INTRODUCTION
The work examines the reasons for the implementation, main stages, and results of the Stolypin agrarian reform, which was carried out by the tsarist government in the period from 1906 to 1914. The problem is considered against the backdrop of political and economic situation prevailing in Russia on the eve of the ongoing reforms.
The beginning of the 20th century was a time of fundamental changes in politics and economics. A crisis situation was brewing in the country, revolutionary uprisings arose, the revolution of 1905-1907 took place. Russia needed to get back on its feet in order to continue to develop as a strong state, in order to gain influence and respect among highly developed countries such as England, France, which At that time they were capitalist powers, with a well-functioning administrative apparatus, a stable economy, and good rates of development of industry, production and economy.
Russia had two paths of development: revolutionary and peaceful, i.e. through reforming the political system and economy. There were no development trends observed in agriculture, but it was agriculture that was considered as a source of capital accumulation for the development of industry. After the abolition of serfdom, the peasants did not improve their situation or living status. Landlord lawlessness continued. A crisis situation was brewing. More and more peasant uprisings arose. To prevent unrest, the government had to immediately take measures to regulate the peasant masses, establish production, and restore agriculture. A reform was needed that could settle all the grievances; a person was needed who would take responsibility for carrying out such a reform. He became Prime Minister Pyotr Arkadyevich Stolypin. He offered his way out of the current situation. His reform was approved and accepted by the government.
The main stages and ways of carrying out the Stolypin agrarian reform are discussed in detail and outlined in this work. Using the available material, we are convinced that this reform was the most acceptable way out of the current situation and gave time to think about further ways of developing Russia.
1. PETER ARKADIEVICH STOLYPIN ABOUT REFORM
“We are called upon to free the people from beggary, from ignorance, from lack of rights,” said Pyotr Arkadyevich Stolypin. He saw the path to these goals primarily in strengthening statehood.
The core of his policy, the work of his whole life, was land reform.
This reform was supposed to create a class of small owners in Russia - a new “strong pillar of order”, a pillar of the state. Then Russia would “not be afraid of all revolutions.” Stolypin concluded his speech on land reform on May 10, 1907 with the famous words: “They (opponents of statehood) need great upheavals, we need Great Russia!”
“Nature has invested in man some innate instincts... and one of the strongest feelings of this order is the sense of ownership.” - Pyotr Arkadyevich wrote in a letter to L.N. Tolstoy in 1907. - “You cannot love someone else’s property on an equal basis with your own, and you cannot cultivate and improve land that is in temporary use, on an equal basis with your own land. The artificial emasculation of our peasant in this regard, the destruction of his innate sense of property leads to many bad things and, most importantly, to poverty. And poverty, for me, is the worst of slavery...”
P.A. Stolypin emphasized that he saw no point in “driving more people from the earth.” developed element landowners." On the contrary, we need to turn the peasants into real owners.
What kind of social system would arise in Russia after this reform?
Stolypin's supporters both then and later imagined him differently. Nationalist Vasily Shulgin, for example, believed that he would be close to the Italian fascist system. The Octobrists thought it would be more of a Western liberal society. Pyotr Arkadyevich himself said in 1909 in an interview: “Give the state 20 years of internal and external peace, and you will not recognize today’s Russia.”
Internal peace meant the suppression of the revolution, external peace meant the absence of wars. “As long as I am in power,” said Stolypin, “I will do everything humanly possible to prevent Russia from going to war. We cannot compare ourselves with the external enemy until the worst ones are destroyed. internal enemies the greatness of Russia - social revolutionaries." Stolypin prevented war after Hungary captured Bosnia in 1908. Having convinced the tsar not to mobilize, he noted with satisfaction: “Today I managed to save Russia from destruction.”
But Stolypin failed to complete the planned reform.
The Black Hundreds and influential court circles were extremely hostile towards him. They believed that he was destroying the traditional way of life in Russia. After the suppression of the revolution, Stolypin began to lose the support of the tsar
2. PREREQUISITES OF AGRARIAN REFORM
Before the revolution of 1905-1907, two different forms of land ownership coexisted in the Russian village: on the one hand, the private property of landowners, on the other, the communal property of peasants. At the same time, the nobility and peasants had two opposing views to earth, two stable worldviews.
Landowners believed that land was property just like any other. They saw no sin in buying and selling it.
The peasants thought differently. They firmly believed that the land was “nobody’s”, God’s, and the right to use it was given only by labor. The rural community responded to this age-old idea. All the land in it was divided between families “according to the number of eaters.” If the size of a family decreased, its land allotment also decreased.
Until 1905, the state supported the community. It was much easier to collect various duties from it than from many individual peasant farms. S. Witte remarked on this matter: “It is easier to shepherd a herd than to shepherd each member of the herd individually.” The community was considered the most reliable support of the autocracy in the village, one of the “pillars” on which it rested political system.
But the tension between the community and private property gradually increased, the population increased, and the peasants' plots became smaller and smaller. This burning shortage of land was called land shortage. Involuntarily, the peasants' gaze turned to the noble estates, where there was a lot of land. In addition, the peasants considered this property to be initially unfair and illegal. “We must take away the landowner’s land and add it to the communal land!” - they repeated with conviction.
In 1905, these contradictions resulted in a real “war for the land.”
The peasants “as a whole,” that is, as a whole community, went to destroy the noble estates. The authorities suppressed the unrest by sending military expeditions to places of unrest, carrying out mass floggings and arrests. From the “original foundation of autocracy,” the community suddenly turned into a “hotbed of rebellion.” The former peaceful neighborhood between the community and the landowners came to an end.
3. STOLYPINSKY AGRARIAN REFORM. ITS BASIC IDEA
During the peasant unrest of 1905, it became clear that it was impossible to maintain the previous situation in the village. Communal and private ownership of land could not coexist side by side for much longer.
At the end of 1905, the authorities seriously considered the possibility of meeting the peasant demands. General Dmitry Trepav said then: “I am a landowner myself and will be very happy to give half of my land for free, being convinced that only under this condition will I retain the second half.” But at the beginning of 1906 there was a change in sentiment. Having recovered from the shock, the government chose the opposite path.
An idea arose: what if we did not give in to the community, but, on the contrary, announced to it merciless war. The point was that private property would go on a decisive offensive against communal property. Especially quickly, within a few months, this idea won the support of the nobility. Many landowners who had previously ardently supported the community now turned out to be its irreconcilable opponents. “The community is a beast, we must fight this beast,” the famous nobleman, monarchist N. Markov categorically stated. The main spokesman for sentiments directed against the community was the Chairman of the Council of Ministers, Pyotr Stolypin. He called for “giving the peasant the freedom to work, get rich, and free him from the bondage of the outdated communal system.” This was the main idea of the land reform, which was called Stolypin.
It was assumed that wealthy peasants would turn from community members into “small landowners.” Thus, the community will be blown up from the inside, destroyed. The struggle between the community and private property will end with the victory of the latter. The country is experiencing new layer strong owners - “a strong pillar of order.”
Stolypin's concept proposed a path for the development of a mixed, multi-structure economy, where state forms of economy had to compete with collective and private ones. The components of his programs are the transition to farms, the use of cooperation, the development of land reclamation, the introduction of three-stage agricultural education, the organization of cheap credit for peasants, the formation of an agricultural party that actually represented the interests of small landowners.
Stolypin puts forward a liberal doctrine of managing the rural community, eliminating striping, developing private property in the countryside and achieving economic growth on this basis. With the progress of the market-oriented peasant economy, in the course of the development of land purchase and sale relations, there should be a natural reduction in the landowner's land fund. The future agrarian system of Russia was presented to the prime minister in the form of a system of small and medium-sized farms, united by local self-governing and small-sized noble estates. On this basis, the integration of two cultures - noble and peasant - was supposed to take place.
Stolypin relies on “strong and strong” peasants. However, it does not require widespread uniformity or unification of forms of land ownership and land use. Where, due to local conditions, the community is economically viable, “it is necessary for the peasant himself to choose the method of using the land that suits him best.”
The beginning of land reform was announced by a government decree of November 9, 1906, adopted as an emergency, bypassing the State Duma. According to this decree, peasants received the right to leave the community with their land. They might as well sell it.
P.A. Stolypin believed that this measure would soon destroy the community. He said that the decree “laid the foundation of a new peasant system.”
In February 1907, the Second State Duma was convened. In it, as in the First Duma, land question remained the center of attention. The difference was that now the “noble side” not only defended itself, but also attacked.
The majority of deputies in the Second Duma, even more firmly than in the First Duma, were in favor of transferring part of the noble lands to the peasants. P.A. Stolypin resolutely rejected such projects. Of course, the Second Duma showed no desire to approve the Stolypin decree of November 9. In this regard, there were persistent rumors among the peasants that it was impossible to leave the community - those who left would not get the landowner's land.
The creation of the June Third system, which was personified by the Third State Duma, along with the agrarian reform, was the second step in transforming Russia into a bourgeois monarchy (the first step was the reform of 1861).
The socio-political meaning boils down to the fact that Caesarism was finally crossed out: the “peasant” Duma turned into the “lord’s” Duma. On November 16, 1907, two weeks after the start of the work of the Third Duma, Stolypin addressed it with a government declaration. The first and main task of the government is not reform, but the fight against revolution.
Stolypin declared the second central task of the government to implement the agrarian law on November 9, 1906, which is “the fundamental thought of the current government...”.
Among the reforms, reforms of local self-government, education, worker insurance, etc. were promised.
