SEPTEMBER ]992

AHMNDER AilD THEtl

Robeil Bideleux

EMANCIPATIIIN (lF THE SERFSIn our first perspective, Robert Bideleux takes issue with some of the traditional views of the emancipation of Russia's

serfs in 1861, and paints a more positive view of the emancipation and its effects than has often been the case.

iexander II (reigned i85>-81) cameto be known as the 'Tsar-Liberator'on account of his resoluteness infreeing millions of Russian serfs

(bondsmen) through the 1861 EmancipationAct, amid widespread opposition from Russia'sserf-owning nobility.

In 1850 peasants made up nearly 9000 ofRussia's population, Nearly half the peasantry,or about 389'o of the total population, tereserfs attached to private landed estates.l Theseserfs were required to provide their 'masters'with unpaid labouf services (barshchina)and/or with dues in kind and/or cash quit-

rents (obrok). They often provided a mixtureof all three. Their lives were in large measuresubject to their masters' wishes in suchmatters as choice of marriage-partner, occupa-tion and place of residence. Serfs could beflogged or exiled to Siberia or sent into lengthymilitary service if they disobeyed their mas-ters or endeavoured to mn away, although itrvas usually in the masters' interests to usetheir pou'ers sparingly. A serf-owner's rvealthrvas usually reckoned in terms of the numberof serfs under his jurisdiction. Most serfs wereallocated farmland for their own use, on whichto maintain themselves and raise (often large)

The freedom of the serfs proclaimed in achurch, 1861.

families. Thus serfs, taken as a whole, becamemajor producers in their own right. But a serfcould ahvays be transferred to (landless)domestic service or recalled to his master'sestate rvhenever his master wished and anyserf who became a successful trader or indus-trialist, as sometimes happened, usually had topay dearly to obtain his personal freedom. Butserfdom was not purely an economic institu-tion. It was also an instrument of social controlover a large and widely-scattered peasant

28

population and a foundation stone of theTsarist political system. This was why Alex-ander II's father and grandfather, TsarNicholas I (reigned 1825 55) and Tsar Alex-ander I (reigned 1801-25) respectively, hadlacked the courage to dismantle serfdom, eventhough they came to see it as a social evil.

IREFORM BEFORE EMAI{CIPATIOI{

The other half of the peasantry largely con-sisted of'state peasants' and, to a much lesserextent, 'crown peasants'. These were peasantsresident on and attached to state land and thelanded estates of the royal family, respectively.In Russia the state domain was far more exten-sive than privately-owned land. Although'state peasants' and'crown peasants' sharedmany of the obligations and disabilities ofserfs, their position was on the whole morefavourable. They usually received more land tocultivate for their own use, they were lesslikely to be required to provide labour servicesand their lives were less subject to externalinterference. Moreover, from 1837 onwards,'state peasants' were placed under the jurisdic-tion of a new reform-minded Ministry of StateDomains and Agriculture, established andadministered by Count P.D. Kiselev. Kiselevendeavoured to distribute tax and quit-rentburdens more fairly, to make 'state peasants'less vulnerable to extortionate officials andmiddlemen and to prevent the emergence of alandless rural proletariat, by strengtheningpeasant communal institutions and communallandholding on the state domains, by moder-ating the revenue demands laid upon the 'statepeasantry' and by fostering an enlightened(albeit paternalistic) code of conduct among hisofficials. Whereas the N{inistry of Finance hadpreviously tried to squeeze as much revenue aspossible out of the 'state peasantry' in the shortrun, to the detriment of peasant welfare, agri-cultural productivity and incentives, Kiselev'snew Ministry of State Domains and Agricul-ture aimed to develop peasant agriculfure, pro-tect peasant welfare and increase taxableincomes over a longer time-span. Indeed, theemancipation of the serfs in the 1860s shouldbe seen as the natural sequel to Kiselev'sreform of the state domains in 1837-55.(Nikolai Miliutin, one of the principal architectsof the 1861 Emancipation Act, was a nephewand close disciple of Kiselev.)

-THE TERMS OF EMAI{CIPATIOl{

Alexander II both freed Russia's serfs frompersonal servitude and endeavoured to ensurethat they were 'allotted'sufficient land to meettheir subsistence needs and their future finan-cial obligations to the state, including so-called'redemption payments' on the land allotted tothem under the terms of the Emancipation.Overall, in 43 provinces of European Russia,the former serfs received 96% of the land theyhad previously farmed for their own use,2although there were significant regional varia-tions. In eight Western provinces, whosepredominantly Polish nobility staged a Polishnationalist rebellion against Tsarist rule in1863, the terms of the Emancipation rvere

l\/ODERN HISTORY REVIEW

revised so as to punish the landed nobility by'allotting' the former serfs more land than theyhad formerly cultivated for their own use, andin these Western borderlands the former serfsreceived their 'allotments' on more generousterms than elsewhere.

But in the fertile black earth and steppeprovinces the former serfs were 'aliotted' only77% of the acreage they had previously culti-vated for their own use, although terms of thetransfer were more favourable than in themore northerly provinces. In the infertile andextensively forested Great Russian heartland,the former serfs received 'allotments' whichwere more generous in size but overpriced.Moreover, under agrarian legislation enactedin the mid-1860s, 'crown peasants' and 'statepeasants' generally received'allotrnents' whichwere both relatively large and more moder-ately priced, as the royal family and the statewere less intent on exacting 'compensation' forthe (less significant) loss of'feudal' dues andlabour-services than rvere the often heavily-indebted and spendthrift landed nobility andthe crown lands and the state domains rveremainly in Russia's more outlying or forestedor infertile regions.

