The demand for food has always been high in Russia which meant that no matter what reforms or radical changes a party can bring in, if they can’t feed the people there will always be bitterness which can and did result in opposition to Lenin and his Bolsheviks. By the time the Bolsheviks had assumed power of the Provisional Government, inflation had already dramatically risen to uncontrollably high levels which made paper money worthless and the little food there was to be found extremely
The lack of usable land in Russia and the subdivison of land between families both resulted in an incredibly low income, especially for larger families. This combined with the illiteracy of the people and refusal of the Tsar to provide basic education meant that there was no way to escape the misfortunes of life as a peasant. The poor harvests of 1900 and 1902 worsened matters even further and fuelled the peasants anger. The famines and starvation that followed provided sufficient evidence that the Tsar was not a born leader, “gifted and sent from God” as they had been taught to believe, but a weak and incompetent leader, incapable of making decisions or change. Another issue was that whilst the Tsar encouraged the industrial growth of Russia, and was keen for the country to become an industrial power, when peasants then left the land to work in the developing enterprises, they discovered that their living conditions did not improve.
Some peasants left to work in the cities as the Tsar wanted Russia to be an industrial power, however the living conditions there hardly improved, which matched their dreadful working conditions. This poor treatment is what led to the 1917 strikes that helped force the Tsar to abdicate from the throne. This was an important factor in bringing down the Tsar because with so many people opposing him (over the years, because of food shortages and war failures, they were supported by women and army members, and the number of workers on strike rose to 250 000), he had no choice but to give up. However, I believe there is more causes behind this so I wouldn’t label it the most important factor of the Tsar’s abdication. Russia’s poor performance in WW1 played a very significant role in bringing down the Tsar too.
The farmers fought against the Gold Standard, railroads, and industrialist during this period causing lots of confrontation. In document G you can see the increase rate of manufacturing corporations and the steady decline of the agricultural market. The United States could no longer wish to be a country of small estate farms. Industrialists and the people living in immense cities depended on farmers to basically keep them alive throughout the years. However, back then numerous people didn’t comprehend just how much of an impact farmers had on their everyday lives.
This meant trade to other countries went down bringing the economy to yet another low and this lack of agricultural workers meant a lack of food across Russia, especially in towns and cities where there was no easy access to farms; and as is with most things in demand, the prices went through the roof, leaving peasants starving on a mass scale. The only short term fix that was established for this whole issue, was a series of loans from Russia’s allies, Britain and France; these loans are especially important when it comes to the provisional government’s role in the second revolution in 1917. The other major issue that was gained from the World War is the amazing show of incompetence from Russian military leaders, most notably Nicholas II. This led to a decreasing
The depression damaged Russia’s economy quite badly. This was because it originated in Europe and at this time Witte, who believed in foreign investment had Russia receiving lots of money from abroad. When the other countries entered this depression they could afford less money leaving their countries so Russia’s income seriously decreased. This added to the population of Russia’s low living standards and so increased the need for a revolution. The next important point to follow this and the final long term factor is the state of Russia around and leading up to this time.
Prior to the “five year plans”, Russia had mostly a peasant farming economy. The 1750 to 1914 period in Russia was met by a large increase in the available labor force. Coupled with an increase in population, Russia's emancipation of the serfs freed many of Russia's serfdom from perpetual slavery. However, the emancipation process was planned so as to put the freed serfs deeply in debt to the original owners of the land. In fact, many of the serfs were so deeply indebted that they relocated to Russia's cities in search of better work opportunities.
The war was a large mistake for the Tsar. Although Russia obtained some successes at the beginning, they were facing one of the most advanced military powers in the world and were being led by incompetent Generals as well as being badly equipped Nicholas II made a grave error, when he fired the military commander and took command of the army. This was a mistake in the fact that he had no military experience whatsoever and from then on, the Tsar was seen as responsible for every failure and defeat that Russia suffered. It saw the loss of 200,000 men and around 15 million peasants were enrolled in the army from the farms. This would lead to the army losing their faith in the Tsar which was extremely vital, for as long as the army remained loyal to the him, they were able to put down any threat of revolution however, the poor conditions eventually led to them refusing to fire upon rioters.
How far was the Russo Japanese War responsible for the outbreak of the 1905 Revolution? The Russo Japanese war of 1904 was a factor contributing to the outbreak of the 1905 revolution, however it is not completely true to say that it was entirely responsible. In Russia at this time and before, there was a lot of tension. The population of Russia were very unhappy with a number of things, for example: no land, pollution, no money etc. This caused a lot of distress amongst Russia’s population as well as depression.
This meant serfdom was already coming to its own natural end, and for Alexander II to support his nobles he had to emancipate the serfs so they could go start increasing their wealth and get out of debt. Serfdom was also holding Russia back, with the rest of Europe liberalising and making vast economic progress Russia’s economy was starting to look inferior and for them to advance as a nation they had to increase productivity of the serfs and the simple solution was to emancipate them. The serfs were inefficient and had a low productivity due to poor farming methods and constantly being oppressed by their nobles. This oppression and poor farming was caused by the extremely conservative rule which refused to modernise, had the Tsar modernised the farming techniques and stopped the