Russia Sees Great Changes
The Bismarckian system was an effort to build a strong national state by combining nationalism, representative institutions, and industrial growth. In the international system that resulted, war more than ever stood as the ultimate test of the state's efficiency. The defeats of Russia in 1856, of Austria in 1859 and 1866, and of France under Napoleon III in 1870 were understood to require drastic governmental changes. In less developed countries, like Russia and Austria, however, essential reforms threatened established interests and became possible only as new compromises were worked out.
Another country that saw great changes in the twenty or so years after the Crimean War was one that largely escaped revolutionary activity and upheaval—Russia. Reforms, advances, and momentous events were driving Russia forward despite the fact that it was bypassed by widespread liberal movements and revolutionary disturbances. The Crimean War had bled Russia white; governmental coffers were exhausted; the economy in a shambles; the army was decimated, and the officer class demoralized. You will remember that Alexander II inherited much of this mess from his father Nicholas, who chose a propitious moment in 1855 to exit from this world. It took Alexander only a year to realize that the only way he could save his country—to bring it up to the standards of the rest of Europe—was by making some pretty drastic reforms. And in 1856—only a year into his reign—Alexander II issued a manifesto promising improvements in justice, education, and employment. Goals once envisaged only by Russian liberals were adopted in defeat by the Russian autocrat. The critical reform was the abolition of serfdom. Discretely but firmly the nobles were told to bring the institution to an end from above rather than to wait for its destruction from below.
Greater freedom of discussion and criticism of the regime allowed under Alexander II generated a flow of public opinion that favored emancipation of the serfs—in principle at least. The problem was how to do it without ruining the gentry and dislocating the whole economy of the country. As a system of labor, serfdom was generally recognized, even by the more conservative elements, as being unprofitable and bad. The big landowners of the south, engaged partly in export trade, were finding wage labor more efficient. Serfdom robbed workers of self-respect, initiative, and incentive. It embittered all social life. Local peasant revolts, already endemic, were becoming more frequent. Nor was it only a matter of agricultural labor, though agriculture was by far the largest occupation of the Russian people. Serfs could be used by their owners or hired out to work in mines or factories or mills, and they could even be mortgaged as security for debts or loans. Some two-thirds of the serfs not owned by the tsar or the state were, indeed, so mortgaged by 1855. They could be bought and sold, and instead of being bound to the land as had been the case in early years, they were virtually in bondage to their owners.
Months passed in silence while secret committees drafted proposals and most nobles dragged their feet. Intellectuals had argued against serfdom for generations, and economic developments—a money economy, foreign trade, new industry—had further weakened the old system. Yet landowners could always argue against taking revolutionary risks "just yet." Serfdom was finally abolished, but only in 1861, nearly five years after the Tsar had ordered his noblemen to consider the move—and then he managed to do so only by Imperial decree.