Horvever, while such complex land trans-fers were bound to involve numerous anoma-lies, injustices and disputes, the fact that landwas transferred to former serfs, 'state peas-ants'and 'crown peasants'on such a massivescale by such a notoriously oppressive andautocratic state was in itself remarkable andrather unusual. In many regions of Europe andthe Americas, former serfs and slaves werefreed either without land on rvhich to supportthemselves or with severely inadequate land-holdings, so as to create large pools of cheapand vulnerable wage-labourers and dependentshare-croppers who could easily be unscnipu-lously exploited by nearby landlords and em-ployers. In Russia, even more remarkably, theownership of the newly-established peasant'allotments' was conferred, not on individualheads of household as private property, butmainly on village communes as communalvillage property or, in regions where com-munal traditions were weak or absent, onwhole households as joint family property. Inpost-Emancipation Russia, peasant'allot-ments' were farmed individually using famill'labour to meet family subsistence and finan-cial needs, but they were not private propertyin the Western sense. 'Allotments' could not bebought, sold, mortgaged or distrained and, inmost areas, they could be periodically reallo-cated or'repartitioned' by the village assemblyin response to changing local economic anddemographic circumstances and in accordancervith the peasants' own conceptions of equalityand justice.

-THE TSAR.TIBERATOR

At first sight, Alexander II rvas a mostunlikely reformer. His stern and rigidll' con-servative father, Tsar Nicholas I, and hi-qtutors had endeavoured to instil in him adevotion to the Imperial Army, to military.pageantry and parades, and to the militaryvirtues of obedience, order and discipline.Moreover, Alexander II always preferred rid-ing and hunting to committees and affairs ofstate. He found it difficult to concentrate onserious business for long and his concentrationwas not helped by the gradual breakdown ofhis marriage to Empress Marie and by persis-tent terrorist attempts to assassinate himduring the 1860s and 1870s.

An important clue to his personality, whichhelps to explain rvhy this otherwise conven-tional and conservative monarch instigated afundamental'restructuring' of Russian society,lay in his apparent thirst for approval andacclaim. This could be seen as weak-rvilled andas a source of psychological vulnerability, yetit motivated him to achieve things he rvouldnot otherrvise have achieved. In his boyhoodand youth, it rvas noted, he had always neededhis austere and imposing father's approbationand praise. After his father's death, he soughtthe approval and acclaim of the relatives andfriends whose qualities and judgement he mostrespected and who, it so happened, rveremostly'abolitionists'. Russian monarchs haveusually paid little heed to what other peoplehave thought of them, but Alexander II rvas animportant exception.

ITHE HISTORIOGRAPHIC DEBATE

Soviet and Western historians have arguedendlessly o",er the motives, causes and rvidersignificance of the Emancipation of Russia'sserfs. Taking their cues from \larx and Lenin.official Soviet histories of Russia have treatecihistor-v as a teleological or sequential progres-sion through successive forms of society orstages of development, each having its orvndistinctive prevailing 'mode of production' and'dominant class'. The prime moi'ers in thisprocess are the'class struggle'and the 'growthof societl,'s productive forces'. Periods of tran-sition from one stage or form of society to thenext are characterised by all-pervasive 'crises'of obsolescent 'modes of production' andoutmoded 'social relations', by revolution or'accelerated evolution', and by the emergenceof a new dominant class, a new prevailing'mode of production' and ner,v 'social relations'corresponding to the requirements of the nextstage in the progres-sion.

1 860s 1 870s 1 880s 1 890sPopulation of European Russia (millions)Net grain + potato outpul(million chetverts, grain equivalent)- per inhabitant (chetverts)- per rural inhabitant (chetverts)

63.7

1582.482.75

69.8

1872.683.00

81 .7 94.2

228 290.52.79 3.083.18 3.55

Source: A.S. Nifontov Zernovoe proizvodstvo Rossii vo vtoroi polovine X/X veka (Moscow 1974), pp. 1 99, 200,201 ,284,286,287.

TABLE 1: Net grain and potato output, European Russia, 1860-90.

SEPTEMBER 1992

According to an official Historl of theUSSR (Moscow i960), after 1800:

serfdom hampered the development of theproductive forces of the counlrl .. . hindered thegrowth of the home market, including thelabour market, restricted the accumuiation ofcapital and hampered thg dgl'glopmen: ol moreprogressive, capitalis:ic :llethods of production.The abolitior oi se::icn lai become an abso-lute nec-ss::i' r :.-19).

The E:ancipation was officially seenas :::- :rsoiution of a deep-seated 'crisis of::::::::. narking the transition from 'feud-:.:.::- :; 'capitalism'. But the embryo of capi-::,,.::- \i'as already growing within the womb: :.r.iciaiism'. The 1830s mark 'the beginning

-- a:l industrial revolution', characterised by:r:rechanisation and a transition from serf ton'age labour in Russia's small but rapidlydeveloping manufacturing sector; the rapidgrowth of towns and village industries; theemergence of a new class of capitalist entre-preneurs and capitalist forms of organisation(the factory and the joint stock company); arevolution in transport and communications(stage coach, steamboat, railway, postal andtelegraphic services); and a transition from arelatively uncommercialised'natural economy'to a commercialised market economy.

