Konstantin Kavelin and the Struggle for Emancipation: A Case Study of the Westerners’ Role in the Foundation of Civil Society in Imperial Russia
Journal: The Carl Beck papers in Russian and East European studies
Year: 2010

This essay explores the emergence of civil society in Imperial Russia in the 1840s and 1850s through an analysis of the role of the public in the preparation for the emancipation of the serfs before the government made the commitment to manumit the serfs. To do so, the essay considers the role of the Westerners, specifically one of the leading Westerners, the legal historian Konstantin Kavelin, from archetypical abstract thinker into political activist within the circumscribed parameters of auto