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1. Catherine II (the Great). The successor of the sickly Peter III, Catherine II was his wife until his suspected murder and she took the throne in 1762. Although she made no great reforms in Russian society, she gathered many friends by her death in 1796. Catherine had to keep the nobility pleased at all times because if she didnt she could be dethroned easily. Because of this she carried out very few social reforms.
Russia continued to follow an economic growth that Peter that Great had started. She tried to remove trade barriers, and assisted in expanding the middle class, which helped trade. Catherine IIs great addition to Russia was the land she gained, she was able to add more territory to Russia than had been in nearly a century before her. While nothing very important was achieved during Catherines rule, she acquired valuable friends that proved to be useful in the future of Russia. Alexander I. The successor of Paul I and the grandson of Catherine the Great, Alexander I spent the early part of his rule attempting to reform the administering body of the government.
The reforms he initiated here brought about a much better trained group of officials. After the Napoleonic Wars, Alexander I was in charge of the reconstruction of much of the land along the route to the French invasion, this caused a expansion in the textile business, which boosted the economy. The major flaw of Alexander I was the way that he put down the attempt for freedom by society. After the wars, many of the people had become self-confident in their beliefs, and when peacetime came, they began to express them. Because of this, Alexander I placed even more restrictions on society's freedom, and ended up sparking the creation of numerous secret societies, which were against the government. Nicholas I.
Nicholas I, the successor of Alexander I, came into power directly after an attempted insurrection of the government, and ruled as a reactive body. His rule was a time of excellent Russian literary works from authors such as Dostoyevsky and Tolstoi, despite the policies of censorship and control that he put into place, . During his reign many technical institutes were founded. By the end of his rule, there were a large number of trained professionals in Russia.
His government also successfully completed the codification of laws, which led to better economic development, the stabilization of the currency, and the creation of protective tariffs. The main flaw of Nicholas Is rule was the timidness exhibited by him and his government. Fearing peasant revolts and the constantly distrusting nobility, the government never took any serious steps towards abolishing the serf system and reforming their backward agrarian economy. Alexander II. The son of Nicholas I, Alexander I took the throne after his fathers death in 1855.
Alexander Is rule was during the time when the people expected much from their leader, and he responded by reforming the country. The main reform of his rule was that of the abolishment of serfdom. Because of this Russia was at last on its way towards joining the world in becoming a modern society. Alexander II also introduced elected institutions of local government, the zemstvos, they handled education, health, welfare, and made changes in the legal system that allowed for fairer trials by jury.
With the reforms he initiated a wake of revolution followed. Industrial and capitalist revolutions caused problems with urbanization, proletarian ization, and an agrarian crisis. These issues continued to grow towards the end of his rule, and he was eventually assassinated by a terrorist group called the Peoples Will 2) The rules of Alexander III and Nicholas II were vastly different from those of their predecessors. The previous rulers had all realized that some kind of social reform was necessary for Russia to survive, these two rulers apparently did not believe that, and showed this in their leadership. Neither of them made any attempts for reform to better Russia, but rather they further divided society. In the case of their predecessors, who had the constant push of the nobility on their back that slowed down any reforms that they tried to create.
But these new rulers had the apparent power to see more changes followed through upon, that could have bettered the nation, but they chose not to act on them. 3) There was much revolutionary activity against the tsar during the 19 th century by Russian intellectuals. Intellects worked with the peasants to reach the common goal of having a good quality of life for all Russian citizens. After initial reforms by Alexander II failed to work students and other revolutionaries started what was called the Populism. Students went to live with the peasants in the country to show that they were working for them, trying to get them better lives.
They were trying to change the government so that the peasants would be represented instead of a tsar controlling the country. But this plan did not work out and the confused peasants turned many of the students into the police. Terrorism was the next move for the revolutionaries and they decided to attack the tsarist regime directly. Several government officials were assassinated at the hands of revolutionaries.
The Peoples Will, a terrorist organization was formed. They successfully assassinated the tsar after several failed attempts. Alexander II passed few meaningful reforms which further convinced Russians that their country would never be able to move forward without the abolishment of the tsarist government. During the rule of Alexander III freedom of the press was greatly restricted and the secret police were strengthened. This only further infuriated the intellectual revolutionaries who now saw that Russia would never be able to survive the upcoming 20 th century with a tsar in control of the country 4) Narodnichesto means to the people. Since most of the people in Russia are peasants it means going to the peasants.