Soviet historians have claimed, not thatmid nineteenth-century Russia was becomingan industrial country, but that revolutionarychanges were taking place within the indus-trial and transport sectors, marking the begin-ning of capitalist industrialisation and atransfomation of 'social relations'. The stan-dard Western objections, that this industriali-sation invoived a narrou' range of small-scaleIight industries rvith lon' levels of mechanisa-tion, that Russia still iacked modern banksand significant steei, engineering, chemicals,coal and oil industries, and that Russia wasstill far from becoming an industrialisedcountry, have rather missed the point. Untilthe 1820s the British Industrial Revolutionwas also based iargely on srveated labour in asimilarll' narrow range of industries whichalso predated the railways and mainly con-sisted of small and relatively unmechanisedlvorkshops rather than factories, often locatedin rural areas with access to water power orrvood fuel, yet this is still justifiably called theIndustrial Revolution.3

Europe SouthernRussia (excl. Russia) Europe

-IMPACT OF I1{DUSTRIATISATIOl{

Soviet historians of Russia have usefullydemonstrated that pre-Emancipation Russiarvas not quite as far behind the West as mostWesterners like to think. Railways, steam-boats, factories, steam-powered machinery andpostal and telegraphic services appeared inRussia not more than two or three decadesafter their advent in the West. And Soviethistorians have used one of several possibleconceptions of an industrial revolution to char-acterise revolutionary changes which reallydid occur in Russia's small but rapidly devel-oping industrial and transport sectors andwhich really did pose a significant threat orchallenge to the continued existence of serf-dom in Russia, in much the same way that theindustrialisation of the northern United Statesthreatened or challenged the continued exis-tence of slavery in the 'Old South' during thissame period. Indeed, the abolition of slaveryin the USA and abolition of serfdom in Russiaoccurred almost simultaneously and, to asignificant extent, Russian and American'abolitionists' exchanged ideas and madecommon cause against the hated institutionsof forced labour and personal servitude.

Up to a point, admittedly, capitalist in-dustry based on wage labour could and did co-exist with systems of forced labour andpersonal servitude. But they represented rivaleconomic systems and mutually incompatiblemoral values and conceptions of human rights,which is why 'abolitionism' was ultimately amoral issue and a moral crusade in bothRussia and the USA.

ITHE ROLE OF PEASAI{T UI{REST

According to official Soviet historiography,the deepening 'contradictions' or tensionsbetrveen the social order and 'social relations'based on serfdom and the 'developing produc-tive forces' of capitalism produced 'an acutesocial and economic crisis'. This 'crisis of serf-dom' gave rise to mounting peasant unrest, a'revolutionary situation' and Russia's firstmajor radical publicists and revolutionarythinkers - men such as Alexander HerzenGBr2-70), Mikhail Bakunin (1814 76), NikolaiChernyshevsky (1828-89) and Dmitri Pisarev

Italy Portugal Greece Spain JapanAustria-Hungary

29

(1840 68), who became the leading lights ofthe emerging radical intelligentsia. Moreover,following Russia's humiliating defeat in theCrimean War (1853-56), which cruelly exposedmany of Russia's deficiencies and destabilisedthe economy and public finances, the Tsaristautocracy was 'forced to prepare the peasantreform of 1861'.

The Soviet emphasis on the importance ofmounting peasant unrest and an emerging'revolutionary situation' is, however, open toserious objections. The rising trend in peasantunrest is well-documented, but it fell far shortof the more massive peasant unrest of the1770s and the 1900s and does not constitutevery convincing evidence of the existence of a'revolutionary situation'. Moreover, while aradical intelligentsia and important revolu-tionary thinkers undoubtedly emerged amidthe 'crisis of serfdom', no one has demon-strated that this was accompained by theemergence of an organised revolutionaryopposition capable of seizing power. Futher-more, 'nothing in Alexander's private corre-spondence or in the reminiscences of hiscontemporaries supports the contention thatthe emancipation was the act of a frightenedman', according to a leading authority on TsarAlexander II.a

Indeed, Nicholas I and his advisers hadregarded rising peasant unrest as a reason fordelaying any radical restructuring of Russiansociety, because of the usefulness of serfdomas a form of control over the peasantry. 'Thecrucial significance of growing peasant unrestlay, not in its effects on Alexander II and hisleading reformers, but in Alexander's skilfuluse of it to intimidate the conservative serf-owning nobility into reluctantly accepting theabolition of serfdom, above all in his famouswarning that 'lt is better to begin to abolishserfdom from above than to wait until itbegins to abolish itself from below.'

TTHE CRIMEAl{ WAR

There is broader agreement on the importanceof the Crimean War as a catalyst of reform.War is 'the midwife of progress' (Marx) and'the locomotive of history' (Trotsky). TheCrimean War highlighted deficiencies inRussia's industrial and armaments capacity,transport capabilities, morale, military re-serves and ability to mobilise for war, whichcould only be overcome by a radical overhaulof the entire economic and social order. Signif-icantly, some of the leading champions andagents of refotm were drawn from the NavyMinistry, which drew radical conclusions fromthe Crimean debacle. Serfdom came to be seenas incompatible rvith Russia's continuance as aGreat Power.

There is also broad agreement on theimportance of growing pressure for reformcoming from educated public opinion and thepress. Liberals, radicals, Slavophils, the Min-istry of Foreign Affairs and leading membersof the royal family shared a growing convic-tion that serfdom was an evil and morallyindefensible institution, a source of shame andembarrassment and a blot on Russia's imageabroad, barring it from the ranks of'civilised'nations.

