This was due to the inefficiency of Serfdom, and by this time, roughly 60% of Serfs had been mortgaged to the government. What this essentially means is that Serfdom was already beginning to come to a natural end. As the Nobles were the Tsar’s staunchest supporters, he was forced to emancipate the Serfs to allow the Nobles to refill their coffers and get out of their debt. As well as this, with the rest of Europe beginning to make large economic progress, Russia was beginning to look inferior economically and industrially, and it was Serfdom that was holding them back, with the simplest solution to just emancipate the Serfs and allow them to become more productive. The main reason that the Serfs were inefficient was due to oppression from the Nobles, which, coupled with poor farming methods, gave inferior results
American Military University HIST 320 Russian History Week Three Paper The Reforms of Peter the Great Tim Nicholson August 21, 2011 It is interesting to note that with the Crown practically thrown into the lap of Peter the Great that at a young age he simply wasn't interested. 1 It was not until he was twenty two that he was in effect the new Tzar. During his young life he saw palace intrigue full of the typical Russian drama of factions fighting over who would rule accompanied by the usual plots, coup's, counter plots, murder and so on... until he was last man standing at twenty two. On the bright side Peter was nearly an unstoppable force, known for having unbounded energy, a huge physical
Firstly the tsar did not help the peasants personally, but instead leave the burden to the prime ministers when they cannot rule like a democracy today. Also it leads to the growing economic problem which is a major factor in why the Romanov’s failed. The war came, the economy was shattered, and it could not last for 4 years of heavy warfare. A war in which it would not be over by Christmas as many wanted. But it wasn’t the prime ministers sole fault the agriculture failed, Russia did have four Dumas during this time and although their power was restricted, the tsar did come close to fall in power in 1905
Having a war caused inflation, government spending rose from 4-30 million, taxation increased, and money became practically worthless and the price of food and fuel quadrupled. This made people angry as they could not afford supplies for themselves and their families, which made them, turn to the Tsar for help but he wasn’t seen to be doing much about the effects of war on the people at home. Furthermore, as well as not being able to
There were a lot of different factors in 1917 which were not there in 1905 some of these factors strongly suggest why Tsarism was abolished in 1917 but not the years before. Some of the events that occurred where World War One which had a catastrophic impact on Russia at the time, the lack of Faith in the Tsar as he had lost one war before and was losing another, the lack of faith in reforms such as the October Manifesto as that was revoked after only a few years and the lack of military conduct as the Cossacks the Tsars most loyal and ruthless troops left him as they wanted change like everybody else. World War One was defiantly one of the main factors that caused the fall of the Tsar as it truly showed to everyone that he was a terrible Country leader as people were dying in the city’s, because they had no food, fuel in 1905 life never got that tough for the people as they had enough to survive but as all the transport links where being used for moving the military so food was left on the docks to rot, as the people in the city’s had no food people started to start Bread riots to try to get the Tsars attention as they really had no food and it was there last resort. Furthermore people had no clean Living and working conditions a lot worse than before. These Factors started to turn everyone against the Tsar as they could see how terrible he really was and how much he wasn’t helping the country or its people which finally lead the end of the Tsar.
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 founding father’s were able to give the people a democratic way of electing leaders, while still having the a few of the people making important decisions in the peoples best interest. During the time of the revolution people were sick of the British parliament and felt as though the were not getting a fair and equal share in the decisions pertaining to them. Hence the phrase taxation without representation was coined. When America won the revolution many concerns and issues cropped up with the declaration of independence, it held very small amounts of power. Paying off debuts of the revolution became a choice that most states opted out on because their was no force behind the request.
One reason why the opponents of the Tsars were more successful than those of the Communists was the fact that, under the Tsars, opposition attained a legal status. It can be argued that the implementation of the Zemstvos under Alexander II paved the way for the full legalisation of opposition, as this allowed the spawning of political ideas. However, under Nicholas II this was more prevalent, as the October Manifesto allowed for the full legalisation of opposition through the implementation of the Dumas. Though the Dumas acted as unsuccessful opposition to the Tsar – as he declared the Fundamental Laws almost immediately after the Dumas came into existence – this was important as it allowed the opposition groups to burgeon. Unlike the regimes of both Alexander II and III, political discussion was allowed, and as such it developed more so than at any other time in the period.
For example Alexander II was a humanitarian but Nicholas II mainly wanted modernisation for Russia. Alexander III just wanted to retain his power and keep in control to avoid the same fate as his father. Similarly, the communist rulers were not uniform either as they had different core aims, for example Khruschev’s main aim was destalinisation whereas Stalin’s was to create his own legacy. The Provisional Government and Lenin were alike in their policies in the fact that they both completely changed the system. In the case of the Provisional Government they changed it from autocratic to democratic and Lenin changed it to a one party state; although the result was different the basis was the same.
The powerful European Empires, such as Russia, began seeing that serfdom was the way to keep their empire stronger and to keep competition to see which empire was better. Prior to the arrival of serfdom in Russia, Russian Peasants lived a ordinary life, but when the destruction from the Tartars in the 13th Century occurred, many Russian Peasants became homeless and began living in lands owned by wealthy Russians. By the end of the 16th century, half of the Russian Peasant population became under control by the landowner, but most were owned by Tsars and religious foundations. The reason for this was to reestablished the Russian institution, which is the feudal system. Russian Serfdom became quite different from the other serfdom's done in Europe and other places.