DOCSLIB.ORG

Territory, Enclosure, and State Territorial Mode of Production in the Russian Imperial Periphery

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Territory, Enclosure, and State Territorial Mode of Production in the Russian Imperial Periphery Geogr. Helv., 74, 13–25, 2019 https://doi.org/10.5194/gh-74-13-2019 © Author(s) 2019. This work is distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License. supported by Territory, enclosure, and state territorial mode of production in the Russian imperial periphery Vera Smirnova Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, 24061, Blacksburg, VA, USA Correspondence: Vera Smirnova ([email protected]) Received: 30 April 2018 – Revised: 22 October 2018 – Accepted: 9 December 2018 – Published: 16 January 2019 Abstract. After the imperial land consolidation acts of 1906, the Russian land commune became a center of territorial struggle where complex alliances of actors, strategies, and representations of territory enacted land enclosure beyond the exclusive control of the state. Using original documentation of Russian imperial land deals obtained in the federal and municipal archives, this study explores how the Russian imperial state and territo- ries in the periphery were dialectically co-produced not only through institutional manipulations, educational programs, and resettlement plans but also through political and public discourses. This paper examines how coalitions of landed nobility and land surveyors, landless serfs, and peasant proprietors used enclosure as con- duits for property violence, accumulation of capital, or, in contrast, as a means of territorial autonomy. Through this example, I bring a territorial dimension into Russian agrarian scholarship by positioning the rural politics of the late imperial period within the global context of capitalist land enclosure. At the same time, by focusing on the reading of territory from the Russian historical perspective, I introduce complexity into the modern territory discourse often found in Western political geographic interpretations. 1 Introduction Sovereignty implies ‘space,’ and what is more, it implies a space against which violence, whether There can be, gentlemen, fateful moments in the latent or overt, is directed – a space established life of the state, when state’s necessity is above the and constituted by violence. – Henri Lefebvre law and when it is crucial to choose between the (1991:280) integrity of theories and the integrity of the father- land. [...] The temporary measure is a harsh mea- Motivated by the Western liberal ideas, Pyotr Stolypin, sure, it should resolve the criminal wave, it should prime minister of the Russian Empire, portrayed “excep- break down the ugly phenomena, and retire into tional measures” of land reforms as being crucial for the eternity. – Pyotr Stolypin (1907:433–445)1 integrity of the state and security of the populations. The Stolypin land consolidation acts of 1906, 1910, and 1911 laid the foundation for continuous exploitation of land, customary 1In this speech, Pyotr Stolypin delivered his intentions to em- territoriality, and human bodies in the Russian peasant land ploy emergency measures of a court-martial law during the revolu- commune, an object of collective land tenure that predated tionary acts, the number of which increased in 1906. The statement serfdom. Land enclosure aimed at overcoming economic in- was titled “Speech about provisional laws” and issued in the period stabilities and the growing legitimation crisis of the Russian between the First and Second Duma, uttered in the State Duma on imperial state, thus assisting in the formation of a new terri- 13 March 1907. Stolypin’s speech also explains the legal aspects of the Article #87 of the Russian Constitution that allows the repeal of torial order of proprietary capitalism. any law in times of emergency. This article itself “establishes the As a consequence of Stolypin’s new land policy, landless procedure for the termination of such a temporary measure” when peasants, legally separated from their village communities, the necessity is over – meaning that “temporary laws can be termi- became an integral part of the state’s surge for industrial- nated in the same order as permanent laws”. ization, accumulation of capital, and the everyday struggle Published by Copernicus Publications for the Geographisch-Ethnographische Gesellschaft Zürich & Association Suisse de Géographie. 