'892-95 534555

415Al l

350400

225240

507508

260276

221 174 209274 160(a) 130(b)

Bulgaria Serbra Romania Denmark France Germany lreland USA Canada Argentina

1 892-951909-13 545 470

780880

1006 555 479852 514 595

526 1291 1043633 1160(c) 1693(c) 1540

(a)1 91 8-22: (b)1 92s-29; (c)1 91 1-1 3

Figures here represent kilograrns, grain equivalent. As potatoes ate 78ok walet and conlain only one-quarter asmany calories per kilogram as grain, four kilograms of potatoes have been treated as equivalent to one kilogramof grain.

TABLE 2: Anmral grain and potato output per inhabitant, Russia and othercountries, 1892-1913.

ISUGCESS OR FAITURE?

The terms on which Russia's serfs were eman-cipated have incurred severe criticism, espe-cially from the West. Most Western historiansof Russia have taken the view that, bystrengthening and extending the Russianvillage commune system and communalownership of inalienable peasant'allotments',and by making the membership of eachvillage commune collectively responsible fortaxes and for 'redeeming' the land allotted tothem, the 1860s Emancipation perpetuatedwasteful cropping patterns which impededagricultural advance, penalised individualenterprise, imposed crushing financial burdens(the so-called'redemption payments'), discour-aged family-limitation and 'locked' the rapidlymultiplying peasant population into an in-creasingly impoverished village sector,promoting rural over-population, famine andthe peasant unrest which exploded in the earlytwentieth century.s As I have sought todemonstrate elsewhere, this dismal doom-laden view does not stand up to closer statis-tical investigation and it is possible to upholdmuch more positive 'revisionist' views of thepost-Emancipation peasantry and peasantagriculture.6 Professor A. Nifontov has esti-mated that, in 50 provinces of EuropeanRussia, the net output of grain and potatoesrose by 2ok per annum from the 1860s to the1890s, well ahead of population growth (1.3%per annum) and rural population growth(\2% per annum), and Professor Paul Gregoryhas calculated that Russia's net output ofgrain and potatoes rose by over 39'o perannum from 1885 89 to 1909-13.7 Grain yieldsper hectare on European Russia's peasant'allotments' rose almost as fast as those onprivate land from the 1860s to the 1900s, roseconsiderably faster than those of the West andJapan over the same period, kept ahead ofrural population growth and by 1911-13 werecomparable to those attained in other coun-tries with similarly short and/or moisture-defi-cient growing seasons. It is also questionablewhether there really was a Russian 'famine' in1891-92, as the above normal mortality at thattime can be more plausibly attributed to theconcurrent cholera epidemic, transmitted viaRussia's unsanitary waterways and water-supplies.

Moreover, the financial burdens on theemancipated peasantry have also been exag-gerated. The 'redemption payments' on landallotted to the peasantry were often burden-some and unjustly high at first, and peasantsrightly resented having to pay anything at allfor land which they regarded as havingalways been rightfully theirs (it had been'usurped' by the state, the Tsars, the Churchand the nobility in centuries past). But theinflation fuelled by large budget deficits,excessive printing of paper money and thebonds issued to former serf-owners ascompensation for the land they had ceded totheir former serfs steadily reduced the burdenof redemption payments in real terms, as didthe remissions granted in the 1880s, so thatby the 1890s redemption payments repre-sented under I0% of state revenue and under2% of the value of agricultural output. By

Emancipating a serf.

then all taxation amounted to under 1300 ofRussia's national income, rvhich ri'as compa-rable with Europe in general and rvell belorvthe tax-burdens on most det'eloping countriestoday.

-DEMOGRAPHIC EFFECTS

It is also questionable whether the terms of theEmancipation really were responsible forrapid rural population growth. Private prop-erty prevailed in Finland and Romania, yetthey experienced rates of rural popuiationgrowth similar to Russia and countries suchas Spain and Italy only avoided them thanksto mass emigration amongst their most fertileage-groups. There was nothing like the popu-lation explosion occurring in today's ThirdWorld. Moreover, Russia's Emancipationarrangements did not prevent dramatic in-creases in peasant mobility, reflected in thesteep rise in the number of internal passports'issued to peasants each year (from 1.3 millionin the 1860s, to 3.7 million in the 1870s, 5million in the 1880s, 7 million in the 1890s and9 million in the 1900s). Mobility increasedsufficiently to allow large-scale colonisation ofSiberia, the Volga basin and the southernsteppes and a 2.5ok per annum growth ofRussia's industrial proletariat between 1861and 19i4. Since industrial output grew by animpressive 5% per annum between 1861 and1914, it is highly unlikely that Russia's townsand industries could have productivelyabsorbed rural labour much faster than theydid.

What the Emancipation arangements didprevent was, not the workforce-growth neededby Russia's burgeoning industries andexpanding frontiers of agricultural settlement,

N/ODERN HISTORY REVIEW

but a painful proletarianisation of the peas-antry and a massive growth of vagrancy,slums, shanty towns and underemployedlabour, such as occurred around many Euro-pean cities in the nineteenth century andaround many Third World cities in the twen-tieth century. Wage labourers made up under10% of Russia's agricultural workforce as lateas the 1900s and under 5% of peasant 'allot-ments' were smaller than 2.2 hectares (5.3acres) according to the 1877 and 1905 landcensuses. (By contrast, in France, Germanyand Southern and Eastern Europe betweenone-third and two-thirds of all farms weresmaller than 2.0 hectares and in Japan two-thirds were smaller than 1.0 hectares.)