This idea was originated by Alexander Herzen in the 1840 s and 1850 s. Herzen was a critic of the tsarist regime. He lived in exile. When he was in London he published a newspaper called the The Bell, in which he set forth reformist positions. The philosophy Herzen presents is a very contradictory "blend, " of and radical thought. The radical strain of his writing can be seen very clearly in his attack on the middle classes, which he thought were overly orthodox in their views.
Herzen approved of Russian communal organization, yet contested. He thought that in a communist state the power of the mass majority would be overwhelming and something to be feared; in addition, the willingness of revolutionaries to destroy freedom raised Herzen's ideas towards them. He opposed any such ideology calling for absolute sacrifice in the name of an abstract principle, utopian concept, or historical destiny. Men were essentially free within certain limits, and life was generally open. In the case of morality, Herzen believed in the free will of men to make decisions as to what moral law was to be followed. In the least, men who are involved in some supposed "higher cause" should not make such judgments.
He was also skeptical of idealism, believing that there could be some dangers in that as well. To Herzen, civilized values and individual liberties were of great significance. The main tenants of Narodnichesto are one, the existing order is doomed and must be overthrown by a socialist revolution, two, the historical development of Russia is different from other countries. This makes it possible to have a direct transition to socialism without the intermediate state of capitalism. Three, communal land tenure and the associations of workingmen and craftsmen are compatible with socialism, and four, the peasants are communist by instinct and tradition. This makes them the real force behind the revolution.
One radical Russian activist who made a contribution to the development of Russian populism, the Narodnichesto, in the 1870 s. As a contemporary of Marx he played an almost independent role in the early development of European Marxism. Being one of the founders of the First International in 1864, he also helped to break it up since he was in direct disagreement with Marx's ideas. The international expelled him in the year 1872. Before that he had been a proponent of the Slavic federation, revealing some hidden Slavophil tendencies.
He was mainly known for being the father of revolutionary anarchism, an idea based on Proudhon's negation of the state combined with Marxist ideas about collective ownership of property. Bakunin rejects the value of the centralized state and organized religion, calling them false and referring to them as products of myth and superstition. Bakunin also advocated communal autonomy, or freedom of action independent of government at the local community level. Believing that power was rightfully exercised from the bottom up rather than in a hierarchical and centralized manner as was traditionally done. Bakunin stated that "labor must be the sole base of human right and the economic organization of the state. " It was because of the current government's entrenched position and reluctance to give up power that social revolution could not be accomplished peacefully, for such a government required a violent and sudden end to be eliminated. He believed that amidst the ruins of the old government would form a new society in which anarchy would reign peacefully, which he implied in the famous anarchist saying: "The urge to destroy is a also a creative urge. " Alexander Kerensky was a moderate socialist.
Kerensky announced two goals, one, offensive against the Central Powers and two, a democratic reorganization of the military command. His Declaration of Soldiers Rights included the appointment of commissars in the army to handle soldiers councils, but the councils issued orders contradicting the commanders and thus undermined the officer corps. Literature was distributed on a massive scale by radical socialists and Bolshevik agents and fraternization with the enemy hit the military ranks hard. 5) The attempted revolutions in 1905 began for many reasons. Russia had just lost a war with the Japan after the Japanese captured Port Arthur.
The government was going through a crisis, the war was started to unite Russia but it only served to further divide them. In January several hundred workers went to the tsar with a petition to improve industrial conditions. But as they came to the palace the guards opened fire on them, almost 100 innocent protesters were killed in cold blood. Over the next year many other disturbances plagued Russia including: peasant revolts, mutinies, assassinations, and strikes. In late 1905 Russia was promised a constitutional government by the October Manifesto which was issued by Nicholas II. In this new government Nicholas II was in charge of ministerial appointment, financial policy, foreign affairs, and military matters.
This revolution did not exactly change the people in power but just changed their titles. The Duma was to represent the people of Russia and was formed in 1905 after the revolution. It was a representative body that was...
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