14 V. Smirnova: Enclosure and state territorial production over property in land. The former land commune became a founding of “a city or a colony” (Schmitt, 2003:70). Only strategic and disputed periphery open for speculations, where through the appropriation of land, resources, or human sub- the hegemony of the individual, the collective, and the state jects, Schmitt argues, does the individual, the collective, or was contested and challenged in the process of territorial- the state legitimize its sovereignty (Schmitt, 2003). As he izing new socio-spatial relations of power. This collapsing states, “no man can give, divide, and distribute without tak- of the sovereign territoriality on a local scale challenges the ing, only a God, who created the world from nothing, can traditional political geographic reading of territory, which [...]” (Schmitt, 2003:345). is often seen as a “state power container” formed and de- Analytical research on territory has traditionally focused formed at the national borders – the issue this paper aims on the bordering of state national limits – one of the most to address through a historical geographic lens. I argue that complex and comprehensive analyses of territorial manifes- in the case of Russian land enclosure, land-embodied social tations often stemmed from the modern Eurocentric con- and ideological relations exceeded the Western regime of pri- text (Giddens, 1985; Gottmann, 1973; Mann, 1984; Ruggie, vate property and social contract, sovereignty characterized 1995; Taylor, 1994). This common conception of territory collective territorial autonomy of the commune in contrast does not necessarily engage with alternative modes of de- to the European context, and strategic territories of dispos- centralized territorial production outside the experiences of session did not necessarily remain confined to the national the European nation-state and has been an important focus frontiers. of scholarly critique over the last decade. More specifically, Drawing on original records of the Russian imperial land a robust field of political geographic literature is now in- deals that I obtained at the Russian federal and municipal volved in exploring the properties of territory that have been archives2 and popular discourses promoted by the Russian undervalued, due to the “analytic flattening” of the concept legal and political theorists through economic and agrarian into a single meaning of the “encasing” of state sovereignty periodicals, this paper explores how the Russian imperial (Sassen, 2013). Approaching the subject from a decentral- state and territory in the land commune were dialectically co- ized (Agnew, 2005, 2015; Antonsich, 2009; Paasi, 2003; produced through the coalitions of landed nobility and land Mountz, 2013), deterritorialized (Dell’Agnese, 2013; Mc- surveyors, landless serfs, and peasant proprietors that used Cann and Ward, 2010; Paasi, 2009), and decolonized per- enclosure as a conduit for extralegal governance, accumula- spective (Halvorsen, 2018; Routledge, 2015; Schwarz and tion of capital, or, in contrast, as a means of territorial au- Streule, 2016) requires at a minimum working on multi- tonomy. I argue that the Russian regime of fictitious property ple operational scales and exploring alternative territorialities eroded the sovereign space of the commune to insert a new produced within the hegemonic systems of power, or what institutional structure of control and extralegal domination Prakash describes as that “which the dominant discourse can- over land and human bodies, yet allowing space for an orga- not appropriate completely, an otherness that resists contain- nized resistance by the multiplicities of actors through which ment” (Prakash, 2000:288). territory was produced, contested, and fractured. Through While Russia of the tsarist period was an expansive em- this example, I bring a territorial dimension into Russian pire, as argues Russian cultural historian Alexander Etkind agrarian scholarship by positioning the rural politics of the following Said’s concept of Orientalism, in political and pub- late imperial period within the global context of capitalist lic discourses “ethnic and cultural differences between the land enclosure. At the same time, by focusing on the reading East Slavic peoples were denied or minimized, and class of territory from the Russian historical perspective, I intro- distinctions between rural, urban and noble-people were de- duce complexity into the territory discourse often found in scribed as deep, close to racial” (Etkind et al., 2012:15). Rus- Western political geographic interpretations. sia “orientalized” its peasants within the central regions in a In a traditional sense, the purpose of territory is of- manner similar to that of the Western maritime empires in ten associated with state space; territory defines the oper- their colonies (Etkind, 2013). This drew many urban intel- ationalization of state sovereignty at the national frontiers, lectuals to study the land commune as something forgotten where, seemingly, “political-economic life is neatly sepa- but also foreign, or as a periphery in relation to the centers of rated into ‘domestic’ and ‘foreign’ realms” (Brenner and El- knowledge and power. “Missionary work, ethnography and den, 2009:354). This necessity of territorial delineation
Load more

Recommended publications
  • The Russian Revolution: a Wider Perspective
    - THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION: A WIDER PERSPECTIVE PREFACE to the Source Collection on the Russian Revolution This is a collection of sources provided by members of the Euroclio network and curated by three members of the Historiana team. It Insert Source here: is not a comprehensive overview of the Russian Revolution. Its purpose is to provide some insights into how politicians, diplomats, senior military officers, other officials, revolutionaries, eye witnesses, bystanders, newspaper editors and journalists, ordinary people and even children perceived some of the key events in Russia from January 1917 through to December 1922. We hope that this transnational and multiperspective collection will widen students’ understanding of what happened in Russia in those critical years. The sources have been provided by history teachers and historians from 13 countries, including the Russian Federation, neighbouring states that in 1917 were part of the Russian Empire, states that were then allies or enemies of Russia and even states which were neutral non-combatants in 1917. To obtain these sources the contributors turned to their own national digital and physical archives. Where necessary, contributors summarised texts in English. Painting by British artist David For EUROCLIO this was a pilot experiment in collecting historical Jagger, entitled The Bolshevik sources and we are very grateful to everyone who took part. We (1918). The image combines the think the experiment was successful and EUROCLIO will be planning features of several Bolshevik further crowd-sourcing of collections on other significant moments leaders. and developments in world history in the future. Source: Canadian War Museum Bob Stradling, Louise Sträuli and Giulia Rossi Public Domain Summer 2019 THE HISTORICAL CONTEXT This collection is divided into four Introductionsections.
    [Show full text]
  • An Old Believer ―Holy Moscow‖ in Imperial Russia: Community and Identity in the History of the Rogozhskoe Cemetery Old Believers, 1771 - 1917
    An Old Believer ―Holy Moscow‖ in Imperial Russia: Community and Identity in the History of the Rogozhskoe Cemetery Old Believers, 1771 - 1917 Dissertation Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Doctoral Degree of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University By Peter Thomas De Simone, B.A., M.A Graduate Program in History The Ohio State University 2012 Dissertation Committee: Nicholas Breyfogle, Advisor David Hoffmann Robin Judd Predrag Matejic Copyright by Peter T. De Simone 2012 Abstract In the mid-seventeenth century Nikon, Patriarch of Moscow, introduced a number of reforms to bring the Russian Orthodox Church into ritualistic and liturgical conformity with the Greek Orthodox Church. However, Nikon‘s reforms met staunch resistance from a number of clergy, led by figures such as the archpriest Avvakum and Bishop Pavel of Kolomna, as well as large portions of the general Russian population. Nikon‘s critics rejected the reforms on two key principles: that conformity with the Greek Church corrupted Russian Orthodoxy‘s spiritual purity and negated Russia‘s historical and Christian destiny as the Third Rome – the final capital of all Christendom before the End Times. Developed in the early sixteenth century, what became the Third Rome Doctrine proclaimed that Muscovite Russia inherited the political and spiritual legacy of the Roman Empire as passed from Constantinople. In the mind of Nikon‘s critics, the Doctrine proclaimed that Constantinople fell in 1453 due to God‘s displeasure with the Greeks. Therefore, to Nikon‘s critics introducing Greek rituals and liturgical reform was to invite the same heresies that led to the Greeks‘ downfall.
