after the expiration of a nine-year period from the date of issue of the manifesto, when the peasant refused the allotment. For the rest of the peasants, this position lost force only in 1883, when they were transferred to owners.
The redemption agreement between the landowner and the peasant community was approved by the mediator. The estate could be purchased at any time, the field plot - with the consent of the landowner and the entire community. After the agreement was approved, all relations (landowner-peasant) ceased and the peasants became owners.
The subject of property in most regions became the community, in some areas - the peasant household. In the latter case, peasants received the right of hereditary disposal of land. Movable property (and real estate previously acquired by the peasant in the name of the landowner) became the property of the peasant. Peasants received the right to enter into obligations and contracts by acquiring movable and immovable property. The lands provided for use could not serve as security for contracts.
Peasants received the right to engage in trade, open enterprises, join guilds, go to court on an equal basis with representatives of other classes, enter service, and leave their place of residence.
In 1863 and 1866 the provisions of the reform were extended to appanage and state peasants.
Peasants paid a ransom for estate and field land. The redemption amount was based not on the actual value of the land, but on the amount of quitrent that the landowner received before the reform. An annual six percent capitalized quitrent was established, equal to the pre-reform annual income ( quitrent ) of the landowner. Thus, the basis for the redemption operation was not the capitalist, but the former feudal criterion.
The peasants paid twenty-five percent of the redemption amount in cash upon completion of the redemption transaction, the landowners received the remaining amount from the treasury (in money and securities), which the peasants had to pay, along with interest, for forty-nine years.
The police fiscal apparatus of the government had to ensure the timeliness of these payments. To finance the reform, the Peasant and Noble Banks were formed.
During the period of "temporary duty" the peasants remained a legally separate class. The peasant community bound its members with a mutual guarantee: it was possible to leave it only by paying half of the remaining debt and with the guarantee that the other half would be paid by the community. It was possible to leave “society” by finding a deputy. The community could decide on a mandatory purchase of the land. The gathering allowed family divisions of land.
Volost gathering decided by a qualified majority issues: on replacing communal land use with precinct land use, on dividing land into permanently inherited plots, on redistributions, on removing its members from the community.
Headman was the actual assistant of the landowner (during the period of temporary existence), could impose fines on the guilty or subject them to arrest.
Volost court elected for a year and resolved minor property disputes or tried for minor offenses.
A wide range of measures were envisaged to apply to arrears: confiscation of income from real estate, placement into work or guardianship, forced sale of the debtor's movable and immovable property, confiscation of part or all of the allotment.
The noble character of the reform was manifested in many features: in the order of calculating redemption payments, in the procedure for the redemption operation, in privileges in the exchange of land plots, etc. During the redemption in the black earth regions, there was a clear tendency to turn peasants into tenants of their own plots (the land there was expensive), and in non-chernozem ones - a fantastic increase in prices for the purchased estate.
During the redemption, a certain picture emerged: the smaller the plot of land being redeemed, the more one had to pay for it. Here a hidden form of redemption not of land, but of the peasant’s personality, was clearly revealed. The landowner wanted to get him for his freedom. At the same time, the introduction of the principle of compulsory redemption was a victory of state interest over the interest of the landowner.
The unfavorable consequences of the reform were the following: a) peasants' allotments decreased compared to pre-reform, and payments increased in comparison with the old quitrent; c) the community actually lost its rights to use forests, meadows and water bodies; c) peasants remained a separate class.
Serfdom is a phenomenon that many historians and writers of that time mention with very negative emotions. This is understandable, because serfdom constrained not only the freedom of people, but also their opportunities for development. This article will tell you when serfdom was adopted and abolished.
To understand when and why serfdom was abolished, it is necessary to familiarize yourself with its essence and history of its origin.