IN III State The Duma, convened in 1907 under a new electoral law (which limited the representation of the poor), was in a completely different mood than in the first two. This Duma was called Stolypinskaya . She not only approved the decree of November 9, but went even further than P.A. himself. Stolypin. (For example, in order to speed up the destruction of the community, the Duma declared all communities where there had been no land redistribution for more than 24 years dissolved).
The discussion of the decree of November 9, 1906 began in the Duma on October 23, 1908, i.e. two years after he entered life. In total, it was discussed for more than six months.
After the decree was adopted by the Duma on November 9, it, with amendments, was submitted for discussion to the State Council and was also adopted, after which, based on the date of its approval by the Tsar, it became known as the law on June 14, 1910. In its content, it was, of course, a liberal bourgeois law, promoting the development of capitalism in the countryside and, therefore, progressive.
The decree introduced extremely important changes in land ownership of peasants. All peasants received the right to leave the community, which in this case allocated land to the exiting individual for his own ownership. At the same time, the decree provided privileges for wealthy peasants in order to encourage them to leave the community. In particular, those who left the community received “in the ownership of individual householders” all the lands “consisting of their permanent use.” This meant that people from the community received surpluses in excess of the per capita norm. Moreover, if there were no redistributions in a given community over the last 24 years, then the householder received the surplus for free, but if there were redistributions, then he paid the community for the surplus at the redemption prices of 1861. Since prices have increased several times over 40 years, this was also beneficial for wealthy immigrants.
Communities in which there were no redistributions from the moment the peasants switched to redemption were recognized as having mechanically transferred to the private property of individual householders. To legally register ownership of their plot, the peasants of such communities only had to submit an application to the land management commission, which drew up documents for the plot that was actually in their possession and became the property of the householder. In addition to this provision, the law differed from the decree in some simplification of the procedure for leaving the community.
In 1906, “Temporary Rules” on the land management of peasants were adopted, which became law after approval by the Duma on May 29, 1911. Land management commissions created on the basis of this law were given the right, during the general land management of communities, to allocate individual householders without the consent of the assembly, at its discretion, if the commission believed that such allocation did not affect the interests of the community. The commissions also had the final say in determining land disputes. Such a right opened the way to the arbitrariness of the commissions.
4. MAIN DIRECTIONS OF STOLYPINSKY AGRARIAN REFORM
Stolypin, being a landowner, leader provincial nobility, knew and understood the interests of the landowners; As governor during the revolution, he saw rebel peasants, so for him the agrarian question was not an abstract concept.
The essence of the reforms: putting a solid foundation under the autocracy and moving along the path of industrialization, and therefore capitalist development.
Core of reforms - agricultural policy.
Agrarian reform was Stolypin's main and favorite brainchild.
The reform had several goals: socio-political - to create in the countryside a strong support for the autocracy from strong property owners, splitting them off from the bulk of the peasantry and opposing them to it; strong farms were supposed to become an obstacle to the growth of the revolution in the countryside; socio-economic - destroy the community, plant private farms in the form of cuts and farmsteads, and the excess work force send it to the city, where it will be absorbed by growing industry; economic - to ensure the rise of agriculture and the further industrialization of the country in order to eliminate the gap with the advanced powers.
The first step in this direction was taken in 1861. Then the agrarian issue was resolved at the expense of the peasants, who paid the landowners both for land and freedom. Agrarian legislation 1906-1910 was the second step, while the government, in order to strengthen its power and the power of the landowners, again tried to solve the agrarian question at the expense of the peasantry.
The new agricultural policy was carried out on the basis of a decree on November 9, 1906. This decree was the main work of Stolypin's life. It was a symbol of faith, a great and last hope, an obsession, his present and future - great if the reform succeeds; catastrophic if it fails. And Stolypin realized this.
In general, a series of laws of 1906-1912. was bourgeois in nature.
The medieval allotment land tenure of peasants was abolished, exit from the community, sale of land, free resettlement to cities and outskirts was allowed, redemption payments were cancelled, Physical punishment, some legal restrictions.
Agrarian reform consisted of a set of sequentially carried out and interconnected measures.
From the end of 1906, the state launched a powerful offensive against the community. To transition to new economic relations, a whole system of economic and legal measures to regulate the agricultural economy was developed. The decree of November 9, 1906 proclaimed the predominance of the fact of sole ownership of land over the legal right of use. The peasants could now leave it and receive full ownership of the land. They could now separate what was in actual use from the community, regardless of its will. The land plot became the property not of the family, but of the individual householder.
The peasants were cut off from the communal land - plots of land. Rich peasants moved their estates to the same plots - these were called farmsteads. The authorities considered farmsteads the ideal form of land tenure. On the part of the farmers, who lived separately from each other, there was no need to fear riots and unrest.
Measures were taken to ensure the strength and stability of working peasant farms. Thus, in order to avoid land speculation and concentration of property, the maximum size of individual land ownership was legally limited, and the sale of land to non-peasants was allowed.
After the start of the reform, many poor people rushed out of the community, who immediately sold their land and went to the cities. Wealthy peasants were in no hurry to leave. What was the explanation for this? First of all, leaving the community broke the peasant’s usual way of life and his entire worldview. The peasant resisted the transition to farms and cuts not because of his darkness and ignorance, as the authorities believed, but based on sound everyday considerations. The community protected him from complete ruin and many other vicissitudes of fate. Peasant agriculture was very dependent on the vagaries of the weather. Having several scattered strips of land in different parts public plot: one in the lowlands, the other on the hills, etc. (this order was called striped), the peasant provided himself with an average annual harvest: in a dry year, stripes in the lowlands helped out, in a rainy year, in the hills. Having received an allotment of one piece, the peasant found himself at the mercy of the elements. He went bankrupt in the first dry year if the cut was in a high place. The next year was rainy, and it was the turn of the neighbor who found himself in the lowlands to go broke. Only a large cut, located in different terrains, could guarantee an annual average harvest.
After the peasants went out to farms or farms, the previous “insurance” against crop failure disappeared. Now just one dry or too rainy year could bring poverty and hunger. To make such fears disappear among the peasants, those leaving the community began to be allocated the best lands. Naturally, this caused indignation among other community members. Hostility quickly grew between both. The number of those leaving the community began to gradually decrease.
The formation of farmsteads and cuts was even somewhat slowed down for the sake of another goal - strengthening the allotment land into personal property. Each member of the community could declare his exit from it and secure his own allotment, which the community could henceforth neither reduce nor move.
But the owner could sell his fortified plot even to a stranger to the community. From an agrotechnical point of view, such an innovation could not bring much benefit (the allotment was striped and remained so), but it was capable of greatly disrupting the unity of the peasant world and causing a split in the community. It was assumed that every householder who had lost several souls in his family and was fearfully awaiting the next redistribution would certainly seize the opportunity to keep his entire allotment intact.
In 1907 - 1915 25% of householders declared separation from the community, but 20% actually separated - 2008.4 thousand householders. New forms of land tenure became widespread: farms and cuts. On January 1, 1916, there were already 1,221.5 thousand of them. In addition, the law of June 14, 1910 considered it unnecessary for many peasants who were only formally considered community members to leave the community. The number of such farms amounted to about one third of all communal households.
Despite all the efforts of the government, farmsteads were well established only in the northwestern provinces, including partly Pskov and Smolensk. Even before the start of the Stolypin reform, the peasants of the Kovno province began to settle in farmsteads. The same phenomenon was observed in the Pskov province. The influence of Prussia and the Baltic states was felt in these parts. The local landscape, changeable, cut by rivers and streams, also contributed to the creation of farmsteads.
In the southern and southeastern provinces, the main obstacle to widespread farming was difficulties with water. But here (in the Northern Black Sea region, in the Northern Caucasus and in the steppe Trans-Volga region) the planting of cuts has been quite successful. The lack of strong community traditions in these places was combined with high level the development of agrarian capitalism, exceptional soil fertility, its uniformity over very large areas and a low level of agriculture. The peasant, having spent almost no labor and money on improving his stripes, left them without regret and switched to cutting.
In the Central Non-Black Earth region, the peasant, on the contrary, had to invest a lot of effort in cultivating his plot. Without care, this land will not give birth to anything. Fertilization of the soil here began from time immemorial. And from the end of the nineteenth century. Cases of collective transitions of entire villages to multi-field crop rotations with sowing of forage grasses have become more frequent. The transition to “ wide stripes"(instead of narrow, confusing).
The government’s activities would be much more beneficial if in the central black earth provinces, instead of planting farmsteads and cuttings, it assisted in the intensification of peasant agriculture within the community. At first, especially under Prince B.A. Vasilchikov, the chief administrator of land management and agriculture, such assistance was partially provided. But with the arrival of A.V. Krivoshein, who in 1908 took the position of chief manager of land management and agriculture and became Stolypin’s closest associate, the land management department pursued a sharply anti-communal policy. As a result, the scythe found its way to stone: the peasants resisted the planting of farms and cuts, and the government almost openly prevented the introduction of advanced farming systems on communal lands. The only thing in which land managers and local peasants found common interest was the division of joint land ownership of several villages. In Moscow and some other provinces, this type of land management received such great development that it began to relegate work on the allocation of farmsteads and plots to the background.
In the central black earth provinces, the main obstacle to the formation of farmsteads and plots on communal lands was the peasants' lack of land. For example, in the Kursk province, local peasants “wanted the landowner’s land immediately and for free.” It followed from this that before planting farmsteads and cuttings, in these provinces it was necessary to solve the problem of peasant land shortage - including through the inflated landowners' latifundia.