    [Show full text]
  • Welfare Reforms in Post-Soviet States: a Comparison
    WELFARE REFORMS IN POST-SOVIET STATES: A COMPARISON OF SOCIAL BENEFITS REFORM IN RUSSIA AND KAZAKHSTAN by ELENA MALTSEVA A thesis submitted in conformity with the requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy Graduate Department of Political Science University of Toronto © Copyright by Elena Maltseva (2012) Welfare Reforms in Post-Soviet States: A Comparison of Social Benefits Reform in Russia and Kazakhstan Elena Maltseva Doctor of Philosophy Political Science University of Toronto (2012) Abstract: Concerned with the question of why governments display varying degrees of success in implementing social reforms, (judged by their ability to arrive at coherent policy outcomes), my dissertation aims to identify the most important factors responsible for the stagnation of social benefits reform in Russia, as opposed to its successful implementation in Kazakhstan. Given their comparable Soviet political and economic characteristics in the immediate aftermath of Communism’s disintegration, why did the implementation of social benefits reform succeed in Kazakhstan, but largely fail in Russia? I argue that although several political and institutional factors did, to a certain degree, influence the course of social benefits reform in these two countries, their success or failure was ultimately determined by the capacity of key state actors to frame the problem and form an effective policy coalition that could further the reform agenda despite various political and institutional obstacles and socioeconomic challenges. In the case of Kazakhstan, the successful implementation of the social benefits reform was a result of a bold and skillful endeavour by Kazakhstani authorities, who used the existing conditions to justify the reform initiative and achieve the reform’s original objectives.
    [Show full text]
  • Events and Land Reform in Russia
    3 TITLE: EVENKS AND LAND REFORM IN RUSSIA: PROGRESS AND OBSTACLES AUTHOR: GAIL FONDAHL University of Northern British Columbia THE NATIONAL COUNCIL FOR SOVIET AND EAST EUROPEAN RESEARCH TITLE VIII PROGRAM 1755 Massachusetts Avenue, N.W. Washington, D.C. 20036 PROJECT INFORMATION:1 CONTRACTOR: Dartmouth College PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR: Gail Fondahl COUNCIL CONTRACT NUMBER: 808-28 DATE: March 1, 1996 COPYRIGHT INFORMATION Individual researchers retain the copyright on work products derived from research funded by Council Contract. The Council and the U.S. Government have the right to duplicate written reports and other materials submitted under Council Contract and to distribute such copies within the Council and U.S. Government for their own use, and to draw upon such reports and materials for their own studies; but the Council and U.S. Government do not have the right to distribute, or make such reports and materials available, outside the Council or U.S. Government without the written consent of the authors, except as may be required under the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act 5 U.S.C. 552, or other applicable law. 1 The work leading to this report was supported in part by contract funds provided by the National Council for Soviet and East European Research, made available by the U. S. Department of State under Title VIII (the Soviet-Eastern European Research and Training Act of 1983, as amended). The analysis and interpretations contained in the report are those of the author(s). EVENKS AND LAND REFORM IN RUSSIA: PROGRESS AND OBSTACLES Gail Fondahl1 The Evenks are one of most populous indigenous peoples of Siberia (with 30,247 individuals, according to a 1989 census), inhabiting an area stretching from west of the Yenisey River to the Okhotsk seaboard and Sakhalin Island, and from the edge of the tundra south to China and Mongolia.
    [Show full text]
  • The Imperial Russian Revision Lists of the 18Th and 19Th Century
    Brigham Young University BYU ScholarsArchive Faculty Publications 2018-05-16 The Imperial Russian Revision Lists of the 18th and 19th Century Joseph B. Everett Brigham Young University - Provo, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/facpub Part of the Genealogy Commons BYU ScholarsArchive Citation Everett, Joseph B., "The Imperial Russian Revision Lists of the 18th and 19th Century" (2018). Faculty Publications. 4308. https://scholarsarchive.byu.edu/facpub/4308 This Peer-Reviewed Article is brought to you for free and open access by BYU ScholarsArchive. It has been accepted for inclusion in Faculty Publications by an authorized administrator of BYU ScholarsArchive. For more information, please contact [email protected], [email protected]. The Imperial Russian Revision Lists of the 18th and 19th Century JOSEPH B. EVERETT* Family History Library, Salt Lake City, Utah, USA One of the most important resources for social and family historians researching in the former Russian Empire are the revision lists, a series of ten enumerations of the population conducted between 1719 and 1858. Listing the members of each household among taxable classes of people across the Russian Empire, the revisions lists are useful for studying historical population demographics and reconstructing family relationships. An awareness of these records and where to access them can be useful for Slavic librarians to facilitate the research of Russian historians and genealogists. This article provides an overview of the history and content of the revision lists with a survey of available collections online and offline. KEYWORDS: Russian Empire, revision lists, census, social history, genealogy, family history, demographics, archives, microfilming, digitization, online databases The Imperial Russian revision lists will be familiar to those acquainted with Nikolai Gogol’s 1842 satirical novel Dead Souls.
