bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
“Contradictions at the Heart of Russian Liberalism” Pavel Miliukov's Views of Peter the Great and the Role of Personality in History as an Academic, a Politician, and an Émigré
Authors: Manchester Laurie 
Published: July 2010

AbstractLaurie Manchester examines how Pavel Miliukov, one of Russia's most renowned academicallytrained historians, prominent liberal politicians, and later émigré intellectuals, portrayed Peter the Great in his various historical works. Examining the entire corpus of Miliukov's pre- and post-revolutionary writings on the Petrine reforms, she argues that Miliukov, driven by his dismissal of or outright contempt for the peasant masses, betrayed his liberal commitment to democracy. This view of the masses remained consistent in his work, and even his shift from a largely negative to a positive view of Peter did not betray his historical methodology, which had always allowed leeway for the role of personality. Assigning a single individual a major role in historical causality was the only way Miliukov could reconcile placing a Russia he had always insisted was backward onto a Western path of development. He believed the democratic end would justify the undemocratic means.
The Question of Social Support for Collectivization
Authors: Fitzpatrick Sheila 
Published: July 2010

AbstractThere was support for the Soviet project in the Russian village (as well as opposition to it) in the 1920s. But then came collectivization, and all internal support apparently vanished – at any rate, it finds no reflection either in the historiography or in recently-published archival documents. This essay argues that support for collectivization did indeed exist in the Russian at the end of the 1920s, but that much of that support had a built-in self-liquidating mechanism once collectivization and rapid industrialization were pursued simultaneously. Peasants of “Soviet” inclinations, especially the young and the so-called bedniaks, tended to approve of the kolkhoz, but at the same time to be strongly attracted to the towns, where opportunities for work and education were opening up on an unprecedented scale. Thus, it was exactly those peasants who were most favorable to the kolkhoz who were the most likely to leave the village for the town during the period of collectivization and the First Five-Year Plan.
Socialist Impressions of Revolutionary Russia, 1920
Authors: Lindemann Albert S. 
Published: July 2010

AbstractThe response to the Bolshevik Revolution in Western Europe ranged from uncritical adulation, where Russia was viewed as a "red paradise," to bitter hostility, where the new regime was believed to be headed by mindless and heartless fanatics who were propagating fraticide and terror. Such conflicting convictions were formed without very much reliable information about revolutionary Russia, expecially after Soviet Russia left the war and was blockaded by the Allies. Expectably, the opinions that existed corresponded to political persuasion rather than copious evidence. It was not until mid-1920, after the war had ended and the blockade lifted, that westerners were able to observe revolutionary Russia in a more thorough and leisured fashion. Moreover, the Bolshevik regime had by this time assumed a more discernible character; after almost three years of rule, the Bolsheviks could more plausibly be charged with some responsibility for conditions in Russia. Of particular interest are the observations and experiences of those revolutionary western socialists who traveled to Russia at this time, representing parties or other groups that hoped in some way to link their efforts up with those of the Bolsheviks; to become, in other words, part of the communist movement, though they were uncertain what this would mean, and their relations with the Bolsheviks were still ambiguous. These socialists are particularly interesting because they were not yet committed, disciplined communists nor were they committed anticommunists, though they later became one or the other. Thus their impressions were relatively unclouded by pre-judgement or parti pris. They desired not only to observe the conditions of Russia after three years of social revolution but to meet the new rulers of Russia and to determine the prerequisites or conditions for membership in the Communist International, or Comintern, as it came to be called, which the Bolsheviks despite their blockaded isolation had established in the spring of 1919. The impressions of these early visitors can be pieced together into a fairly complete and vivid account through a variety of sources, including memoirs, diaries, stenographic accounts of public and private meetings in Russia, socialist newspaper reportage, and polemical pamphlets. Although obviously many frustrating lacunae remain, these accounts often complement one another, especially by comparing accounts from one foreign delegation to another. In this article I will concentrate on the overall impressions of western socialists as they traveled through Russia and met leading Bolsheviks. In a companion article, I will investigate the many surprises and disillusionments of these early visitors as they attempted to negotiate entry into the new International.
The Socialization of the Russian Bureaucratic Elite, 1811-1917: Life at the Tsarskoe Selo Lyceum and the School of Jurisprudence
Authors: Sinel Allen A. 
Published: July 2010