What is serfdom
Serfdom is a stricter form of feudal power. It originated in European countries long before its adoption in Russia and had a very negative impact on the comprehensive development of the country. At a time when Russian peasants, closely tied to the lands of their feudal lords, worked almost around the clock and paid huge taxes, European peasants were already adapted to the rapidly developing capitalist system.
The essence of serfdom is as follows. At that time, society was divided into two main layers - peasants and feudal lords. Peasants did not have private property. Feudal lords are the main owners of the country's capital, who were the owners of land, houses and other private property. Since the peasants needed to survive, they had to work on the land of the feudal lords. For this they were charged a portion of their harvest and work done. This is ordinary feudalism.
Serfdom in Russia is a toughened feudalism, which not only rips off more than half of the harvest and profit from the peasants, but also ties the peasant to the land of the feudal lord. Thus, the peasant is shackled and cannot move freely from one feudal lord to another, cannot accumulate funds and also become a feudal lord.
When was serfdom abolished in Russia?
The realization that serfdom was destroying society came to Russia much later than to Europe. If the majority of European countries abolished serfdom in the 18th century, then in Russia it was finally abolished on February 19, 1861. At that time, the imminent approach of a peasant uprising was felt. In addition, from an economic point of view, serfdom was already beginning to suffer. It was these factors that led to the abolition of serfdom.
Although the above two factors are considered the main ones, some historians argue that there were other phenomena that played a role in the abolition of serfdom in Russia.
Serfdom in Russia was formed gradually and, according to historians, there are many reasons for this. Back in the 15th century, peasants could freely leave for another landowner. The legal enslavement of peasants took place in stages.
Code of laws of 1497
The code of law of 1497 is the beginning of the legal formalization of serfdom.
Ivan III adopted a set of laws of a unified Russian state - the Code of Laws. Article 57 “On Christian Refusal” stated that the transfer from one landowner to another is limited to a single period for the entire country: a week before and a week after St. George’s Day - November 26. The peasants could go to another landowner, but they had to pay elderly for the use of land and yard. Moreover, the more time a peasant lived with a landowner, the more he had to pay him: for example, for living for 4 years - 15 pounds of honey, a herd of domestic animals or 200 pounds of rye.
Land reform of 1550
Under Ivan IV, the Code of Law of 1550 was adopted; he retained the right of peasants to move on St. George’s Day, but increased the payment for elderly and established an additional duty, in addition, the Code of Law obliged the owner to answer for the crimes of his peasants, which increased their dependence. Since 1581, the so-called reserved years, in which the transition was prohibited even on St. George’s Day. This was connected with the census: in which region the census took place, in that region the reserve year. In 1592, the census was completed, and with it the possibility of peasants transferring was completed. This provision was secured by a special Decree. Since then there has been a saying: “Here’s St. George’s Day for you, grandma...
The peasants, deprived of the opportunity to move to another owner, began to run away, settling for life in other regions or on “free” lands. The owners of the escaped peasants had the right to search for and return the fugitives: in 1597, Tsar Fedor issued a Decree according to which the period for searching for fugitive peasants was five years.
“The master will come, the master will judge us...”
Serfdomin the 17th century
In the 17th century in Russia, on the one hand, commodity production and the market appeared, and on the other, feudal relations were consolidated, adapting to market ones. This was a time of strengthening of autocracy, the emergence of prerequisites for the transition to an absolute monarchy. The 17th century is the era of mass popular movements in Russia.
In the second half of the 17th century. peasants in Russia were united into two groups − serfs and black-sown Serf peasants ran their farms on patrimonial, local and church lands, and bore various feudal duties in favor of the landowners. Black-nosed peasants were included in the category of “taxable people” who paid taxes and were under the control of the authorities. Therefore, there was a mass exodus of black-mown peasants.
Government Vasily Shuisky tried to resolve the situation, to increase the period of search for fugitive peasants to 15 years, but neither the peasants themselves nor the nobles supported Shuisky’s unpopular peasant policy.
