This money was important because the economy in Russia was poor at the time; bearing in mind there was a huge number of peasants and very few working class people at the time may suggest a reason for this. Russia's biggest produce was grain. This was the most important factor in my opinion, as without this money, Witte wouldn't have been able to implement any of his ideas. The second area was state sponsored development of heavy industry. Witte believed that heavy industry was the way forward, because he thought that light industry and agriculture could both benefit from this boost.
This was mostly due to his policies of collectivisation which made economic sense and forced a lot of peasants to leave the land, which was a process needed in order to change an agricultural rural society to an urban and industrial one as well s the fact that his industrialisation plan increased massively the heavy industry in Russia; the production of raw materials such as iron, coal, steel and oil all increased successfully. There were other successes in his economic policy of rearmament, which also improved labour productivity and the transport in the country. However, it would be incorrect to say that all what Stalin did during this period was a success since he also presented various failures, for example not being able to boost the production of consumer goods as well as creating a huge man made famine. It was clear at the time that Russia needed a change, as Stalin said: ‘’ We are fifty or a hundred years behind the advanced countries. We must make good this
Sergie Witte's attempts to modernise the Russian economy during the period 1892-1903 were very successful. How far do you agree? Sergie Witte made several attempts to modernise Russia during the period during the period 1892-1903, however they were not always successful in the grand scheme of things in the country as he successfully freed serfs, however they were not completely free and were still heavily taxed. He however did manage to somewhat modernise Russia but one could argue that it was not to a great enough extent. Sergie Witte's aims included creating a bigger business class as that is what was driving other countries forward such as Britain and Germany.
In 1928, Joseph Stalin, now leader of the USSR, knew that the agricultural sector had to be made more efficient in order for it to feed the huge workforce which would take Russia through industrialisation. In his ascent to power, Stalin criticised Lenin's New Economic Policy for its Capitalistic features and so, through the Gosplan, a centrally controlled economy was created which subsequently gave birth to the five-year-plans and Collectivisation. By removing the Kulaks (wealthy peasants), combining numerous small holdings into one large farm and introducing modern equipment, collective farms were established. There is no doubt that this was a much more Socialist policy than the NEP, but whether it was successful is highly debatable: it would entirely depend on the interpretation of the word 'success' which, for this essay at least, will be that it has benefitted the majority of the people it has affected. However, it would be all too easy for one's opinion to be based entirely on the increase in agricultural output after 1928.
The party was led by Victor Chernov, who believed that the future of Russia not only lay with the peasantry, but the more newly developed industrial workers too - thus a main aim was to gain support of the peasantry and townspeople. The aim of the SR's was essentially to help the people a lot more by improving things such as their living conditions, and also they wanted to return all land back to peasants . Rather unsurprisingly, especially considering the peasants made up about 80% of the Russian population, the SR's were arguably the most popular party at the time in Russia. However despite those positive outlooks on the party there were a number of a weaknesses that caused divisions within
Witte tried to change this with a series of projects, to help the economy and industry of Russia. He tried many different things such as building a huge railway system called the Trans-Siberian Railway across Russia (7000km). This helped Russia modernize by greatly improving infrastructure in the country. He also exploited Russia’s vast quantities of natural resources to sell them/use them in their own economy. These ideas seemed great but they did work much as Russia’s economy only grew by 50%, compared to other countries this was nothing.
This railway also opened up a range of different jobs, meaning that the unemployment of Russia plummeted. Although this factor of the changing in Russia was very substantial, it promised more than it delivered. Sections of the railway were still incomplete in 1914 and it did not greatly improve or increase east-west communications. Between 1881 and 1910, Russia’s trade with other countries dramatically increased very dramatically this is seen by the statistics as the exported goods is higher than the imported goods, also the productivity of natural resources dramatically increased as there was allot more iron, coal and oil being produced and sent from Russia to the rest of Europe. Although this was a large advantage to the economy of Russia, the grain production did increase, but it didn’t
This helped modernise society as the hierarchy within Russia became weaker making slightly more like other countries at the time. Another change in society occurred within the system of patronage too, in that, the working and middle classes began to grow. This was because there were more factories being built (often by foreign companies) which led to more jobs and in turn, more money. This increase in factories was all due to protective tariffs, put in place by Russia’s minister of finance (from 1893 -1903) - Sergei Witte. The tariffs restricted the
The 1880s saw an industrial expansion in Russia. Coal and oil exports rapidly increased meaning more money was being brought into the country. The government however, used it for increasing military power such as making new weapons and employing more soldiers rather than helping the structure of Russia. To help the structure of Russia they could have spent it on building new roads and railways, and investing in new agricultural equipment which would help the economical transformation of Russia a lot more. Sergei Witte was minister of finance from 1892 to 1903 and wanted to modernise Russia.
All payments went towards the king, this would've also made the Earls not feel powerful enough, especially Harold Godwin who was seen as the most powerful man in England, but theoretically he wasn’t. However the Economy was well governed because the trade increased, which encouraged both the growth of towns and foreign contacts, this demonstrates that England were still involved in trade, which was good for the economy. However the economy was not very well developed especially compared to the Byzantine Empire and Muslim world. Those economies were massive, especially when compared to England’s. Overall I believe that the economy for pre-Conquest England as well- governed to an extent as the King did have large control, he did control this well, but he may have been seen as too powerful where the government is concerned.