Figure 1.-- Some former serfs made progress after Tsar Alexander II emancipated the Serfs. Most made very little of any advance in their socil and economic conditions. By the 20th century we finally have many photogrphic images of the rural peasantry, like this peasant family we think in the 1900s. Many Tsarist officials were most cincerned about agrarian issues. Tghe Revolution when it canme would come primsrily from the much more politically cioncious urban proleterit.

Some former serfs made progress after Tsar Alexander II emancipated the Serfs. Most made very little of any advance in their socil and economic conditions. One source writes, "It is true that most peasants lived in intellectual darkness being unable to so much as read their own names. Many were intensely superstitious and ardently believed in witches flying on broomsticks. A patina of Orthodox Christianity covered a mass of centuries of folk beliefs. When a tractor was brought to a Siberian village some peasants condemned it as the vehicle of the Antichrist. Many peasants especially in outlying regions were exceptionally ignorant and knew nothing about foreign countries. Little wonder that Lenin said, ”I come to abolish the village idiot.” [Calers] Russia was in tumault at the turn-of-the 20th century. The economy was rapidly expanding. There was rapid growth of industry and the formation of a new indutrial proleterit in the late-19th century. Urban workers were much more politically concious than the somnolent peasantry. There was a mild recession in world markerts during a period of general growth (after 1897). It was a relstively mild recession and does not show up in ll accounts. [Zarnowitz, pp. 226–29.] Russia because it was growiing so rapidly and had borrowed so heavily in Eyropean markets was impacted. A contraction of Western money markets (1899–1900) resulted in a serious econoimic downturn in Russia. Large numbers of indebted nobels mortgaged their estates to a noble land bank or sold them outright to municipalities, merchants, or peasants. Thus was a proicess that began before the recession. The aristocracy by the time of 1905 Revolution had sold off or morgaged massive areas of land, about two-thirds of the land held at the time of Emanciopation. The Tsarist Government encouraged this opricess hoping to make the forner serfs politically conservative like he French peasantry. The idea was to finance this through hving the peasantry make small installment over decades. [Harcave, p. 19.] This may have worked if individual peasants were allowed to own land, but for the most the land that was acquired by the peasntry known as 'llotment land' was acquired by communal groups. The result was a groiwing agrarian problem. The Tsarist regime recognized the problem. Mimister of Interior 9mraning the Tsarist police) Vyacheslav von Plehve[a stated in 1903 that the agrarian problem was the country's most serious problem. Showing the mindset of the Tsarist regime, the other problems he listed in order of severity were: the Jews, the schools, and the workers. [Harcave, p. 21.] The economic decline all fed into the Revolution of 1905. There was rural unrest, primarily peasants without employment or land. This did not threaten the regime because the most of the peasantry did not ruse up. The situation in the cities was diufferent. And worker disturbances joined by military ynits and the middle class did challenge the regime. The Tsarist regime survived nother decade. World War I (1914-18) would eventully end the Tsarist regime and aristocratic control of Russia's huge estates. Much to the surpriuse of the Bolsheviks, they managed to seized power, not in a country like Germany with a strong industrial proleterit, but in Russia a country with a largely agricultural economy and large numbers of peasats just emnerging from serfdom. The peasants did not play a major role in the urban actions that overthrew the Tsarisrt regime. Most who had been drafted into the Army, deserted headed home to seize land from their aristocratic estates. This undercut the powr of thae artisyocracy whivch had been the primary support of the Tsarist rehime. Lenin's mantra of 'Peace, land, and bread' had great appeal. Two decades later, Stalin would launch a major campaign against the peasantry and seize their land (1930-31).

Sources

Calers. G. "Russia at the turn of the 20th century, WorldPress.com (2011).

Haynes, Mike. "Patterns of Conflict in the 1905 Revolution" in Pete Glatter ed. The Russian Revolution of 1905 (1970).

Harcave, Sidney. The Russian Revolution (London: Collier Books, 1970).

Zarnowitz, Victor (1996). Business Cycles: Theory, History, Indicators, and Forecasting (Chicago: University of Chicago Press: 1996).

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