The June 3rd coup d'etat radically changed the situation in the country. The peasants had to give up their dreams of a quick cut-off. The pace of implementation of the decree of November 9, 1906 increased sharply. In 1908, compared with 1907, the number of established householders increased 10 times and exceeded half a million. In 1909, a record figure was reached - 579.4 thousand fortified. But from 1910 the pace of strengthening began to slow down. The artificial measures introduced into law on June 14, 1910 did not straighten the curve. The number of peasants who separated from the community stabilized only after the law “On Land Management” was issued on May 29, 1911. However, once again approach the highest figures of 1908-1909. It didn't work out that way.
Over these years, in some southern provinces, for example in Bessarabia and Poltava, communal land ownership was almost completely eliminated. In other provinces, for example in Kursk, it lost its primacy. (In these provinces there were many communities with household land ownership before).
But in the northern, northeastern, southeastern, and partly in the central industrial provinces, the reform only slightly affected the mass of the communal peasantry.
The stripwise fortified personal peasant land property was very vaguely similar to the classical Roman “sacred and inviolable private property" And the point is not only in the legal restrictions imposed on fortified plots (prohibition of selling to persons of the non-peasant class, mortgaging in private banks). The peasants themselves, leaving the community, attached primary importance to securing not specific strips, but their total area. Therefore, it happened that they were not averse to taking part in the general redistribution, if this did not reduce the area of their allotment (for example, when switching to “wide stripes”). To prevent the authorities from interfering and disrupting the matter, such redistributions were sometimes carried out secretly. It happened that the local authorities adopted the same view of the fortified land. The ministerial audit of 1911 discovered numerous cases of share strengthening in the Oryol province.
This means that it was not certain strips that were strengthened, but the share of one or another householder in worldly land ownership. And the government itself eventually took the same point of view, assigning to itself, by law on May 29, 1911, the right to move fortified strips when allocating farmsteads or areas.
Therefore, the massive strengthening of striped lands actually only led to the formation of unallocated communities. By the beginning of the Stolypin reform, about a third of communities in European Russia the land was not redistributed. Sometimes two communities lived side by side - one that was being redistributed and one that was not being redivided. Big difference no one noted the level of their agriculture. Only in a time without boundaries, the rich were richer and the poor poorer.
In reality, the government, of course, did not want the concentration of land in the hands of a few world-eaters and the ruin of the mass of farmers. Without food in the countryside, the landless poor had to pour into the city. Industry, which was depressed before 1910, could not cope with an influx of labor on such a scale. Masses of homeless and unemployed people threatened new social upheavals. Therefore, the government hastened to make an addition to its decree, prohibiting, within one district, the concentration in the same hands of more than six higher per capita allotments, determined by the reform of 1861. For different provinces, this ranged from 12 to 18 dessiatines. The ceiling set for “strong owners” was very low. The corresponding norm became law on June 14, 1910.
IN real life It was mainly the poor who left the community, as well as city dwellers who remembered that in a long-abandoned village they had a plot of land that could now be sold. Migrants leaving for Siberia also sold land. A huge amount of land for inter-strip fortification went on sale. In 1914, for example, 60% of the area of land fortified that year was sold. The buyer of the land sometimes turned out to be a peasant society, and then it returned to the worldly pot. More often, it was wealthy peasants who bought land, who, by the way, were not always in a hurry to leave the community. Other communal peasants also bought. Fortified and public lands ended up in the hands of the same owner. Without leaving the community, he at the same time had fortified areas. The witness and participant in this whole shake-up could still remember where and what stripes she had. But already in the second generation such confusion should have begun that no court would be able to sort it out. Something similar, however, has already happened once. Allotments purchased ahead of schedule (according to the reform of 1861) at one time greatly disrupted the uniformity of land use in the community. But then they gradually began to get even. Since the Stolypin reform did not resolve the agrarian question and land oppression continued to increase, a new wave of redistribution was inevitable, which was supposed to sweep away much of Stolypin’s legacy. And indeed, land redistribution, which had almost stalled at the height of the reform, began to rise again from 1912.
Stolypin, apparently, himself understood that inter-strip fortification would not create a “strong owner.” It was not for nothing that he called on local authorities to “be convinced that strengthening the areas is only half the battle, even just the beginning, and that the law of November 9 was not created to strengthen the interstriped area.” On October 15, 1908, by agreement of the Ministers of Internal Affairs, Justice and the Chief Administrator of Land Management and Agriculture, “Temporary Rules on the Allocation of Allotment Land to Certain Places” were issued. “The most perfect type of land structure is a farmstead,” the rules said, “and if it is impossible to form one, a continuous cut for all field land, set aside specifically from the root estate.”
March 1909 The Committee on Land Management Affairs approved the “Temporary Rules on the Land Management of Entire Rural Communities.” Since that time, local land management authorities have increasingly focused on the development of plots of entire villages. IN new instructions, published in 1910, especially emphasized: “The ultimate goal of land management is the development of the entire allotment; therefore, when carrying out work on allotments, one should strive to ensure that these works cover the largest possible area of the allotment being arranged...” When assigning work to the queue, the first to go was the development of the entire allotment, then - for group allotments, and only after them - for single. In practice, given the shortage of land surveyors, this meant the cessation of single allotments. Indeed, a strong owner could wait a long time until all the poor people in the neighboring village were driven out to be cut off.
In May 1911, the Law “On Land Management” was issued. It included the main provisions of the instructions of 1909-1910. The new law established that the transition to cutting and farm farming no longer required the preliminary consolidation of allotment lands into personal ownership. Since that time, inter-strip fortification has lost its former significance.
Of the total number of farmsteads and farmsteads created during the reform, 64.3% arose as a result of the expansion of entire villages. It was more convenient for land managers to work this way, the productivity of their work increased, high authorities received round numbers to juggle, but at the same time the number of small farmers and cut-off farmers, who could not be called “strong owners,” multiplied. Many farms were unviable. In the Poltava province, for example, with the full expansion of settlements, on average there were 4.1 dessiatines per owner. The peasants said that on some farms “there is nowhere to put the chicken.”
Only about 30% of farmsteads and cuts on communal lands were formed by allocating individual owners. But these, as a rule, were strong owners. In the same Poltava province, the average size of a single allotment was 10 dessiatines. But most of these allocations were made in the first years of the reform. Then this matter practically disappeared.
Stolypin had mixed feelings about this development. On the one hand, he understood that only the dissection of allotments would isolate peasant farms from each other, and only complete resettlement into farmsteads would finally liquidate the community. It will be difficult for peasants dispersed among farmsteads to rebel.
On the other hand, Stolypin could not help but see that instead of strong, stable farms, the land management department was fabricating a mass of small and obviously weak ones - those who could not stabilize the situation in the countryside and become the support of the regime. However, he was unable to deploy the cumbersome machine of the land management department in such a way that it would act not as it was convenient for it, but as needed for the benefit of the business.
Simultaneously with the publication of new agrarian laws, the government is taking measures to forcibly destroy the community, without relying entirely on the action of economic factors. Immediately after November 9, 1906, the entire state apparatus was set in motion by issuing the most categorical circulars and orders, as well as by repressing those who did not implement them too energetically.
The practice of the reform showed that the mass of the peasantry was opposed to separation from the community - at least in most areas. A survey of peasant sentiments by the Free Economic Society showed that in the central provinces peasants had a negative attitude towards separation from the community (89 negative indicators in questionnaires versus 7 positive). Many peasant correspondents wrote that the decree of November 9 was aimed at ruining the masses of peasants so that a few could profit from it.
In the current situation for the government the only way carrying out the reform was the path of violence against the main mass of the peasantry. The specific methods of violence were very diverse - from intimidation of village gatherings to drawing up fictitious verdicts, from the cancellation of decisions of gatherings by the zemstvo chief to the issuance of decisions by county land management commissions on the allocation of householders, from the use of police force to obtain the “consent” of gatherings to the expulsion of opponents of the allocation.
In order to get the peasants to agree to the division of the entire plot, officials from the land management authorities sometimes resorted to the most unceremonious measures of pressure. One typical case is described in the memoirs of the zemstvo chief V. Polivanov. The author served in the Gryazovets district of the Vologda province. One day, early in the morning during a time of need, an indispensable member of the land management commission came to one of the villages. A meeting was convened, and an indispensable member explained to the “peasants” that they needed to go out to the farms: the society was small, there was enough land and water on three sides. “I looked at the plan and told my clerk: Lopatikha needs to be transferred to farms as soon as possible.” After consulting among themselves, the participants refused. Neither promises to provide a loan, nor threats to arrest the “rebels” and bring in soldiers to billet had any effect. The peasants kept repeating: “We will live as the old people lived, but we don’t agree to farmsteads.” Then the indispensable member went to drink tea, and forbade the peasants to disperse and sit on the ground. After drinking tea, I definitely felt sleepy. He went out to the peasants waiting under the windows late in the evening. “Well, do you agree?” “Everyone agrees!” the gathering answered unanimously. “To the farm, then to the farm, to the aspen, then to the aspen, just so that everyone, that is, together.” V. Polivanov claimed that he managed to reach the governor and restore justice.
However, there is evidence that sometimes peasants' resistance to too much pressure from officials led to bloody clashes.
4.1 ACTIVITIES OF THE PEASANT BANK
In 1906-1907 By decrees of the tsar, some part of the state and appanage lands was transferred to the Peasant Bank for sale to peasants in order to ease land pressure.
Opponents of the Stolypin land reform said that it was being carried out according to the principle: “The rich will get more, the poor will take away.” According to the reform supporters, peasant owners were supposed to increase their plots not only at the expense of the rural poor. The Peasant Land Bank helped them in this, buying up land from landowners and selling it to peasants in small plots. The law of June 5, 1912 allowed the issuance of a loan secured by any allotment land acquired by peasants.