    [Show full text]
  • Jan Sobczak Alexei Nikolaevich, Tsarevich of Russia
    Jan Sobczak Alexei Nikolaevich, Tsarevich of Russia Echa Przeszłości 12, 143-156 2011 ECHA PRZESZŁOŚCI XII, 2011 ISSN 1509-9873 Jan Sobczak ALEXEI NIKOLAEVICH, TSAREVICH OF RUSSIA This article does not aspire to give an exhaustive account of the life of Alexei Nikolaevich, not only for reasons of limited space. The role played by the young lad who was much loved by the nation, became the Russian tsesarevich and was murdered at the tender age of 14, would not justify such an effort. In addition to delivering general biographical information about Alexei that can be found in a variety of sources, I will attempt to throw some light on the less known aspects of his life that profoundly affected the fate of the Russian Empire and brought tragic consequences for the young imperial heir1. Alexei Nikolaevich was born in Peterhof on 12 August (30 July) 1904 on Friday at noon, during an unusually hot summer that had started already in February, at the beginning of Russia’s much unfortunate war against Japan. Alexei was the fifth child and the only son of Nicholas II and Alexandra Feodorovna. He had four older sisters who were the Grand Duchesses: Olga (8.5 years older than Alexei), Tatiana (7 years older), Maria (5 years older) and Anastasia (3 years older). In line with the law of succession, Alexei automatically became heir to the throne, and his birth was heralded to the public by a 300-gun salute from the Peter and Paul Fortress. According to Nicholas II, the imperial heir was named Alexei to break away from a nearly century-old tradition of naming the oldest sons Alexander and Nicholas and to commemorate Peter the Great’s father, Alexei Mikhailovich, the second tsar of the Romanov dynasty that had ruled over Russia for nearly 300 years from the 17th century.
    [Show full text]
  • East View Research Collections: Ukrainian Studies
    East View Research Collections: Ukrainian Studies East View produces a variety of valuable collections for researchers and graduate-level students in Ukrainian studies. Covering the period from 1830 to 1945, the collections include primary source documents on uprisings against the Russian Empire; the Prosvita Society (a pro-Ukrainian cultural organization); the Stolypin assassination; the short-lived government and secret police of Hetman Skoropadsky; Ukraine under Nazi occupation; and more. Collections are available online, in full-image, text-searchable files, providing researchers with convenient access to rare, primary source materials. See below for detailed collection descriptions; please inquire for pricing and availability. Collection Spotlight: The Chernobyl Files, Declassified Documents of the Ukrainian KGB The Chernobyl Files collection contains reports prepared for and by a variety of Russian and Ukrainian government agencies, including the KGB, that document and detail the most important developments in the wake of the disaster, as well as internal reports and investigations on its various causes. Learn more at https://www.eastview.com/resources/e-collections/chernobyl-files/ Collection Spotlight: Judaica Digital Collections Features a collection of eight resources from the State Archives of Kyiv Oblast’, covering the period from the Russian Empire of the 1850s to the early Soviet era of the 1920s. The collections include documentation from important historical events, such as Kyiv’s Bloody October of 1905 and the Beilis Case. Topics covered include: emigration from Ukraine, before and during the Soviet era; anti-Semitic groups, ethnic tension and the resulting pogroms; Jewish societies and education programs; and more. Learn more at https://www.eastview.com/resources/e-collections/judaica-digital-collections/ Other Featured Collections Assassination of Russian Prime Minister Pyotr Stolypin, 1911.