Thus, notrvithstanding frequent allegationsthat post-Emancipation Russia neglected theneeds of the peasantry or lacked an effectiveagrarian policy, it can be seen to have hadunusually enlightened agrarian arrangementswhich to a large extent shielded the peasantryagainst the usual dire social consequences ofthe rapid development of capitalism in anagrarian society, without significantly im-pairing the development of peasant agricultureand of the economy as a whole.

Indeed, b1' freeing peasants from theobligations to perform onerous unpaid labour-services and/or provide 'tribute' to serf-orvnersandior the state, by transferring land to thetiller, and by allorving peasants to work their'ailotments' according to their own rights andusing and reaping the rewards of their ownfamily labour, the Emancipation released long-suppressed energies and initiatives, fosteringan impressive growth and diversification ofindependent peasant agriculture. By 1881,85% of former serfs had become owners oftheir 'allotments'.

-A1{ I 1{ CREASI 1{G tY ASSERTIVE

PEASAl{TRYThe emptions of peasant unrest in the 1900slvere rarely the result of impoverishmentallegedly caused by the terms of the Emanci-pation. They were more often the result of thegrowing economic strength, assertiveness,education, confidence and expectations of theemancipated peasantry (albeit from smallbeginnings), major non-economic grievancesand declining noble control of the countryside.

The dissolution of serfdom encouragedmany estate-owners to sell or lease out most oftheir land, especiaily as man)' invariably livedbeyond their means or found themselvesunable to generate enough cash to pay moneywages to former serfs or discovered that, inthe absence of serfdom, they were often inca-pable of making a success of estate-manage-ment, since the Russian nobility was morestrongly orientated towards careers in thearny or public administration than entrepre-neurship, and so was ill-equipped for the tran-sition to capitalism.

The partial rvithdrawal of the nobility fromthe countryside into urban occupationsincreasingly brought discontented peasantsinto direct confrontations with the state, whichhad to increasingly rely on officials and thearmy to control the countryside. Thus localagrarian disputes became increasingly politi-

SEPTEN/BER 1992

cised and explosive. Moreover, the post-Eman-cipation peasantry continued to be subject towidely-resented legal/civil disabiiities and, inaddition, over half the peasantry belonged tounderpriviieged and oppressed ethnic and/orreligious minorities, rvho increasingl-v assertedtheir separate identities, aspirations anddemands, from the 1890s to 19i7.

-UNFITIISHED BUSIIIESS

Thus. a.::rough the agrarian arrangements:s:21.:srei 5r ihe Emancipation of the serfs'... e:.e ::usuailr' enlightened, the 'Tsar"Liber-:::.: -.:i a lot of unfinished business, raised=\:.clations t'hich his regime was unable to:ui;i, and released social forces r,vhich itri'as ultimateiy incapable of controlling (fore-shadorving Russia's more recent experienceof 'perestroika' under Mikhail Gorbachev).Alexander II rvas assassinated at the seventhattempt by revolutionary terrorists whobelieved that his reforms had not gone farenough and that his death would trigger off amore far-reaching social revolution. Instead,the assassination of the 'Tsar-Liberator'precipitated a reactionary backlash against theintelligentsia and ethnic and religious minori-ties and a reversal of some of his reforms,deflecting Russia off the road towards freedomand on to the road tog'ards the modern policestate and nerv forms of serfdom. Alexander II'slife ended not just in personal tragedy, but in atragedy from t'hose consequences Russia isstil1 struggling to escape.

-t{0TEs

(1) Hoch. H. and Augusiine. \\'. (1979) 'The taxcensuse-i and ihc Crciine of the serf population ofImperial Russia iS33 58'. Slalic Reieu,,Yo1.38,pp.403 25.

(2) Gerschenkron. .\. (1966)'Agrarian policies andindustriaiise-rion in Russia 1861 1917', inCanfiritQ, Et'/tiittiltit Historl' of Europe, Vol. 6,Part II. Canbridge L niversitl' Press.

(3) Berg. \1. (i985) The Age of Manufacturers,Fontana Press. London.

(,1) Kieber. A. (1966) The Politics of Autocracy,flouton and Co., The Hague, p. 33.

(5) Gerschenkron, A. (1966)'Agrarian polices andindustrialisation in Russia 1861 1917', inCanfiridge Ecanamic Historj: of Europe, Vol. 6,Part II. Cambridge University Press; Robbins,R.G. (197-) Faninc in Russia, Columbia Univer-.::'.' Prcss, \eg' York.-' l-l::=-.ur. R. (1987) Cr,,nununism and Deuelop-... ,.. l.i.::-*c:r. London. pp.II-22,32 33, 45;l:-:.:--... R. 139{,)) -{gricultural advance under::.: :.'.,.:..: i ::::.:ne Si stem', in Bartlett, R. (ed.)Ltii:,i C n:r.:ti... ,;i...i Ptasaut Contmunitf it'L

Rrr-.-.ia. ]i:..::...-.-.. 1_ - jlr. pp. 196-218.(7) \ifonior'. -{.S. -:,;t ZLttnt)L'0e proiztodstuo

Rossii t,t ti,ri,'l )' ..::i.'. XIX lrAa, \loscori', pp.198 201. 2&-S,. a:i Gregorl'. P. (1980) 'Grainmarketings and peasa:: consunption in Russia1885 -1913', in E::DI,'rrtijnt.-: iti Ecittiomic History,Vol. 17, pp. 13il61.

Robert Bideleux is the Director of theCentre of Russian and East EuropeanStudies at the Uni.-ersity College ofSwansea, Uniaersity of Wales. His prin-cipal publication is Communism andDevelopment (Methuen 1987).