Development various forms credit - mortgage, reclamation, agricultural, land management - contributed to the intensification of market relations in the countryside. But in fact, this land was bought mainly by kulaks, who thus received additional opportunities for expanding the economy, since only wealthy peasants could afford to buy land even through a bank, with payment in installments.
Many nobles, impoverished or worried about peasant unrest, willingly sold their lands. The inspirer of the reform P.A. Stolypin, to set an example, himself sold one of his estates. Thus, the bank acted as an intermediary between land sellers - nobles and its buyers - peasants.
The Bank carried out large-scale purchases of lands with their subsequent resale to peasants on preferential terms, and intermediary operations to increase peasant land use. He increased credit to the peasants and significantly reduced the cost of it, and the Bank paid more interest on its obligations than the peasants paid it. The difference in payment was covered by subsidies from the budget, amounting for the period from 1906 to 1917. 1457.5 billion rubles.
The Bank actively influenced the forms of land ownership: for peasants who acquired land as their sole property, payments were reduced. As a result, if before 1906 the bulk of land buyers were peasant collectives, then by 1913 79.7% of buyers were individual peasants.
The scale of operations of the Peasant Land Bank in 1905-1907. for land purchases has almost tripled. Many landowners were in a hurry to part with their estates. In 1905-1907 the bank bought over 2.7 million dessiatines. land. State and appanage lands were placed at his disposal. Meanwhile, the peasants, counting on the liquidation of landownership in the near future, were not very willing to make purchases. From November 1905 to early May 1907, the bank sold only about 170 thousand dessiatines. He ended up with a lot of land in his hands, the economic management of which he was not equipped to manage, and little money. The government even used pension fund savings to support it.
The activities of the Peasant Bank caused growing irritation among landowners. This was manifested in sharp attacks against him at the Third Congress of Authorized Noble Societies in March-April 1907. The delegates were dissatisfied with the fact that the bank sold land only to peasants (some landowners were not averse to using its services as buyers). They were also concerned that the bank had not yet completely abandoned the sale of land to rural communities (although it tried to sell land mainly to individual peasants in whole plots). The general mood of the noble deputies was expressed by A.D. Kashkarov: “I believe that the Peasant Bank should not be involved in resolving the so-called agrarian question... the agrarian question should be stopped by the power of the authorities.”
At the same time, peasants were very reluctant to leave the community and strengthen their plots. There was a rumor that those who left the community would not receive land from the landowners.
Only after the end of the revolution did agrarian reform move faster. First of all, the government took vigorous action to liquidate the land reserves of the Peasant Bank. On June 13, 1907, this issue was discussed in the Council of Ministers, and it was decided to establish temporary branches of the Bank Council in local areas, transferring to them a number of important powers.
Partly as a result of the measures taken, but also due to changes general situation in the country, things went better for the Peasant Bank. Total for 1907-1915 3,909 thousand dessiatines were sold from the bank's fund, divided into approximately 280 thousand farm and cutting plots. Sales increased annually until 1911, but then began to decline.
This was explained, firstly, by the fact that during the implementation of the decree of November 9, 1906, a large amount of cheap allotment “peasant” land was thrown onto the market, and secondly, by the fact that with the end of the revolution, landowners sharply reduced the sale of their lands. It turned out that the suppression of the revolution in the end did not benefit the creation of farms and cuts on bank lands.
The question of how purchases of bank farms and cuts were distributed among various layers of the peasantry has not been sufficiently studied. According to some estimates, the rich elite among buyers was only 5-6%. The rest belonged to the middle peasantry and the poor. Her attempts to gain a foothold in the bank's lands were explained quite simply. Many landowners' lands, leased to the same companies year after year, became, as it were, part of their allotment. Their sale to the Peasant Bank primarily affected land-poor owners. Meanwhile, the bank gave a loan in the amount of up to 90-95% of the cost of the site. The sale of a fortified plot usually made it possible to pay the down payment. Some zemstvos provided assistance in establishing farmsteads. All this pushed the poor to bank lands, and the bank, having losses from maintaining purchased lands on its balance sheet, was not picky in choosing clients.
Having set foot on banking land, the peasant seemed to be restoring for himself those grueling and endless redemption payments, which, under the pressure of the revolution, the government abolished on January 1, 1907. Soon, arrears in bank payments appeared. As before, the authorities were forced to resort to installments and delays. But something also appeared that the peasant had not known before: the auction of the entire farm. From 1908 to 1914 11.4 thousand plots were sold this way. This, apparently, was primarily a measure of intimidation. And the bulk of the poor, presumably, remained on their farms and farmsteads. For her, however, the same life continued (“to get by,” “to hold out,” “to hold out”) that she led in the community.
However, this does not exclude the possibility that quite strong farms have appeared on the bank lands. From this point of view, land management on bank lands was more promising than on allotment lands.
4.2 COOPERATIVE MOVEMENT
Loans from the peasant bank could not fully satisfy the peasant's demand for money goods. Therefore, credit cooperation has become widespread and has gone through two stages in its development. At the first stage, they dominated administrative forms regulation of small loan relations. By creating a qualified cadre of small loan inspectors and by allocating significant credit through state banks for initial loans to credit unions and for subsequent loans, the government stimulated the cooperative movement. At the second stage, rural credit partnerships, accumulating their own capital, developed independently. As a result, a wide network of small peasant credit institutions, savings and loan banks and credit partnerships was created that served the cash flow of peasant farms. By January 1, 1914, the number of such institutions exceeded 13 thousand.
Credit relations gave a strong impetus to the development of production, consumer and marketing cooperatives. Peasants on a cooperative basis created dairy and butter artels, agricultural societies, consumer shops and even peasant artel dairies.
4.3 RESETTLEMENT OF PEASANTS TO SIBERIA
Stolypin's government also passed a series of new laws on the resettlement of peasants to the outskirts. The possibilities for broad development of resettlement were already laid down in the law of June 6, 1904. This law introduced freedom of resettlement without benefits, and the government was given the right to make decisions on the opening of free preferential resettlement from certain areas of the empire, “eviction from which was recognized as particularly desirable.”
The law on preferential resettlement was first applied in 1905: the government “opened” resettlement from the Poltava and Kharkov provinces, where the peasant movement was especially widespread.
Mass relocation of peasants to eastern outskirts country was one of the most important areas of reform. This reduced the “land pressure” in the European part of Russia and “let off steam” of discontent.
By decree of March 10, 1906, the right to resettle peasants was granted to everyone without restrictions. The government allocated considerable funds for the costs of settling settlers in new places, for their medical care and public needs, and for building roads. In 1906-1913. 2792.8 thousand people moved beyond the Urals.
Over the 11 years of reform, over 3 million people moved to the free lands of Siberia and Central Asia. In 1908, the number of immigrants was the largest during all the years of reform and amounted to 665 thousand people.
However, the scale of this event also led to difficulties in its implementation. The wave of immigrants quickly declined. Not everyone was able to develop new lands. A reverse flow of immigrants moved back to European Russia. The completely ruined poor returned, unable to settle down in their new place. The number of peasants who were unable to adapt to new conditions and were forced to return amounted to 12% of the total number of migrants. In total, about 550 thousand people returned in this way.
The results of the resettlement campaign were as follows. Firstly, during this period there was a huge leap in economic and social development Siberia. Also, the population of this region increased by 153% during the years of colonization. If before the resettlement to Siberia there was a reduction in sown areas, then in 1906-1913. they were expanded by 80%, while in the European part of Russia by 6.2%. In terms of the pace of development of livestock farming, Siberia also overtook the European part of Russia.
4.4 AGRICULTURAL EVENTS
One of the main obstacles to the economic progress of the village was the low level of farming and the illiteracy of the vast majority of producers who were accustomed to working according to the general custom. During the years of reform, peasants were provided with large-scale agro-economic assistance. Agro-industrial services were specially created for peasants, who organized training courses on cattle breeding and dairy production, democratization and the introduction of progressive forms of agricultural production. Much attention was paid to the progress of the system of out-of-school agricultural education. If in 1905 the number of students at agricultural courses was 2 thousand people, then in 1912 - 58 thousand, and at agricultural readings - 31.6 thousand and 1046 thousand people, respectively.
Currently, there is an opinion that Stolypin’s agrarian reforms led to the concentration of the land fund in the hands of a small rich stratum as a result of the landlessness of the bulk of the peasants. Reality shows the opposite - an increase specific gravity“middle strata” in peasant land use. This can be clearly seen from the data given in the table. During the reform period, peasants actively bought land and increased their land fund annually by 2 million dessiatines. Also, peasant land use increased significantly due to the rental of landowners and government lands.
Distribution of the land fund between groups of peasant buyers
Having a male soulPeriodLandlessUp to three dessiatinesOver three dessiatines1885-190310,961,527,61906-191216,368,413,3
5. RESULTS OF STOLYPINSKY AGRARIAN REFORM
agrarian reform land tenure Stolypin
The results of the reform are characterized rapid growth agricultural production, increasing the capacity of the domestic market, increasing exports of agricultural products, and Russia's trade balance was becoming increasingly active. As a result, it was possible not only to bring agriculture out of crisis, but also to turn it into a dominant economic development Russia. The gross income of all agriculture in 1913 amounted to 52.6% of the total gross income. Total income National economy due to the increase in value created in agriculture, increased in comparable prices from 1900 to 1913 by 33.8%.
Differentiation of types of agricultural production by region led to an increase in the marketability of agriculture. Three quarters of all raw materials processed by the industry came from agriculture. The turnover of agricultural products increased by 46% during the reform period.
Exports of agricultural products increased even more, by 61% compared to 1901-1905, in the pre-war years. Russia was the largest producer and exporter of bread and flax, and a number of livestock products. Thus, in 1910, Russian wheat exports amounted to 36.4% of total world exports.