    [Show full text]
  • Background Guide, and to Issac and Stasya for Being Great Friends During Our Weird Chicago Summer
    Russian Duma 1917 (DUMA) MUNUC 33 ONLINE 1 Russian Duma 1917 (DUMA) | MUNUC 33 Online TABLE OF CONTENTS ______________________________________________________ CHAIR LETTERS………………………….….………………………….……..….3 ROOM MECHANICS…………………………………………………………… 6 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM………………………….……………..…………......9 HISTORY OF THE PROBLEM………………………………………………………….16 ROSTER……………………………………………………….………………………..23 BIBLIOGRAPHY………………………………………………………..…………….. 46 2 Russian Duma 1917 (DUMA) | MUNUC 33 Online CHAIR LETTERS ____________________________________________________ My Fellow Russians, We stand today on the edge of a great crisis. Our nation has never been more divided, more war- stricken, more fearful of the future. Yet, the promise and the greatness of Russia remains undaunted. The Russian Provisional Government can and will overcome these challenges and lead our Motherland into the dawn of a new day. Out of character. To introduce myself, I’m a fourth-year Economics and History double major, currently writing a BA thesis on World War II rationing in the United States. I compete on UChicago’s travel team and I additionally am a CD for our college conference. Besides that, I am the VP of the Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternity, previously a member of an all-men a cappella group and a proud procrastinator. This letter, for example, is about a month late. We decided to run this committee for a multitude of reasons, but I personally think that Russian in 1917 represents such a critical point in history. In an unlikely way, the most autocratic regime on Earth became replaced with a socialist state. The story of this dramatic shift in government and ideology represents, to me, one of the most interesting parts of history: that sometimes facts can be stranger than fiction.
    [Show full text]
  • The Property Rights to Be Reformed
    Chapter 2 The Property Rights to Be Reformed ‘‘Reform’’ makes sense only if there is a problem. Indeed, a problem did exist, and to understand it, it is important to examine the characteristics of ‘‘open fields,’’ repartition, and family tenure and to explore some of the theories of their origins. If these reflected some almost unchangeable attribute of the Russian character, then remedies such as Stolypin’s would have been naı¨ve; but the character explanation seems most unlikely. The next step is, then, to look at how these practices were likely to have inflicted serious productivity losses, and to ask why, if these losses were substantial, the peasants didn’t cure them through voluntary transactions among themselves or between individual peasants and their communes. Finally, this chapter explores some more general questions about peasants’ habits of mind, solidarity, and outlook on some of the key attributes of modernity such as law and property. Open fields ‘‘Open fields’’ mixed individual and collective ownership; while indi- vidual households owned tracts, many operations were collectively ................. 15954$ $CH2 10-09-06 08:53:25 PS PAGE 31 32 Liberal Reform in an Illiberal Regime controlled.1 In addition, each household possessed multiple, widely scattered plots. Although the two features—plot scattering and the mixture of individual and collective control—were conceptually in- dependent, they seem to have generally existed together. In mixing collective and individual control, open fields enabled farmers to use the same land for activities that were best conducted on different scales. Animals grazed over large tracts, reducing the costs of fencing and of keeping an eye on the animals.