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Our second perspective examines the difficulty of explaining emancipation tothe serfs and the confused hopes and aspirations which this gave rise to.

ost textbooks on Russian historyand many of the more specialisedstudies have approached the aboli-tion of serfdom in Russia from the

points of view of Tsar Alexander II, the impe-rial bureaucracy and the landed nobiiity. Thepurpose of this article is to look at abolitionfrom the perspective of the people it mostdirectly affected: the 22 million Russian serfs.The article starts by considering the serfs'status on the eve of 1861. This is necessary inorder to understand horv serfs were affectedby the terms of abolition, which is discussed inthe second part of the article. The final partfocuses on the immediate reactions by formerserfs to abolition, paying particular attentionto how, or indeed whether, they understood thereform.

-THE SERFS'STATUS

Serfs comprised slightly under half the peasantpopulation of Russia on the eve of abolition.Most Russian peasants were small-scalesubsistence fatmers who relied on the labourof their families to cultivate small plots ofland. Unlike 'capitalist' farmers, they did notaim to produce a large harvest to sell at aprofit at the market. Instead, they endeavouredto produce sufficient to support their families,and a surplus to sell to raise some money.They used this money to buy the ferv essen-tials they could not produce themselves, and topay the dues and taxes demanded from themby the outside world. Many peasants, espe-cially those in the less fertile northern part ofRussia, supplemented their incomes from agri-culture by engaging in handicrafts or pettytrade. Others, usually with permission, workedarvay from their home villages in a u'idevariety of occupations on a seasonal or semi-permanent basis.

1 Legal StatusSerfs u,ere a particular, legally-defined cate-gorl' of peasants. They lived on the landedestates of members of the nobility. (The rest ofthe peasant population lived on land belongingto the state: state peasants - or members ofthe imperial famiiy: appanage peasants.) Serfswere bound to the estates of noble landorvners

and were not permitted to leave rvithoutpemission. Serfs were also the property of thelandorvners, rvho could buy and sell them as ifthey were slaves. Landowners could also takeserfs arvay from the land and convert themto domestic serfs, who worked as servants inthe landorvners' househoids, and in a varietyof skilled occupations on the estate. By 1858,domestic serfs comprised 6.8% of the serfpopulation.

2 land and 0bligationMost landowners granted their serfs (rvith theexception of domestic serfs) the use of allot-ments of land, although legally the landremained the property of the nobles. Serfsper{ormed obligations in return for the use oftheir allotments. There were two forms ofthese obligations. The first was labour obliga-lions (barshcJuna). Some iandowners retainedpart of the estate for themselves (the denesne),and compelled their serfs to spend part of theirtime cultivating this land. ln 1797 Tsar Paulrecommended, '"vith limited results, thatbarshchina be restricted to three days a week.

The second category of obiigations "vasdues (obroA). Some landowners turned over

most of their estates to the serfs, anddemanded dues in money and/or agriculturalproduce in return. On some estates, the trvoforms of obligations were combined. An unfor-tunate group of serfs on such estates wereliable to both forms of obligations. Male serfsr,vere also required to pay the poll tax to thestate, and were liable to be conscripted into thearrny.

3 Landownels'AuthorityIn addition to owning land populated by serfs,landorvners were also responsible for adminis-tration and justice on their estates. In practice,horvever, many landowners were absentees.They hired managers or stewards to admin-ister their estates. NIost landorvners used someof their serfs to help run their estates, andturned o'u'er some of the responsibilities to theserfs themselves, to the institutions known ascommunes (mir or obshchina). Communes tookthe responsibility for apportioning the allot-ments of land to individual serf families, andsharing out the obligations and taxes.

These four points - the serfs' legal status,

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their use of land allotments, their obligationsto landowners, and the landowners' adminis-trative and judicial authority - were the fourmain features of the institution of serfdom inRussia. This was the institution which wasabolished in 1861.

-TERMS OF ABOI.ITIOlI

The statute abolishing serfdom was signedinto law by Tsar Alexander II on 19 February1861, and published on 5 March. The eventualaim was for former serfs to become the fulllegal owners of allotments of land. The statutelaid down a complex, gradual, three-stageprocess for the abolition of serfdom and transi-tion to this new agrarian order. The first stagebegan on 5 March 1861. All former serfs inRussia entered a transition period, lasting fromtwo to nine years. In this period everything,with one important exception, remainedexactly as it was while preparations weremade for the second stage. This was to becalled 'temporary obligation', during whichrelations between former serfs and landownerswere to be regulated by law according tocharters which had been drawn up during thepreceding period.'Temporary obligation'would end when the landowner chose toinitiate the third and final stage, the ,redemp-tion operation'. During this stage former serfswould purchase land allotments from thelandowners through the intermediary of thegovernment. In 1881 the government madetransfer to the final stage compulsory for allformer serfs who were still 'temporarily obli-gated'.

The following account of the process ofabolition will summarise the main terms asthey related to the four main features ofserfdom and to the three stages outlinedabove. The one thing which changed at oncewas the legal status of the former serfs. On 5March 1861 serfs became legally free; theyceased to be serfs (therefore in the rest of thisarticle they will be referred to simply as ,peas-ants'). Legal freedom meant, for example, thatthey could no longer be bought and sold,

contracts, including the sale and purchase ofproperty, without the landowners' permission.The former domestic serfs received personalfreedom, but nothing else.