The above does not mean at all that pre-war Russia should be represented as a “peasant paradise.” The problems of hunger and agricultural overpopulation were not resolved. The country still suffered from technical, economic and cultural backwardness. According to calculations by I.D. Kondratiev in the USA, on average, a farm had a fixed capital of 3,900 rubles, and in European Russia, the fixed capital of an average peasant farm barely reached 900 rubles. The national income per capita of the agricultural population in Russia was approximately 52 rubles per year, and in the United States - 262 rubles.
The rate of growth in labor productivity in agriculture has been comparatively slow. While in Russia in 1913 they received 55 poods of bread per dessiatine, in the USA they received 68, in France - 89, and in Belgium - 168 poods. Economic growth occurred not on the basis of intensification of production, but due to an increase in the intensity of manual peasant labor. But during the period under review, socio-economic conditions were created for the transition to a new stage of agrarian transformation - the transformation of agriculture into a capital-intensive, technologically progressive sector of the economy.
5.1 RESULTS AND CONSEQUENCES OF STOLYPINSKY AGRARIAN REFORM
The community survived the clash with private land ownership, and after the February Revolution of 1917 it went on a decisive offensive. Now the struggle for land again found a way out in the arson of estates and the murders of landowners, which occurred with even greater ferocity than in 1905. “Then you didn’t finish the job, you stopped halfway? - the peasants reasoned. “Well, now we won’t stop and destroy all the landowners at the roots.”
The results of the Stolypin agrarian reform are expressed in the following figures. By January 1, 1916, 2 million householders left the community for the interstitial fortification. They owned 14.1 million dessiatines. land. 469 thousand householders living in non-allocation communities received certificates of identification for 2.8 million dessiatines. 1.3 million householders switched to farm and farm ownership (12.7 million dessiatines). In addition, 280 thousand farms and farms were formed on bank lands - this is a special account. But the other figures given above cannot be mechanically added up, since some householders, having strengthened their plots, then went to farmsteads and cuts, while others went to them immediately, without intersecting fortification. According to rough estimates, a total of about 3 million householders left the community, which is slightly less than a third of the total number in those provinces where the reform was carried out. However, as noted, some of the deportees actually abandoned farming long ago. 22% of land was withdrawn from communal circulation. About half of them went on sale. Some part returned to the communal pot.
Over the 11 years of the Stolypin land reform, 26% of peasants left the community. 85% of peasant lands remained with the community. Ultimately, the authorities failed to either destroy the community or create a stable and sufficiently massive layer of peasant-owners. So you can talk about the general failure of the Stolypin agrarian reform.
At the same time, it is known that after the end of the revolution and before the outbreak of the First World War, the situation in the Russian village improved noticeably. Of course, in addition to the reform, other factors were at work. Firstly, as had already happened, since 1907, redemption payments, which the peasants had been paying for more than 40 years, were abolished. Secondly, the global agricultural crisis ended and grain prices began to rise. From this, one must assume, something also fell to ordinary peasants. Thirdly, during the years of the revolution, landownership decreased, and in connection with this, bonded forms of exploitation decreased. Finally, fourthly, during the entire period there was only one bad harvest year (1911), but there were excellent harvests for two years in a row (1912-1913). As for the agrarian reform, such a large-scale event, which required such a significant land shake-up, could not have a positive impact in the very first years of its implementation. Nevertheless, the events that accompanied it were a good, useful thing.
This concerns the provision of greater personal freedom to peasants, the establishment of farmsteads and plots on bank lands, resettlement to Siberia, and certain types of land management.
5.2 POSITIVE RESULTS OF AGRARIAN REFORM
The positive results of agrarian reform include:
Up to a quarter of the farms were separated from the community, the stratification of the village increased, the rural elite provided up to half of the market grain,
3 million households moved from European Russia,
4 million dessiatines of communal lands were involved in market circulation,
the cost of agricultural implements increased from 59 to 83 rubles. per yard,
consumption of superphosphate fertilizers increased from 8 to 20 million poods,
for 1890-1913 per capita income rural population increased from 22 to 33 rubles. in year,
5.3 NEGATIVE RESULTS OF AGRARIAN REFORM
The negative results of agrarian reform include:
from 70% to 90% of the peasants who left the community somehow retained ties with the community; the bulk of the peasants were the labor farms of community members,
0.5 million migrants returned to Central Russia,
per peasant household there were 2-4 dessiatines, with the norm being 7-8 dessiatines,
the main agricultural implement is the plow (8 million pieces), 58% of farms did not have plows,
mineral fertilizers were used on 2% of the sown area,
in 1911-1912 The country was struck by famine, affecting 30 million people.
6. REASONS FOR THE FAILURE OF STOLYPINSKY AGRARIAN REFORM
During the revolution and civil war, communal land ownership won a decisive victory. However, a decade later, at the end of the 20s, a sharp struggle broke out again between the peasant community and the state. The result of this struggle was the destruction of the community.
But a number of external circumstances (the death of Stolypin, the beginning of the war) interrupted the Stolypin reform. If we look at all the reforms that were conceived by Stolypin and announced in the declaration, we will see that most of them failed to come true, and some were just begun, but the death of their creator did not allow them to be completed, because many of the introductions were based on enthusiasm Stolypin, who tried to somehow improve the political or economic structure of Russia.
Stolypin himself believed that it would take 15-20 years for his endeavors to succeed. But also for the period 1906 - 1913. a lot has been done.
The revolution showed a huge socio-economic and political gap between the people and the government. The country needed radical reforms, which were not forthcoming. We can say that during the period of the Stolypin reforms the country was not experiencing a constitutional crisis, but a revolutionary one. Standing still or half-reforms could not solve the situation; on the contrary, they only expanded the springboard for the struggle for fundamental changes. Only the destruction of the tsarist regime and landownership could change the course of events; the measures that Stolypin took during his reforms were half-hearted. The main failure of Stolypin’s reforms is that he wanted to carry out reorganization in a non-democratic way and, despite him, Struve wrote: “It is his agrarian policy that is in blatant contradiction with his other policies. It changes the economic foundation of the country, while all other policies strive to preserve the political “superstructure” as intact as possible and only slightly decorate its façade.” Of course, Stolypin was an outstanding figure and politician, but with the existence of such a system as in Russia, all his projects were “split apart” due to lack of understanding or unwillingness to understand the full importance of his undertakings. It must be said that without those human qualities, such as courage, determination, assertiveness, political flair, cunning, Stolypin would hardly have been able to make any contribution to the development of the country.
What are the reasons for her defeat?
Firstly, Stolypin began his reforms very late (not in 1861, but only in 1906).
Secondly, the transition from a natural type of economy to a market economy under the conditions of an administrative-command system is possible, first of all, on the basis of the active activity of the state. In this case, the financial and credit activities of the state should play a special role. An example of this is the government, which was able, with amazing speed and scope, to reorient the powerful bureaucratic apparatus of the empire to energetic work. At the same time, “local economic profitability was deliberately sacrificed for the sake of the future social effect from the creation and development of new economic forms.” This is how the Ministry of Finance, the Peasant Bank, the Ministry of Agriculture, and others acted state institutions.
Thirdly, where administrative principles of economic management and egalitarian methods of distribution dominated, there will always be strong opposition to change.
Fourthly, the reason for the defeat is the mass revolutionary struggle, which swept away the tsarist monarchy along with its agrarian reform from the historical arena.
Therefore, it is necessary to have social support in the form of proactive and qualified segments of the population.
The collapse of the Stolypin reform did not mean that it had no serious significance. It was a major step along the capitalist path and contributed to a certain extent to the growth in the use of machinery, fertilizers, and an increase in the marketability of agriculture.
CONCLUSION
Pyotr Arkadyevich Stolypin was a talented politician who conceived several reforms that could make the Russian Empire an advanced state in all respects. One of these ideas was Stolypin’s agrarian reform.
The essence of Stolypin's agrarian reform boiled down to the desire to create a layer of prosperous peasantry in the countryside. Pyotr Arkadyevich believed that by creating such a layer, one could forget about the revolutionary plague for a long time. The wealthy peasantry was supposed to become a reliable support for the Russian state and its power. Stolypin believed that in no case could the needs of the peasantry be met at the expense of the landowners. Stolypin saw the implementation of his idea in the destruction of the peasant community. The peasant community was a structure that had both pros and cons. Often the community fed and saved peasants in lean years. People who were in the community had to provide each other some help. On the other hand, lazy people and alcoholics lived at the expense of the community, with whom, according to the rules of the community, they had to share the harvest and other products of labor. By destroying the community, Stolypin wanted to make every peasant, first of all, an owner, responsible only for himself and his family. In this situation, everyone would strive to work more, thereby providing themselves with everything they need.
The Stolypin Agrarian Reform began its life in 1906. This year, a decree was adopted that made it easier for all peasants to leave the community. Leaving the peasant community, its former member could demand that it assign the plot of land allotted to him as personal ownership. Moreover, this land was not given to the peasant according to the “strip” principle, as before, but was tied to one place. By 1916, 2.5 million peasants left the community.
During Stolypin's agrarian reform, the activities of the Peasant Bank, established back in 1882, intensified. The bank served as an intermediary between landowners who wanted to sell their lands and peasants who wanted to buy them.
The second direction of the Stolypin agrarian reform was the policy of resettlement of peasants. Through resettlement, Peter Arkadyevich hoped to reduce land hunger in the central provinces and populate the uninhabited lands of Siberia. To some extent, this policy justified itself. The settlers were provided with large land and many benefits, but the process itself was poorly streamlined. It is worth noting that the first settlers gave a significant increase to the wheat harvest in Russia.