During the reign Mikhail Romanov further enslavement of the peasants took place. Cases of concessions or sales of peasants without land are increasing.
During the reign Alexey Mikhailovich Romanov a number of reforms were carried out: the procedure for collecting payments and carrying out duties was changed. In 1646 - 1648 A household inventory of peasants and peasants was carried out. And in 1648, an uprising called the “Salt Riot” took place in Moscow, the cause of which was an excessively high tax on salt. Following Moscow, other cities also rose. As a result of the current situation, it became clear that a revision of the laws was necessary. In 1649, a Zemsky Sobor was convened, at which the Council Code was adopted, according to which the peasants were finally attached to the land.
Its special chapter, “The Court of Peasants,” abolished the “fixed summers” for the search and return of fugitive peasants, the indefinite search and return of fugitives, established the heredity of serfdom and the right of the landowner to dispose of the property of the serf. If the owner of the peasants turned out to be insolvent, the property of the peasants and slaves dependent on him was collected to repay his debt. Landowners received the right of patrimonial court and police supervision over peasants. Peasants did not have the right to speak in court independently. Marriages, family divisions of peasants, and inheritance of peasant property could only occur with the consent of the landowner. Peasants were forbidden to keep trading shops; they could only trade from carts.
Harboring runaway peasants was punishable by a fine, whipping and prison. For the murder of another peasant, the landowner had to give up his best peasant and his family. Their owner had to pay for runaway peasants. At the same time, serf peasants were also considered “state tax collectors,” i.e. bore duties for the benefit of the state. Peasant owners were obliged to provide them with land and implements. It was forbidden to deprive peasants of land by turning them into slaves or setting them free; it was forbidden to forcibly take away property from peasants. The right of peasants to complain about their masters was also preserved.
At the same time, serfdom extended to the black-sown peasants, the palace peasants who served the needs of the royal court, who were forbidden to leave their communities.
The Council Code of 1649 demonstrated the path to strengthening Russian statehood. It legally formalized serfdom.
Serfdom inXVIII century
Peter I
In 1718 - 1724, under Peter I, a census of the peasantry was carried out, after which household taxation in the country was replaced by poll tax. In fact, the peasants maintained the army, and the townspeople maintained the fleet. The size of the tax was determined arithmetically. The amount of military expenses was divided by the number of souls and the amount was 74 kopecks. from peasants and 1 rub. 20 kopecks - from the townspeople. The poll tax brought more income to the treasury. During the reign of Peter I, a new category of peasants was formed, called state, they paid into the state treasury, in addition to the poll tax, a quitrent of 40 kopecks. Under Peter I, a passport system was also introduced: now if a peasant went to work more than thirty miles from home, he had to receive a note in his passport about the date of return.
Elizaveta Petrovna
Elizaveta Petrovna simultaneously increased the dependence of the peasants and changed their situation: she eased the situation of the peasants, forgiving them arrears for 17 years, reduced the size of the per capita tax, changed the recruitment (divided the country into 5 districts, which alternately supplied soldiers). But she also signed a decree according to which serfs could not voluntarily enroll as soldiers and allowed them to engage in crafts and trade. This put the beginning of delamination peasants
Catherine II
Catherine II set a course for further strengthening of absolutism and centralization: the nobles began to receive land and serfs as a reward.
Serfdom in19th century
Alexander I
Of course, serfdom hampered the development of industry and the development of the state in general, but despite this, agriculture adapted to new conditions and developed according to its capabilities: new agricultural machines were introduced, new crops began to be grown (sugar beets, potatoes, etc.) , to develop new lands in Ukraine, the Don, and the Volga region. But at the same time, the contradictions between landowners and peasants are intensifying - corvée and quitrent are being taken to the limit by the landowners. Corvée, in addition to working on the master's arable land, included work in a serf factory and performing various household chores for the landowner throughout the year. Sometimes the corvee was 5-6 days a week, which did not allow the peasant to run an independent farm at all. The process of stratification within the peasantry began to intensify. The rural bourgeoisie, represented by peasant owners (usually state peasants), gained the opportunity to acquire ownership of uninhabited lands and lease land from landowners.