During the transition period, the size andlocation of the peasants' land allotmentsremained the same as they had been immedi-ately prior to 1861. In the second stage, 'tempo-rary obligation', the size and location ofallotments were to be set according to princi-ples laid down in the statute, and recorded inthe charters. These principles took account oflocal customs, regional differences and finan-cial considerations. The statute laid downmaximum and minimum sizes for peasants'allotments in each region. In some cases,however, peasants had previously cultivatedallotments which were larger than themaximum size. In such cases, part of the peas-ants' land was taken away ('cut off') andretained by the landowners. Some historianshave calculated that in the more fertile parts ofRussia, where land was more valuable, peas-ants lost around a quarter of their land.

In the third stage, the 'redemption opera-tion', the peasants could buy, or'redeem', theirland allotments. As most peasants lacked theresources to buy the land directly from thelandowners, or even raise the money them-selves in loans, the government stepped in toact as intermediary. The government agreed toadvance most of the price set for the land tothe landowners in long-term bonds. The peas-ants would then repay the money to thegovernment, with interest capitalised at 6%per annum, in instalments. The instalmentswere known as redemption payments, andwere to be spread over 49 years. At the end ofthis period, the peasants would be the full legalowners of their land allotments. In fact, thepeasants quickly ran up massive arrears. Theredemption payments were rescheduled, butthe outstanding amount was cancelled in theaftermath of the 1905 revolution.

The peasants' obligations to the

MODERN HISTORY REVIEW

redemption operation, when they werereplaced by the redemption payments. Theredemption payments were ostensiblypayments for the allotments of land. In reality,however, the peasants were paying more thanthe market value of the land. The differencewas a partly hidden element to compensatelandowners for the loss of the free labour oftheir former serfs, or the loss of their obrohpayments.

In the area of the fourth feature of serfdom,administration and justice, the authority ofthe landowners over their former serfs washanded over to a reconstituted commune at thevillage leve1, and to newly-created institutionsof peasant self-government at the slightlyhigher level of township (uolost). This localpeasant self-government was, however, subjectto the supervision of officials from the localnobility and the provincial local governmentinstitutions. Moreover, there were majorreforms of local government and the courts inmid-1860s.

IPEASA]IT REACTIOil

This summary of the terms of the abolition ofserfdom cannot convey the true complexity ofthe reform. The statute ran to over 350 pages.The Tsar tried to explain the reform to thepopulation in a short proclamation, which wasread out in churches all over Russia duringLent. Alexander II put forward his reasons forabolishing serfdom, explained how the statutehad been prepared, and summarised the termsin a rather general and unsystematic manner.l

1 A frluch-misunderstood ProclamationIn the weeks after the proclamation was readout, peasants all over Russia tried to makesense of what they had heard. The atmospherein the Volga region of south-eastern Russia inthe spring of 1861 was described in a letter bya landowner in Saratov province:

and could enter into legally binding

Peasants at work haulingboats along the Volga.

landowners remained as beforeduring the transition period. Inthe second stage, 'temporary

Nobody could understand fthe proclama-tionl. We have still not received the full

text of the law. This has given theopportunily for everyone to inter-

pret it in his own way. Confu-sion has begun. But first it

was understood thatl' freedom was postponed

for two years. But asyou know

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landlords are the same, but many are wicked.... It is easily understandable that when the[proclamation] was read, peasants [belongingto the latter sortl could not believe that all theTsar's mercy just consisted of them having toremain under this oppression for another twoyears .... The peasants interpreted the fprocla-mationl to mean that, as they had been givenfreedom, there was no more labour service(completely logical, in my opinion) and stoppedworking for the landlords. ...The districtadministrator was sent to try to persuade them,but without success. The peasants respeclfullytold him 'Sir, we cannot disobey the Tsar'sorders', and did not go to work.2

There were hundreds of such incidents invillages all over Russia in the spring andsummer of 1861. For the most part, however,peasants restricted themselves to passiveresistance. In the village of Bezdna, in Kazanprovince to the east of Moscow, a semi-literatepeasant named Anton Petrov read the statute.He interpreted it to mean that the Tsar hadgranted'true freedom', but that this was beingconcealed by the landowners. In part, hismisinterpretation can be explained by the factsthat the legislation was very complex and hewas, at best, semiliterate. It is a measure ofhis level of literacy that he misunderstood apercentage symbol (%) to be the seal of StAnne, which he apparently believed meantthat the Tsar had granted freedom. A series ofofficials tried without success to make thepeasants see reason. Troops were sent to thevillage. Confronted by an enormous crowd ofsullen peasants, the troops panicked andopened fire. Around 100 peasants were killed.

2 Reasons lor MisunderstandingsThe peasants' apparent misunderstandings ofthe Tsar's intentions and the incidents whichfollowed can be explained by a number offactors. The terms of abolition were extremelycomplex, and rvere not adequately explained inthe proclamation rvhich was read out. The textis permeated by the Tsar's desire to reassurethe nobiliqv and maintain order, rather than togive a clear, concise explanation of what wasgoing to happen to the peasants who werebeing freed from serfdom. Some of the priestswho read out the proclamation, moreover, wereprobably semiliterate, and may not have readit out correctly.

The legislation was prepared and writtenby educated bureaucrats in St Petersburg.They drew up the legislation on the basis oflengthy discussions and debates inside thebureaucracy and with members of the nobility,and on the basis of detailed statistical researchinto the conditions of life on serf estates. Manyof the bureaucrats, however, had little if anydirect experience of peasant life. The resultinglegislation rvas therefore written from anabstract and theoretical point of view, and wascouched in difficult, legalistic terminology.

