However after Karakazov attempts to assassinate the Tsar in 1866, he becomes much more autocratic, revealing that he had no intention of significantly developing politics, his use of the Zemstvas were in fact to help sustain autocracy, through making local administration more efficient. It can be suggested from this that Alexander II had put the Zemstva Act in place to appease the nobles angered by the Emancipation Act. Alexander III was much more of a successful autocrat. His reactionary attitude led to the reversal of many of his father’s liberal reforms, and was in some cases angered by them. Alexander III re-implements Tsarist form, through the use of repression and terror.
He did not realise that, following Alexander II’s emancipation of the serfs in 1861, he could not return to a state of rigid autocracy when the serfs had already had some freedom. The reformist groups formed as a result of his errors, he fuelled the creation of them. He aggravated them by taking away many of their rights for example fees quadrupled to restrict entry to secondary and higher education and their previous ability to vote was made more difficult. The fact that they had been given a taste of liberalism by Alexander II was what made the Russian people more aware of the inconveniences of the Tsarist Regime; they began to lose their respect for him and one of the main problems he had on his name was
In particular, he released the serfs, which is generally seen as one of the most significant social reforms of the nineteenth century. Yet, the fundamental inconsistency between Alexander II's commitment to autocracy and his moves towards liberal reform isolated him from both reformers and conservatives. The growth of radical political opposition during his reign, was arguably given momentum by the liberal reforms he made which still left some radical groups pushing for revolution and eventually led to his assassination by terrorist of 'The People's Will' group in 1881. A great obstacle was that compared to Western Europe, Russia was backward economically, socially and politically in the late 19th Century. Russia was determined to not set up a new system by which the government were modernized and autocratic in which this stopped Russia from industrialising.
How far does the reign of Alexander III deserve to be called reactionary? When Alexander III became Tsar in March 1884, Russia was in crises, following the assassination of Alexander II at the hands of The People’s Will. There was a huge amount of pressure on Alexander III, not only to govern the world’s largest country, but also to be a good leader in an autocratic empire and restore the approach in which the slavophiles were demanding for. Reactionaries believed that the reforms of Alexander II disestablished the country by encouraging demand for further reforms; Alexander III transformed this opinion brining back harsher rulings to regain power and to deserve the title of a reactionary. The generally chaotic nature of the Empire following Alexander II’s death was suggestive of the need for strong leadership to stabilise the country.
Tsar Alexander III’s reforms were reverse ‘reaction’ of what his father, Alexander II, did before him to improve the country he ruled over. Repressive policies under Nicholas II were continued right up until early 1905 when Bloody Sunday took place outside Winter Palace and hundreds of Russian citizens were massacred by the Cossacks. It appears that there was extremely little, if any, political reform during 1881-1905. Political reform after 1905 began to rise. A clear turning point for politics in Russia was the publishing of the October Manifesto.
Prior to 1917, Russia was run by a Tsar, and its system of government was based on autocracy. There was much dissatisfaction with the Tsar during World War One, which led to his abdication – the March revolution. The provisional government took charge of Russia, whose authority and power was taken over by Lenin’s Bolsheviks in the second revolution in October. The Romanov family had been ruling Russia since 1613, but in March 1917, Nicholas Romanov II was forced to abdicate. Nicholas was a sensitive man with high pride and always preferred to be with his family rather than to involve himself in the running of his nation.
He then intended for a mass increase in resource production to take place, which in fact did occur over the coming plans. Another political reason was that Stalin needed to develop a reputation that would supress that of Lenin. This was very important for Stalin as people viewed him as Lenin’s underdog, stating that Stalin lived in his shadow constantly referring to him whenever possible. This therefore retained Lenin’s god-like figure, which angered Stalin. He then decided to talk about Lenin’s mistakes to the Bolshevik Party, which came as a huge
How accurate is it to say that the growth of reformist groups in the years from 1881 was the main cause of the 1905 revolution? The most notable reformist groups that had an impact on the 1905 revolution were the national minorities, the army and the revolutionary parties. The national minorities leapt at the chance of changing autocracy, ending Russification and a democratic government by using Russia’s confusion against itself. It consisted of Jews who wanted civil rights, Polish and Finnish people (and other parts of the Russian empire) who wanted independence and many others. This turned into great violence across the empire, with peasants even attacking officials.
There were many factors that created a base for the reformist groups to flourish at that time in Russia which in turn created a Revolution. Alexander III was determined to upkeep Russia’s image as a major European power, unlike his father; however he was a conservative, believing that his father’s reforms were a mistake and took to reverse them as much as he could. The counter-reforms initially may have looked like a success due to the period of stability during Alexander III’s reign; however with the Revolution a few years later it seems to be that the counter-reforms were not as successful as they may have seemed. The political oppression resultant of these counter-reforms meant Russia politically was behind its major European counterparts, whilst England and France by now had a form of democracy, Russia was still being ruled by total autocracy, and this increased the resentment against the government and added to the growth of reformist groups. Because of the political structure in place in Russia at the time, without a revolution the only way change was possible was from the Tsar being willing to change things, the Tsar was not willing and he clearly demonstrated this through the counter-reforms, leaving an angry population
Therefore Liberals wanted constitutional reform and more power to be given to the Reichstag. Whereas socialists demanded social reform and power to the workers and trade unions. However conservatives, such as Bismarck wanted to conserve to the Junkers – the elite class. To do this he proposed the Anti-Socialist Law in 1879 and also passed the Tariff Law, which appeased the liberals. The years leading up to the war the German people were dreading it, there were protests in Berlin in July 1914.