Stolypin's agrarian reform was a great project, the completion of which was prevented by the death of its author.
LIST OF REFERENCES USED
1. Munchaev Sh.M. “History of Russia” Moscow, 2000.
Orlov A.S., Georgiev V.A. “History from ancient times to the present day” Moscow, 2001.
Kuleshov S.V. “History of the Fatherland” Moscow, 1991.
Tyukavkina V.G. “History of the USSR” Moscow, 1989.
Shatsillo K.F. “We need a great Russia” Moscow, 1991.
Avrekh A.Ya. “P.A. Stolypin and the fate of reforms in Russia" Moscow, 1991.
Kozarezov V.V. “About Pyotr Arkadyevich Stolypin” Moscow, 1991.
Tutoring
Need help studying a topic?
Our specialists will advise or provide tutoring services on topics that interest you.
Submit your application indicating the topic right now to find out about the possibility of obtaining a consultation.
As the first Russian revolution clearly showed, the main problem of Russian society remained the agrarian question, which became aggravated at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. In the future, the dissatisfied peasantry, who made up the majority of the country's population, could go further than the defeat of the 2 thousand burned in 1905-1907. landowners' estates.
In addition, without the development of agriculture, Russia could not develop as great country, which P.A. understood perfectly well. Stolypin.
1. Goals of the reform
1.1. Socio-political goals.
1.1.1. The main goal was attracting broad sections of the peasantry to the side of the regime and preventing a new agrarian war. To achieve this, it was intended to help transform the majority of Russian villagers into strong, imbued with the idea of property, rich peasantry, which, according to Stolypin, serves everywhere as the best bastion of order and tranquility.
Previously, there was a widespread view that the Stolypin reform was aimed at attracting the existing narrow layer of kulaks.
1.1.3. Carrying out agrarian reform, the government sought do not affect the interests of landowners. In post-reform times and at the beginning of the 20th century, the government was unable to protect noble land ownership from reduction, but the large and small landed nobility continued to form the most reliable support of the autocracy. To push him away would be suicide for the regime.
In addition, noble class organizations, including the Council of the United Nobility, had great influence on Nicholas II and his entourage. A member of the government, much less a prime minister, who raised the issue of alienation of landowners' lands could not hold his place, much less organize the implementation of such a reform. The reformers also took into account the fact that landowners' farms produced a significant portion of marketable grain, which was also the case.
1.1.2. Another goal was destruction of the rural community. Remembering the participation of the community in the struggle of 1905-1907, the reformers understood that the main thing in the peasant movement was the question of land and did not immediately seek to destroy the administrative organization of the community.
1.2. Socio-economic goals were closely related to socio-political ones. It was planned to liquidate the land community, its economic land distribution mechanism, on the one hand, which formed the basis of the social unity of the community, and on the other hand, hindered the development of agricultural technology.
Ultimate economic goal reforms were supposed to be a general rise in the country's agriculture, the transformation of the agricultural sector into the economic base of the new Great Russia.
2. Preparation of reform.
2.1. Preparation of reform projects before the revolution. actually started Meeting on the needs of the agricultural industry under the leadership of S.Yu. Witte in 1902-1903. In 1905-1907 the conclusions formulated by the meeting, primarily the idea of the need to destroy the land community and transform peasants into land owners, were reflected in a number of projects of government officials ( N.N. Kutler, V.I. Gurko).
2.2. Since the beginning of the revolution and the active participation of peasants in the destruction of landowners' estates, Nicholas II, frightened by agrarian uprisings, changed his attitude towards the landed peasant community. The Peasant Bank was allowed to issue loans against peasant plots (November 1905), which actually meant the possibility of alienation of communal lands. P.A. Stolypin in 1906, having become prime minister, supported a policy that did not affect the interests of landowners Gurko project, which formed the basis Decree of November 9, 1906, which marked the beginning of agrarian reform.
3. Main directions of reform
3.1. Change of ownership on peasant land, their transformation into full owners of their plots was supposed to be carried out by the law of 1910, first of all, by strengthening the plots into private property. In addition, according to law of 1911 . it was allowed to carry out land development (reducing land into farms and cuttings) without fortification, after which the peasants also became landowners. At the same time, a peasant could only sell an allotment to a peasant, which limited the right to land ownership.
3.2. Organization of farms and farms (land management). Without land management, technical improvement and economic development of agriculture were impossible in the conditions of peasant striped(2/3 of the peasants in the central regions had plots divided into 6 or more strips in various places community field) and distant lands(40% of the peasants of the Center had to walk 5 or more miles from their estates to their plots every day). In economic terms, according to Gurko’s plan, fortification without land management made no sense.
Therefore, work was planned by state land management commissions to consolidate the strips peasant allotment into a single area - cut. If such a cut was located outside the village, the estate was moved there, which meant the formation farms.
3.3 . Resettlement of peasants to free lands. To solve the problem of peasant land shortages and reduction agricultural overpopulation resettlement policy intensified in the Central regions. Funds were allocated to transport those interested to new places, primarily to Siberia. Special (so-called Stolypin) passenger carriages were built for the settlers. Beyond the Urals, lands were transferred to peasants free of charge, and loans were issued to improve the economy and improve the economy.
3.4. Selling land to peasants in installments through Peasant Bank was also necessary to reduce land shortage. Secured by allotment land, loans were issued for the purchase of state-owned land transferred to the Bank's fund and land that was sold by landowners.
3.5. Development of agricultural cooperation, Both fishing and credit were given impetus by the publication in 1908 of a model charter. Credit partnerships received some benefits.
5. Progress of reform
5.1. Legal basis, stages and timing of the reform. The legislative basis for the reform was Decree of November 9, 1906 ., after the adoption of which the reform began to be implemented. The main provisions of the Decree were enshrined in Law of 1910., approved by the Duma and the State Council. Serious clarifications were introduced into the course of the reform law 1911., reflecting a change in the emphasis of government policy and marking the beginning of the second stage of the reform.
In 1915-1916, due to the war, the reform actually stopped. In June 1917, the reform was officially terminated by the Provisional Government.
The reform was carried out through the efforts Main Directorate of Land Management and Agriculture, headed A.V. Krivoshein and the Stolypin Ministry of Internal Affairs.
5.2. Transformation of peasants into landowners at the first stage (1907-1910) in accordance with the Decree of November 9, it went in several ways.
5 .2.1. U fastening interstrip sections into the property. Over the years, 2 million plots have been strengthened. When pressure from local authorities ceased, the strengthening process was sharply reduced. In addition, the majority of peasants who only wanted to sell their plot without returning to independent farming had already done so. After 1911, only those who wanted to sell their plot applied. Total in 1907-1915. 2.5 million people became fortifications. - 26% of the peasants of European Russia (without the Western provinces and Trans-Urals), but almost 40% of them sold their plots, most of them moving beyond the Urals, moving to the city or joining the stratum of the rural proletariat.
5 .2.2. Land management in the second stage (1911-1916) according to the laws of 1910 and 1911 made it possible to obtain ownership of an allotment automatically - after creation cuts And farmsteads, without filing an application for strengthening the property.
5 .2.3. In old-fashioned communities(in communities where there were no redistributions since 1861), according to the law of 1910, peasants were automatically recognized as the owners of the plots. Such communities accounted for 30% of their total number. At the same time, only 600 thousand of the 3.5 million members of the non-redivided communities requested documents certifying their property.
5 .2.4. Homestead possessions. Peasants Western provinces and some areas of the South, where communities did not exist, also automatically became owners. To do this, they did not need to submit special applications. Beyond the Urals the reform was not formally carried out, but even there the peasants did not know communal property.
5.3. Land management. Organization of farms and farms. In 1907-1910 only 1/10 of the peasants who strengthened their plots formed farms and farms.
After 1910, the government realized that a strong peasantry could not arise in multi-lane areas. This required not a formal strengthening of ownership, but an economic transformation of the plots. Local authorities, who sometimes resorted to coercion among community members, were no longer recommended to artificially encourage the strengthening process. The main direction of the reform was land management, which now in itself turned land into the private property of peasants.
Now the process has accelerated. In total, by 1916, 1.6 million individual farms (farms and cuts) were formed on approximately 1/3 of peasant allotments (community and household plots) and land purchased by peasants from the bank.
This was the beginning. It is important that in reality the potential scope of the movement turned out to be wider: another 20% of peasants in European Russia submitted applications for land management, but land management work was suspended by the war (May 1915) and interrupted by the revolution.
5.4. Relocation beyond the Urals. Having received a loan from the government, 3.3 million people moved to the new lands in Stolypin’s carriages, 2/3 of whom were landless or land-poor peasants. 0.5 million returned, many joined the population of Siberian cities or became agricultural workers. Only a small part of the peasants became rural owners in the new place. This direction of reform, oriented towards the resettlement of the poor, turned out to be the least effective, although it played an important role in the development of Siberia.
5.4. Buying land peasants with with the help of the Peasant Bank has acquired significant proportions. The bank sold 15 million state-owned and landowners' land, 90% of which was bought by peasants in installments. Special benefits were provided to the owners of farmsteads and cuts, who, unlike others, received a loan in the amount of 100% of the value of the acquired land at 5% per annum.
5.5. developed at a rapid pace cooperative movement. In 1905-1915 the number of rural credit partnerships increased from 1680 to 15.5 thousand. The number of production and consumer cooperatives in the village increased from 3 thousand in 1908 to 10 thousand in 1915. Many economists of different political orientations came to the conclusion that cooperation represents the most promising direction for the development of the Russian village, meeting the needs of modernization of peasant farming.