The secret committee under Alexander I recognized the need for changes in peasant policy, but considered the foundations of absolutism and serfdom unshakable, although in the future it envisaged the abolition of serfdom and the introduction of a constitution. In 1801, a decree was issued on the right to purchase land by merchants, burghers and peasants (state and appanage).
In 1803, a decree “On Free Plowmen” was issued, which provided for the liberation of serfs for the purchase of land by entire villages or individual families by mutual consent of peasants and landowners. However, the practical results of this decree were negligible. The provision did not apply to landless peasant farm laborers.
Alexander I tried to solve the peasant question again in 1818. He even approved the project of A. Arakcheev and Minister of Finance D. Guryev on the gradual elimination of serfdom by buying out landowner peasants from their plots with the treasury. But this project was not practically implemented (with the exception of granting personal freedom to the Baltic peasants in 1816−1819, but without land).
By 1825, 375 thousand state peasants were in military settlements (1/3 of the Russian army), of which a Separate Corps was formed under the command of Arakcheev - the peasants served and worked at the same time, discipline was strict, punishments were numerous.
AlexanderII – Tsar-Liberator
Alexander II, who ascended the throne on February 19, 1855, set the following goals as the basis for the peasant reform:
- liberation of peasants from personal dependence;
- turning them into small owners while maintaining a significant part of landownership.
On February 19, 1861, Alexander II signed the Manifesto on the abolition of serfdom; he changed the fate of 23 million serfs: they received personal freedom and civil rights.
Manifesto on the abolition of serfdom
But for the land plots allotted to them (until they redeem them), they had to serve labor service or pay money, i.e. began to be called “temporarily obligated”. The sizes of peasant plots varied: from 1 to 12 dessiatines per male capita (on average 3.3 dessiatines). For the plots, the peasants had to pay the landowner an amount of money that, if deposited in the bank at 6%, would bring him an annual income equal to the pre-reform quitrent. According to the law, the peasants had to pay the landowner a lump sum for their allotment about a fifth of the stipulated amount (they could pay it not in money, but by working for the landowner). The rest was paid by the state. But the peasants had to return this amount to him (with interest) in annual payments for 49 years.
A. Mukha "Abolition of serfdom in Rus'"
The peasant reform was a compromise solution to the abolition of serfdom (this path is called reform); it was based on the real circumstances of life in Russia in the mid-19th century, the interests of both peasants and landowners. The disadvantage of this program was that, having received freedom and land, the peasant did not become the owner of his plot and a full member of society: peasants continued to be subjected to corporal punishment (until 1903), they actually could not participate in agrarian reforms.
Let's summarize
Like any historical event, the abolition of serfdom is not assessed unambiguously.
It is hardly worth perceiving serfdom as a terrible evil and only as a feature of Russia. It was in many countries of the world. And its cancellation did not happen immediately. There are still countries in the world where slavery has not been abolished by law. For example, slavery was abolished in Mauritania only in 2009. The abolition of serfdom also did not automatically mean an improvement in the living conditions of the peasants. Historians, for example, note the deterioration of the living conditions of peasants in the Baltic states, where serfdom was abolished under Alexander I. Napoleon, having captured Poland, abolished serfdom there, but it was reintroduced in this country and abolished only in 1863. In Denmark, serfdom was officially abolished in 1788, but peasants had to work corvée on the landowners' lands, which was finally abolished only in 1880.
Some historians even believe that serfdom in Russia was a necessary form of existence for society in conditions of constant political tension. It is possible that if Russia did not have to constantly repel the onslaught from the southeast and west, it would not have arisen at all, i.e. Serfdom is a system that ensured the national security and independence of the country.
Monument to Emperor Alexander II, Moscow