Peasants approached abolition from a verydifferent perspective. The concerns and atti-tudes of the bureaucrats were completely aliento them. Ilost peasants had little experience oflife outside the village and outside the basicfeatures of peasant life. They knew about thecustoms and tra{itions of peasant family andvillage life. They understood subsistence

farming and that they were compelled to serveobligations to their landowner and the Tsar.But they understood all these in purely prac-tical terms, in the ways they affected theireveryday lives. This gap between the perspec-tives and language of the bureaucrats whodrew up the legislation and the peasantswhom it affected contributed greatly to themisunderstandings and confusion whichfollowed the promulgation of the reform. Peas-ants had to try to relate what they had heardread out to the experience of their daily lives.

Another reason for the misunderstandingswas that serfdom was not abolished primarilyin the interests of the peasantry. Rather, it wasa compromise between the interests of thegovernment, the landowning nobility and,lastly, the serfs. No one involved in preparingthe reform asked serfs about their views. Theauthorities were interested in what serfswanted and expected, but they were probablymotivated by the desire to avert, and preparedto suppress, any serious peasant unrest whichmay have been caused by mass peasantdisappointment with the terms of abolition.There was thus a large gulf between whatwas enacted in 1861 and serfs' hopes andexpectations.

3 Seil ExpectationsOne way in which peasants responded to thisgulf was to try to examine the texts of theproclamation and statute in more detail. Mostpeasants were illiterate, therefore they turnedto people who were literate, and whom theythought they could trust, such as AntonPetrov, to read the legislation for them. Inaddition to his difficulty in reading thecomplex language of the statute, AntonPetrov's misunderstanding also resulted fromhis, and the other peasants', desire to find inthe legislation what they wanted and expected.

Earlier in the nineteenth century, manyserfs may have accepted any measure whichseemed to promise some amelioration intheir status and condition. After the publicannouncement of the Tsar's intention to abol-ish serfdom in 1857, however, they had cometo hope for, and to expect, major changes.Several Soviet historians have tried to recon-struct serfs' hopes and expectations at the timeof abolition. The most extreme version of serfs'demands put forward by Soviet historians wasas follows:

1 To become completely independent fromtheir landowner, i.e. to become personallyfree.

2 To be given their land allotments withoutpayment, and also to be given all other landon the estate belonging to the landowner. Itseems that serfs had their own concept oflandownership. They apparently believedthat they already owned the land by virtueof having cultivated it for generations.

3 An end to all obligations for theiriandowners and to the state. They wantedto be left alone to enjoy the fruits of theirown labours.

4 In a similar vein, they wanted to be leftalone to run their own affairs as they sawfit, in accordance with peasant customs andtraditions. They did not want any supervi-

JJ

sion or interference from outside, especiallynot from members of the local nobility.

Less extreme variants of serfs' hopes andexpectations on the eve of 1861 differ fromthese in degree rather than substance. Theterms of the abolition of serfdom, however,were a very long way from even the lessextreme variants. Only the first point, personalfreedom, was granted in 1861. From the peas-ants'point of view the changes proposed in theother areas were a very long way from whatthey wanted, and were postponed far into thefuture. At first, immediately after the promul-gation of the reform, it seems that many peas-ants simply could not believe that the terms ofabolition were the real ones. This problem ofunderstanding was exacerbated because manypeasants believed, or at least claimed tobelieve, that the Tsar was on their side, andwanted to enact major reforms for their benefit.

The peasants' immediate reaction to abolition was confusion, bewilderment and disbelief.Gradually, especially after 1863, they came toaccept that the terms which had been explainedto them were genuine. The great hopes andexpectations of 1861 died down. Peasantsrealised that, as they had done for centuries,they would have to continue trying to make thebest of their lot, waiting for other opportunitiesto realise their aims and aspirations.

-11oTES

(1) For a translation of the proclamation, see: B.Dmytryshyn (ed.) (1990) (3rd edn) ImperialRussia: A Source Booh,1700-1917, Holt, Rinehartand Winston Inc; Fort Worth, Texas, pp. 307-11.

(2) Quoted in McCauley, M. & Waldron, P. (1988)The Emergence of the Modern Russian State,1855 81, Barnes and Noble Books, New Jersey,p. 113.

IFURTHER READII{G

Blum, J. 096I) Lord and Peasant in Russia fromthe Ninth to the Nineteenth Century, PrincetonUniversity Press.

Emmons, T. 'The peasant and emancipation' in W.S. Vucinich (ed.) (1968) The Peasant in Nine'te enth- Century Rr.rssaa, Stanford University Press,pp.41 77.

Field, D. (1989) (2nd edn) Rebels in the Name of the?sar, Unwin Hyman.

Hoch, S. L. (1986) Serfdom and Social Control inRussia: Petroushoe, A Vilkge in Tambou, ChicagoUniversity Press.

Kolchin, P. (1987) Unfree Labor: American Slaueryand Russian Serfdam, Harvard University Press.

Perrie, M. (1989) Alexandzr II: Emancipation andReform in Russia, 1855 188-1, Historical Association pamphlet, London. '

Puskarev, S. G.'The Russian peasants'reaction tothe Emancipation of 1861', Russian Reuiew YoL.27,No.2 (April 1968), pp. 199-214 .

Zaionchkovsky, P. (1978) The Abolition of Serfdomin Russia, Academic International Press, Florida.

Daaid Moon is a lecturer in the HistoryDepartment at the Uniuersity of Neu'castle upon Tyne. He is the author ofRussian Peasants and Tsarist Legislationon the Eve of Reform: Interaction betweenPeasants and Officialdom, 1825-1855(Macmillan 1992).