At the same time, in the absence of state credit for agriculture, the level of development of cooperation remained insufficient for the Russian village.
6. Main economic results of the reform
6.1. The peasant sector of the Russian agricultural economy was experiencing serious progress. Harvest years and rising world grain prices played a big role in this. But bran and farmstead farms especially progressed, where new technologies were used to a greater extent. The yield in them exceeded similar indicators of community fields by 30-50%.
6.2. Much marketability has increased peasant farming, also largely due to farmsteads and cuts. New farming systems and crops were introduced. From a third to a half of individual owners participated in credit partnerships, which provided them with funds for modernization. Over 1.6 million peasants attended agricultural courses.
6.2. In general the revolution in agricultural economics and agricultural technology did not occur, but when assessing economic results, it is important to take into account that the reform, designed to last decades, over the course of several years only managed to clarify its direction and gain momentum. Without large loans, land reclamation and other measures, the reform was not capable of producing great results, and such measures could not be carried out without the state allocating significant funds.
7. Basic social and political
results of the reform
In socio-political terms, the reform was a relative success.
7.1. Social results. The fate of the community.
7.1.1. Destruction of the land community. The community as a self-government body of the Russian village was not affected by the reform, but the socio-economic organism of the community began to collapse. The number of land communities decreased from 135 thousand to 110 thousand. The process occurred especially quickly in the most developed northwestern, southern and southeastern regions, where the community was historically weaker.
Some historians believed that the reform failed, since only 26% of the peasants allegedly left the community and the process of exit began to fade from 1910. But only peasants who consolidated their striped plots of property were taken into account.
After 1910, there were fewer and fewer statements about strengthening the ownership of plots and, accordingly, leaving the land community. But land management processes developed more and more quickly from that time on. Landowners who settled also became owners.
More than a third of its members left the community, but the process was not yet completed. Evidence of the growth of this trend is the significant number of submitted applications for land management, most of which land managers did not manage to complete by May 1915.
As a result, in the center of the country, together with members of old-fashioned communities, at least 2/3 of the former communal peasantry were involved in the destruction of the land community. Taking into account the West and South of Russia, the Baltic states, and Siberia, where land communities did not exist, the majority of the country's peasantry by 1917 were actually outside the land community.
It is also important to take into account that the reform, designed for at least two decades, had just begun, and only in 1910-1911 was the right direction for its development found.
7.1.2. The question of community viability. At the same time, in the central non-chernozem regions, the disintegration of the community was almost not observed. It was here that cases of arson of farmsteads were more numerous, and peasants who wanted to leave the community often did not receive the consent of the village assembly. In the non-chernozem center, communal traditions were the strongest, and agriculture was the most backward in socio-economic terms. The low standard of living determined the desire of the peasants, who did little farming here, to preserve the old equalizing mechanism and social protection body.
Besperedelnye communities, mainly located in Ukraine, for a number of other reasons also largely retained their integrity.
At the same time, the reform had beneficial influence to surviving communities. It revealed some viability of the community organization. Freed from potential proletarians who sold their plots, the communities also gradually turned to the use of progressive farming methods. More than 2.5 million land development applications were submitted by communities. Rural societies increasingly used multiple fields and grass sowing, which, however, did not become the prevailing form of agricultural technology here.
7.2. Socio-political results of the reform.
7.2.1. Partial success. Stopping peasant uprisings. At the first stage in 1907-1909. with the strengthening of property plots, often under pressure from zemstvo bosses, the number of peasant uprisings (mainly against the arbitrariness of the authorities) began to grow, reaching almost 1 thousand in 1910. But after the emphasis of government policy shifted to land management, the abandonment of coercion and some economic successes Peasant unrest almost ceased, decreasing to 128 in 1913.
7.2.2. Prevention of a general peasant uprising and general redistribution. home political goal yet was not achieved. As 1917 showed, the peasantry retained the ability to act as a whole against the landowners (and the regime that defended them), under the influence not so much economic necessity, how much historical memory of centuries of serf oppression, hatred of bars.
In 1917, it became obvious that the agrarian reform was 50 years late, but the main reason for its relative failure was the socio-political half-heartedness of the reforms, which manifested itself in the preservation of the landed estates intact
The essence of the Stolypin agrarian reform was an attempt to solve the agrarian question without affecting the lands of the landowners. Stolypin saw a way out in replacing communal peasant land ownership with individual, private land ownership. This measure was laid down in the reform project of 1861, however, it was not implemented. The immediate predecessor of Stolypin's projects was S.Yu. Witte, who proposed in 1902-1903. begin the liquidation of the community. The basis for the Stolypin reform was created by the decree of 1905 on the abolition of redemption payments, according to which peasants (still within the community) became the owners of their land. In October 1906, the poll tax and mutual responsibility were finally abolished, the power of zemstvo chiefs and district authorities over the peasantry was limited, the rights of peasants in zemstvo elections were increased, and freedom of movement and choice of place of residence by peasants was expanded. On November 9, 1906, a decree was adopted granting peasants the right to freely leave the community with the transfer of their part of the land to private ownership (on June 14, 1910, this decree was approved by the Duma and became law). At the request of the allottee, individual strips of his land could be combined into one plot - a cut. A peasant who separated from the community could move his yard with all the outbuildings and residential buildings from the village - in this case, a farm arose that was in many ways reminiscent of American farms. The peasant's private ownership of land allowed him to farm much more efficiently. In addition, kulaks could buy plots from their poor neighbors, which partly solved the problem of peasant land shortage in central Russia. The Stolypin reform also envisaged the sale of part of appanage and state-owned lands to peasants through the Peasant Bank, whose task was to regulate land use, providing barriers to monopolism and land speculation. Along with this, the bank had to buy up landowners' estates for resale to peasants and issue loans for peasants to purchase land. An important point of the reform was the organization of resettlement. The state provided assistance with transport, loans for the construction of houses, the purchase of cars, livestock and household property, and preliminary land development of plots for migrants (hundreds of thousands of peasants moved from the central regions to Siberia, Kazakhstan and Central Asia, where there was a huge free land fund). With this measure, the authors of the reform sought to prevent the excessive proletarianization of the peasantry.
In rural areas, road construction, cooperative activities, insurance coverage, medical and veterinary care, agronomic consultation, and the construction of schools and rural churches were organized. In Siberia, state-owned warehouses for agricultural machinery were established, intended to serve farmers at low prices.
As a result of these measures, sustainable and highly developed agriculture was created in Russia. Productivity for 1906 - 1913 increased by 14%. Soon after the start of the reforms, the surplus of free grain began to amount to hundreds of millions of poods, and foreign exchange earnings associated with the export of grain increased sharply. Only in 1908 -1910. it increased 3.5 times. Russia provided 50% of the world's egg exports and 80% of the world's flax production. The number of horses increased by 37%, cattle - by 63.5%. Peasant land ownership was constantly growing: by 1914, almost 100% of arable land in Asian Russia and about 90% in European Russia belonged to peasants on the basis of ownership and lease. People's - and especially peasant - savings increased rapidly: the amount of deposits in savings banks increased almost tenfold between 1906 and 1914. Based on the growing prosperity of the population and the strengthening of the state budget, spending on education and culture constantly increased: for example, the number of rural students increased by 33 times between 1906 and 1913.
Stolypin's government program also envisaged a whole range of measures to restructure local self-government, public education and religion. Stolypin envisaged restoring the classless principle and lowering the property qualification for elections to zemstvos, as well as eliminating the volost court of peasants, which was supposed to equalize their civil rights with the rest of the population. He considered it necessary to introduce universal primary education. This would meet the needs of the country's industrial development and allow the peasant to increase his educational qualifications necessary for representation in zemstvo self-government bodies. Freedom of conscience and religious tolerance were called upon to implement the reform of the church.
There are several opinions about what social goals were pursued by the Stolypin reform. Some historians believe that the prime minister sought to split the peasantry and separate out a wealthy group from it. The rural bourgeoisie would become a new support of power and would make it possible to “surround the landowners’ estates with a protective rampart of kulak farms.” Others dispute this version: they point out that the government feared a large concentration of land in the hands of the wealthy elite (under the terms of the reform it was forbidden to buy up more than six peasant plots within one county). This fact is explained by the fact that Stolypin cared not only about the interests of the wealthy layer, but about the bulk of the peasants and sought to prevent their proletarianization. His task was to instill in every peasant “a sense of master, owner.”
The Stolypin reform lasted about seven years - until the outbreak of the First World War. The post-revolutionary years were marked by a noticeable increase in the living standards of the masses: consumption of food and industrial goods increased, and deposits in savings institutions increased. Cooperation was experiencing a “golden age”: the number of consumer societies grew between 1906 and 1912. six times (the number of rural cooperatives - 12 times). Cooperative associations included hundreds of societies and millions of members, their turnover reached millions of rubles. Siberia and Altai were rising, energetically being developed by settlers; Literacy in the village increased.
The success of agrarian reforms was possible only under the condition of internal political stability in the country. Stolypin, being a strong supporter of Russian statehood, took steps to curb leftist terror and social demagoguery. Stolypin is famous for saying: “Opponents of statehood want to free themselves from Russia’s historical past. They offer us, among other strong and strong nations, to turn Russia into ruins... They need great upheavals, we need a great Russia!” Concerned about the successful progress of the Stolypin reform, the revolutionaries understood that stabilization in the country would deprive them of all ground, and their lives, given on the altar of revolutionary disruption, would be lived in vain. At the Socialist Revolutionary Congress in 1908, it was noted with alarm: “Any success of the government in agrarian reform causes serious damage to the cause of the revolution.” P. A. Stolypin said: “Give the state 20 years of peace, internal and external, and you will not recognize today’s Russia!” But the left radicals tried to have time to raise a new revolutionary wave. Terrorists made fourteen attempts on Stolypin's life. In September 1911 he was mortally wounded.