AbstractNo other European bureaucracy in the nineteenth century faced so formidable a challenge as did the Russian. Russia's territorial expanse, the backwardness and diversity of its population, the paucity of political rights, and the weakness of its local institutions all intensified the normal difficulties of governing a state. Whether the tsarist officials met this challenge successfully or not, the enormity of the problem would justify a careful study of the Russian bureaucracy. Yet, not until recently have Western scholars begun to give the imperial bureaucracy the attention it deserves and, in so doing, to redraw the one-dimensional picture too often sketched by Soviet historians and pre-revolutionary Russian liberals.1 The work is by no means finished. Even a cursory comparison with studies of the administrative systems of other European powers, like France, Great Britain, Germany, or Austria, reveals how much remains unknown about the Russian experience. So far historians have concentrated on the nature and activity of the Russian bureaucracy while generally neglecting its education and preparation. True, John Armstrong's The European Administrative Elite, an impressive comparative study of English, French, German, and Russian developments, does devote considerable space to the bureaucrat's pre-service training; but the fact that the Russian case invariably gets the briefest treatment underscores the need for further investigations into the education of the Russian governmental elite. The present paper, it is hoped, will help fill this need.
Conciliation Boards in Revolutionary Petrograd: Aspects of the Crisis of Labor-Management Relations in 1917
Authors: Hogan Heather 
Published: July 2010

AbstractIn the past several years, our understanding of the Russian Revolution of 1917 has been enriched by studies of local, grass roots organizations which arose in the wake of the February Revolution and responded to the specific needs of their initiators. Studies of the raionnye sovety and factory militias, for example, have closely examined popular institutions which reflect in microcosm the larger issues and conflicts underlying the question of national reconstruction.1 By focusing on events "from below" we have gained a clearer understanding of the constraints within which the Provisional Government and Petrograd Soviet operated and the reasons for the widening gap between effective policy formulation and its execution. The conciliation boards (primiritel'nye kamery) provide a similarly productive area of investigation by illustrating some of the critical problems of labor-management relations, particularly the conflict over the dismissal of administrative personnel in the metal working industry of the capital. This issue is, admittedly, a small aspect of labor-management conflict in the revolutionary period, but one that is richly suggestive of the depth and contours of social conflict within the factories and the difficulty of finding institutional mechanisms for its resolution, even in the initial "peaceful" phase of revolutionary development. The dismissal of administrative personnel was an issue that dominated the proceedings of the local boards and in many ways influenced their further development.
The Socialist Revolutionaries From 1902 To 1907: Peasant and Workers' Party
Authors: Melancon Michael 
Published: July 2010

AbstractTradition has long held that the Socialist Revolutionary Party (PSR) was primarily peasant-oriented. Titles of important studies of the party suggest that the respective authors adhere to-the traditional view.1 Awareness of Socialist Revolutionary. (SR) successes among the peasantry in 1917, culminating in their sweep of provincial Russia in the Constituent Assembly elections in November, has heightened the perception of the SRs as a predominantly peasant party. Whatever the origin of the misapprehension, primary sources indicate that along with their interest in the peasantry (at times intense, at other times surprisingly muted) SRs took a great interest in the urban proletariat and, in return, received strong support from workers. The primary task of this study, then, is to examine the relationship between SRs and urban workers from about 1902 to 1907.2 This of course raises the question of SR and populist revolutionary programs before 1902.
The Sedimentary Society
Authors: Rieber Alfred J. 
Published: July 2010

AbstractThe great historian V. O. Kliuchevskii found the key to Russian society in the relative simplicity of its social forms in comparison with Western Europe. But in writing his magisterial Course in Russian History he revealed a degree of complexity that belied his disarming formula. The apparent contradiction stems from the standard of comparison. There were elements of complexity in Russian society that had no counterparts in the experience of the West. Moreover, the definition of society in nineteenth-century social history may have been too confining. If we make the effort to explore the unique features of Russian history and at the same time expand the boundaries of social history, we may arrive at a more comprehensive picture of Russia's social structure on the eve of revolution.
Chekhov Vs. Gor'Kii and the Moscow Arts Theater
Authors: Linden Anna L. 
Published: July 2010

