4Russian Inter-Revolution

1907-1914• A. Themes• B. Third-of-June Regime, 1907-11• C. Crisis from Below

1. Minorities2. Peasants3. Workers

D. Crisis at the TopE. Crisis from WithoutF. Conclusion

A. Themes

1. Breakdown of dysfunctional political system

2. Minority issue

3. Failure of Stolypin agrarian reform

4. Re-emergence of worker radicalism

5. Crisis in elites, defection of intelligentsia

6. Counterproductive foreign policy

B. Third-of-June Regime, 1907-11

1. Four power blocs2. Successful partnership, 1907-93. Growing tensions4. Naval reform bill5. Old Believer bill6. Finnish bill7. Western zemstvo bill8. Why Stolypin failed

P.A. Stolypin

C. Crisis from Below1. Minorities

a) Major dynamics

b) Case studies

Mendel Beilis and Family

Crisis from Below2. Peasants

a) Stolypin reform: conception

b) Peasant response

c) Implementation

d) Agrarian crisis: intensification

Peasant Duma Deputy, G.F. Fedorov (1908 speech)

When the peasants sent me here, they said: “Go, ask, demand that they divide up the land for us.” We did not come here to carve up our tiny plots into even smaller pieces. The government should not think that from this law the country will become content and tranquil. If I should get the two acres of land [that I now hold], all the same I shall scream: “Give me land!” I have nothing to eat. I can’t exist!! As to the comment by Duma deputy Shidlovskii [a noble landowner] that our [national] culture will go under, then just let him show me what “culture” will allow me to survive on two acres of land!

Peasant Disorders, 1908-1913

Year Number of Mass Disorders Repressed

1908 264

1909 328

1910 198

1911 243

1912 291

1913 173

Crisis from Below3. Workers

a) Strike movement

b) Lena Goldfields

c) Labor press

d) Bolsheviks and Mensheviks

Strike Movement, 1908-14

Year Total Strikes

Percent Political

Strikers

1908 900 5 176,000

1909 300 0 64,000

1910 200 0 46,000

1911 500 0 105,000

1912 2,000 64 725,000

1913 2,400 43 887,000

1914 3,500 68 1,337,000

D. Crisis at the Top, 1911-14

1. Intelligentsia: Vekhi Syndrome

2. Government: After Stolypin

3. Duma: United Opposition

Goncharova, “Nativity” (1910)

Kandinsky, “Improvisation” (1910)

Malevich, “Knife-Grinder” (1912)

Tercenteniary of Dynasty:Start of Imperial Tour

1913: Tercenteniary of Dynasty:Crowds in Kostroma

Goremykin: Back as PM

Rasputin: Blessing

Rasputin (with Tobol’sk bishop)

Rasputin and Female Admirers

“St. Rasputin”: Popular Icon

E. Crisis from Without

1. Russia as secondary power

2. Foreign policy as domestic policy

3. New debacles