Pyotr Arkadyevich Stolypin (April 2(14), 1862 - September 5(18), 1911) - a prominent statesman during the reign of Nicholas II. Author of a number of reforms designed to accelerate the economic development of the Russian economy while maintaining autocratic foundations and stabilizing the existing political and social order. Let us briefly examine the points of Stolypin’s reform.
Reasons for reforms
By the twentieth century, Russia remained a country with feudal remnants. The First Russian Revolution showed that the country had big problems in the agricultural sector, the national issue has become aggravated and active work extremist organizations.
Among other things, in Russia the level of literacy of the population remained low, and the proletariat and peasantry were dissatisfied with their social position. The weak and indecisive government did not want to solve these problems radically until Pyotr Stolypin (1906-1911) was appointed to the post of prime minister.
He was supposed to continue the economic policy of S. Yu. Witte and bring Russia into the category of capitalist powers, ending the era of feudalism in the country.
Let's reflect Stolypin's reforms in the table.
Rice. 1. Portrait of P.A. Stolypin.
Agrarian reform
The most important and famous of the reforms concerned the peasant community.
Its goals were:
- Increasing labor productivity of peasants
- Elimination of social tension among the peasantry
- The withdrawal of kulaks from communal dependence and the eventual destruction of the community
Stolypin took a number of measures to achieve his goals. Thus, peasants were allowed to leave the community and create their own personal separate farms, sell or mortgage their land plots, and also pass them on by inheritance.
TOP 5 articleswho are reading along with this
Peasants could receive a loan on preferential terms secured by land or receive a loan to purchase land from a landowner for a period of 55.5 years. The resettlement policy of land-poor peasants to state lands in the uninhabited territories of the Urals, Siberia and the Far East was also envisaged.
The state assumed obligations to support agronomic measures that could increase yields or improve the quality of labor in agriculture.
The use of these methods made it possible to remove 21% of the peasants from the community, the process of stratification of the peasants accelerated - the number of kulaks grew and the yield of the fields increased. However, there were pros and cons to this reform.
Rice. 2. Stolypin carriage.
The resettlement of peasants did not give the desired effect, since more than a half They quickly returned, and in addition to the contradictions between peasants and landowners, there was a conflict between community members and kulaks.
The problem with Stolypin’s reform was that the author himself allocated at least 20 years for its implementation, and it was criticized almost immediately after its adoption. Neither Stolypin nor his contemporaries were able to see the results of their labors.
Military reform
Analyzing the experience of the Russian-Japanese War, Stolypin first of all developed a new Military Regulations. The principle of conscription into the army, the regulations of conscription commissions, and the benefits of conscripts were clearly formulated. Funding for the maintenance of the officer corps increased and a new military uniform, strategic railway construction began.
Stolypin remained a principled opponent of Russia's participation in a possible world war, believing that the country would not withstand such a load.
Rice. 3. Construction railway V Russian Empire 20th century.
Other reforms of Stolypin
In 1908, by decree of Stolypin, compulsory primary education was to be introduced in Russia within 10 years.
Stolypin was a supporter of strengthening tsarist power. He was one of the main figures in establishing the “June Third Monarchy” in 1907. During this period of the reign of Nicholas II, the Russification of western territories such as Poland and Finland intensified. As part of this policy, Stolypin carried out a zemstvo reform, according to which local government bodies were elected in such a way that representatives of national minorities were a minority.
In 1908, the State Duma adopted laws on providing medical assistance to employees in case of injury or illness, and also established payments to the family breadwinner who lost his ability to work.
The influence of the 1905 revolution on the situation in the country forced Stolypin to introduce military courts, and in addition, the development of a unified legal space for the Russian Empire began. It was planned to define human rights and areas of responsibility of officials. This was the beginning of a large-scale reform of the country's governance.
What have we learned?
From an article on the history of grade 9, we became acquainted with the activities of Pyotr Stolypin. We can conclude that Stolypin’s reforms affected all spheres of human activity and over the course of 20 years should have resolved many issues that had accumulated in Russian society, however, first his death, and then the outbreak of war, did not allow Russia to go through this path bloodlessly.
Test on the topic
Evaluation of the report
Average rating: 4.4. Total ratings received: 511.
Agrarian reform (in short - Stolypin's reform) is a generalized name for a whole set of measures that have been carried out in the field of agriculture since 1906. These changes were led by P. A. Stolypin. The main goal of all events was to create conditions for attracting peasants to work on their land.
In past years, the system of such transformations (the reforms of P. A. Stolypin - briefly) was criticized in every possible way, but nowadays it is customary to praise it. At the same time, no one strives to fully understand it. We should also not forget that Stolypin himself was not the author of the agrarian reform; it was only part of the general system of transformations he conceived.
Stolypin as Minister of Internal Affairs
The relatively young Stolypin came to power without much struggle or labor. His candidacy was nominated in 1905 by Prince A.D. Obolensky, who was his relative and chief prosecutor of the Synod. The opponent of this candidacy was S. Yu. Witte, who saw another person as Minister of Internal Affairs.
Having come to power, Stolypin failed to change the attitude of the cabinet of ministers. Many officials never became his like-minded people. For example, V.N. Kakovo, who held the post of Minister of Finance, was very skeptical about Stolypin’s ideas regarding solving the agrarian issue - he spared money for it.
In order to protect himself and his family, Stolypin, at the Tsar’s suggestion, moved to the Winter Palace, which was reliably guarded.
The most difficult decision for him was the adoption of a decree on military courts. He later admitted that this “ heavy cross"he was forced to bear against his own will. The following describes Stolypin's reforms (briefly).
General description of the modernization program
When the peasant movement began to decline by the fall of 1906, the government announced its plans regarding the agrarian question. The so-called Stolypin program began with a decree of November 9, 1906. Stolypin's agrarian reform followed, which is briefly described in the article.
While still the governor of Saratov, the future minister wanted to organize assistance for the creation of strong individual farms for peasants on the basis of state lands. Such actions were supposed to show the peasants a new way and encourage them to abandon communal land ownership.
Another official, V.I. Gurko, developed a project whose goal was to create farms on peasant lands, and not on state ones. The difference was significant. But even this Gurko considered not the most important. Its main goal was to secure allotment land in the ownership of peasants. According to this plan, any member of the peasant community could take away their allotment, and no one had the right to reduce or change it. This would allow the government to split the community. The unfavorable situation in the empire required the implementation of Stolypin's reform (in short, the agrarian reform).
The situation in the country on the eve of the reform
In 1905-1907, as part of the revolution, peasant unrest took place in Russia. Along with problems within the country, Russia lost the war with Japan in 1905. All this spoke of serious problems that needed to be solved.
At the same time, the State Duma begins its work. She gave the go-ahead for the reforms of Witte and Stolypin (in short - agrarian).
Directions
The transformations were supposed to create strong economic holdings and destroy collective ownership of land, which hampered further development. It was necessary to eradicate outdated class restrictions, encourage the purchase of land from landowners, and increase the pace of running one’s own household through lending.
Stolypin's agrarian reform, which is briefly described in the article, was aimed at improving allotment land ownership and practically did not touch private property.
Main stages of modernization
By May 1906, a congress of noble societies was held, at which D. I. Pestrzhetsky made a report. He was one of the officials of the Ministry of Internal Affairs who developed the agricultural project. His report criticized possible land reforms. It stated that throughout the country the peasants had no problems with a shortage of land, and the nobles had no reason to alienate it. It was proposed to solve certain cases of land shortage by purchasing plots through a bank and relocating to the outskirts of the country.
The report caused mixed opinions among the nobles on this matter. The views on the reforms of Witte and Stolypin (in short - agrarian reform) were equally ambiguous. There were also those (Count D. A. Olsufiev) who proposed to compromise with the peasants. This meant selling them the land, leaving the main part for themselves. But such reasoning did not meet with support or at least sympathy from the majority of those present.
The only thing on which almost everyone at the congress was unanimous was that negative attitude to the communities. With attacks on peasant communities K. N. Grimm, V. L. Kushelev, A. P. Urusov and others spoke. Regarding them, the phrase was said that “this is a swamp in which everything that could be in the open gets bogged down.” The nobles believed that for the benefit of the peasants the community must be destroyed.
Those who tried to raise the issue of alienation of landowners' lands did not receive support. Back in 1905, when the land management manager N.N. Kutler proposed to the tsar to solve the problem of peasants' lack of land in this way, the ruler refused him and sent him into retirement.
Stolypin was also not a supporter of the forced alienation of land, believing that everything was going on as usual. Some of the nobles, fearing revolution, sold land to the Peasant Bank, which divided it into small plots and sold it to those peasants who were cramped in the community. This was the main meaning of Stolypin's reform briefly.
During 1905-1907, the bank bought more than 2.5 million acres of land from landowners. However, peasants, fearing the liquidation of private land ownership, practically did not purchase land. During this time, the bank sold only 170 thousand dessiatines. The bank's activities caused discontent among the nobles. Then land sales began to increase. The reform began to bear fruit only after 1911.
The results of Stolypin's reforms
Brief statistics on the results of agrarian reform:
- more than 6 million households filed a petition to secure plots of land as private property;
- by the February Revolution, about 30% of the land was transferred to the ownership of peasants and partnerships;
- with the help of the Peasant Bank, peasants acquired 9.6 million dessiatines;
- landed estates have lost their importance as mass phenomenon, by 1916, almost all land sown was peasant.