In spite of all these changing times and circumstances, the tension between the upper and lower classes remained tenser than ever before, building up under the fabric of society. Russian became industrialized during the 1930's when Joseph Stalin instituted a series of what he called “five year plans". The plans were designed to rapidly increase the industrial capacity of the Soviet Union and change it from an agrarian economy to an industrial one. The plans succeeded and Russia did become an industrialized nation. Prior to the “five year plans”, Russia had mostly a peasant farming economy.
Conversely, the higher-value rouble helped increase the prices of goods. Witte's main method for raising the capital and modernisation would be the Trans-Siberian Railway, which from 1881 to 1900 increased from 13,000 to 33,000 miles. It was hoped it would encourage east to West migration of workers, to feed in to industry, however this did not happen. Instead, it helped growth and exports of Russia by making transportation of materials far easier. On the other hand, the growth in population compared with national output shows less production per head, and therefore less efficient production.
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
But they knew that they couldn’t rely on that army so the emperors raised all of the taxes because hiring the army was expensive. The military have gotten treats from northern european tribes. The military also got low funds for defense. The military got problems recruting roman citzens and recruting of non-romans. The military was declined of patriotism and loyalty among soldiers.
To what extent was the Russian economy transformed in the period of 1881-1914 Russia’s economy in 1881 was in a rather detrimental state, they seemed to be so many years behind the rest of the European superpowers, especially in terms of industrial progress. A famous historian Murphy referred to Russia as the “most economically underdeveloped superpower.” Many reforms were attempted to improve the economic state of Russia, but just how successful were they? In this essay I am going to be writing from the point of view that Russia economy was changed, however there are some flaws in this statement, which I will discuss further on… Firstly, the first indication of major change for me was the reforms applying to the rural areas of Russia. At the start of this period peasants were in heavy debt and struggling to survive, agriculturally, the country wasn’t producing enough crops to supply the country with food, let alone sell for a profit. (Only 50% of Russian farms produced surplus crops.)
Much like Tsarist reforming leaders, Witte and Alexander II, a poor economic situation also significantly influenced Lenin’s reforms, showing a nuanced continuity between factors influencing reforms in the Tsarist and Communist state. The peasants were at first discontented by the reform, for” a tax of 10% was imposed upon the harvest” (Acton), leading to crop prices temporarily rising, causing a famine reminiscent of the Tsarist age, indicating little change. However a year later the grain harvest increased by 19 million tonnes, this proved to be significant as the impacts of the NEP allowed Russian society to become more self-sufficient, without the need for imports. The reform was also significant, as it encouraged the growth of a bourgeoisie in the form of NEP men; older Bolsheviks viewed them as a threat to the socialist government, yet they accepted that a middle class was a necessary step towards complete socialism. The view that Lenin’s reforms were significant, therefore is credible, for despite gaining a government that had been ravaged by two wars, and rapid inflation, after about eight years Lenin’s NEP encouraged great economic growth, thus consolidating the position of the Bolshevik government in Russian society based upon Lenin’s work as a reforming
In addition, the railway cost the country a lot of money and a lot of time to build, so it can be argued that the railway was not even worth building in the first place as that money could have gone to other important industrial plans or improving conditions for workers. Secondly, Witte took out numerous large foreign loans from more industrialised countries to bring in more money for the country. This temporarily solved Russia’s economic problems, however later resulted in a lot of debt, especially to the French, which caused huge economic problems for Russia, whose
These other causes are all political social and economical factors which helped to free the serfs. And had the Tsar taken a more liberal view on his rule the emancipation may never have happened. Firstly there are many political causes for the emancipation of the serfs. The bankruptcy of nobles who were the tsar’s main supporters was, caused because of the inefficiency of using serfs to farm lands, which meant most nobles were losing money and by 1860 over 60% of serfs were mortgaged to the government meaning they were “unofficially” no longer tied to their land. 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.
Professor Pierce HIST 2020-501 “Regulated Influence” Without the free market enterprise the country would fail. You could see civil liberties slip away one by one. The freedoms of each and every person could be at stake. The American way of life could cease to exist. In the late 1800s times were tough, living and working was brutal, due to the conditions and the lack of safety regulations, scarce supplies of food, over population due to the vast amounts of immigrants filled the cities, money was hard to come by, because monopolies were controlling the market place, influencing consumer pricing and purchasing the “haves” could get it, while the “have not’s” had to fight for it (Doc-4).
They would raise rent on peasants who didn’t have much which resulted in people going against authorities. One more reason is the Yellow Turban Uprising; this group of people rose up due to the hardships on the poor. The bureaucrats did not help at all and actually raised taxes and rent even when peasants didn’t have anything to give. The yellow turban rebels revolted against the Han dynasty gradually hurting the government little by