    [Show full text]
  • The Ukrainian Weekly 1995
    INSIDE: • The public perception of economic reform in Ukraine — page 2. • Urbana conference spotlights minorities and diaspora — page 10. • Ukrainian stars on Broadway — page 1 1. 30 THE UKRAINIAN WEEKLY Published by the Ukrainian National Association Inc., a fraternal non-profit association Vol. LXIII No. 30 THE UKRAINIAN WEEKLY SUNDAY, JULY 23, 1995 $1.25/$2in Ukraine UKRAINIAN ORTHODOX PATRIARCH V0L0DYMYR DIES OBITUARY: Former political prisonerRio t police and mourners clash by Khristina Lew Citing sources close to the Cabinet of was elected UOC patriarch in 1993 Kyyiv Press Bureau ministers, Respublika reported on July 19 that President Leonid Kuchma, who was in JERSEY CITY, N.J. — Patriarch KYYIV - Riot police and participants Belarus at the time of the patriarchal funer­ Volodymyr (Vasyl Romaniuk), a politi­ of the funeral procession bearing the al, was contacted there regarding permis­ cal prisoner persecuted for his religious body of the late Patriarch Volodymyr sion for burial of the primate's earthly Romaniuk, head of the Ukrainian beliefs during decades of Soviet repres­ remains at St. Sophia Cathedral. Orthodox Church - Kyyiv Patriarchate, sion who later went on to be elected pri­ Respublika reported that the president did violently clashed twice on July 18. mate of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church not grant permission. One member of the Ukrainian National —Kyyiv Patriarchate, died in Kyyiv on Metropolitan Filaret told a press con­ Assembly - Ukrainian National Self- Friday, July 14. He was 69 years old. ference on July 19 that neither Baikiv Defense Organization, a paramilitary The patriarch's secretary, the Rev. Cemetery nor St Volodymyr Cathedral, group, was killed during a confrontation Borys, told Reuters that the cause of death the seat of the UOC - KP, are appropri­ with Berkut forces, a special detachment of was a heart attack, his third in recent years.
    [Show full text]
  • The National Emblem
    Administrative Department of the President of the Republic of Azerbaijan P R E S I D E N T I A L L I B R A R Y NATIONAL EMBLEM Contents National Emblem ........................................................................................................................... 2 The emblems of provinces ............................................................................................................ 3 The emblems of Azerbaijani cities and governorates in period of tsarist Russia ................... 4 Caspian oblast .............................................................................................................................. 4 Baku Governorate. ....................................................................................................................... 5 Elisabethpol (Ganja) Governorate ............................................................................................... 6 Irevan (Erivan) Governorate ....................................................................................................... 7 The emblems of the cities .............................................................................................................. 8 Baku .............................................................................................................................................. 8 Ganja ............................................................................................................................................. 9 Shusha .......................................................................................................................................
    [Show full text]
  • Land Redistributions and the Russian Peasant Commune in the Late-Imperial Period
    Land Redistributions and the Russian Peasant Commune in the Late-Imperial Period Steven Nafziger1 Preliminary and Incomplete Comments welcome and encouraged. Version: December, 2004 1Department of Economics, Yale University, [email protected]. This paper forms part of a larger project on the economics of rural development in Russia between 1861 and 1917. Research for this project was supported in part by the Title VIII Combined Research and Language Training Program, which is funded by the U.S. State Department and admin- istered by the American Councils for International Education: ACTR/ACCELS. The opinions expressed herein are the author’s and do not necessarily express the views of either the State Department or American Councils. Further support from the Economic History Association, the Sasakawa Foundation, Yale’s Economic Growth Center, and the Yale Center for Interna- tional and Area Studies is very much appreciated. The comments and suggestions of Tracy Dennison, Daniel Field, Timothy Guinnane, Mark Harrison, Valery Lazarev, Carol Leonard, Jason Long, Angela Micah, Carolyn Moehling, Benjamin Polak, Christopher Udry, and partic- ipants at the 2004 World Cliometric Congress, the 2004 Economic History Association meet- ings, and seminars at Yale and Harvard Universities were extremely helpful. Errors remain the exclusive property of the author. Abstract This paper investigates the motivations for, and effects of, intra-community land re- distributions by Russian peasants in the 19th century. Scholars such as Alexander Gerschenkron have emphasized that such repartitions of arable land create negative investment and innovation incentives and played a major role in hampering rural de- velopment in the period after serfdom.
    [Show full text]