AbstractFor most of the twentieth century readers have been wondering how the version of A. P. Chekhov's famous play The Cherry Orchard could be subtitled "A Comedy." Unknown until now is the fact that Chekhov's manuscript was rewritten by the directors of the Moscow Arts Theater for a combination of political, aesthetic, and commercial reasons. This has been unknown until now because A. M. Gor'kii simultaneously wrote a competing play The Summer-Tenants which failed almost completely. Out of loyalty to Gor'kii's memory, Soviet scholarship for over seven decades concealed the true story of The Cherry Orchard.
Swimming With the Current
Authors: Fisher Ralph T. 
Published: July 2010

AbstractHaving accepted Richard Hellie's flattering invitation to prepare an "old geezer's memoir" for this journal, I read with special fascination those contributed in 1988-90 by Sam Baron, Bob Byrnes, Nick Riasanovsky, and Don Treadgold. They bear out what Horace Lunt said in the Summer 1987 Slavic Review: The story of the Slavic field in North America since World War II is complex as well as important, and those who know about various parts of it should publish their recollections while they can. Even we old-timers sometimes need to be reminded how much we depend today on structures that are new since we began our own professional lives: big centers of Russian studies and big libraries to back them up; foundations that care about our field; the USDE's Title VI and the State Department's Title VIII programs; the AAASS and its affiliates with their conventions; the NEH; NCSEER, IREX, the Kennan Institute; vital tools like the CDSP, ABSEES, and guides to archives; and Radio Liberty, the CIA, and other govemment and non-government agencies doing important research and publication in our field. My assignment here is to tell my own story, with particular attention to one of those teaching and research institutions in which I have had a hand: the University of Illinois's Russian and East European Center and its affiliated Slavic and East European Library, in the prairie towns of Champaign and Urbana. I hope to convey what I experienced as someone who in youth did not-unlike some of my colleagues-seem to be pointed toward academic life, but was swept along in directions he did not foresee.
The Role of Forests in Witte's Industrialization Drive
Authors: Tomoff Kiril 
Published: July 2010

AbstractRussia's forests played a crucial role in the industrialization drive that Minister of Finance Sergei Witte led beginning in 1892. While most histories of Imperial Russian industrialization understandably concentrate on heavy industry, railroads, and coal, the main focii of Witte's industrial policy and rhetoric,1 this essay argues that forests contributed crucial sources of income and industrial fuel for Witte's campaign while providing the material for the expansion of a distinct forest industrial sector. The forest income of the Ministry of State Domains became a growing source of revenue for a government that needed all the money it could get as it financed railroad construction to propel heavy industry through a period of rapid growth. Forests also provided charcoal and fuel wood for industrial and non-industrial consumption throughout the 1890s. Wood provided all or most of the fuel for Urals metallurgy, the textile industry, still Russia's largest, and a growing forest industrial sector. Forests even helped satisfy the fuel demands of the showcase areas of rapid industrialization, the railroads and southern metallurgy. This essay demonstrates that the rate at which timber was being felled outstripped forest exports and population growth. It argues that industrial consumption of wood fuel, including charcoal, spurred the development of a timber industry which was to remain in place to satisfy the steep increase in forest exports during the second industrialization spurt before 1914. Forests' importance to Russia's industrialization should not be ignored.
Narratives of Appeal and the Appeal of Narratives: Labor Discipline and Its Contestation in the Early Soviet Period1
Authors: Siegelbaum Lewis H. 
Published: July 2010

Abstract"The verdict of the court [of the Union of Soviet Employees of 8.6.21] that I left service as a cleaner at the Lomonosov Technical Institute without receiving the permission of the administration and that I should again work there for eight hours a day is unjust." So begins Anna Matveevna Malomakhova's brief appeal to the Moscow Provincial Council of Trade Unions. Malomakhova, a forty-three-year old "sick woman"-with a medical certificate testifying to her condition-complained that she and other cleaners had been ordered by Shkil2; the building superintendent, to work not eight but twelve hours, engaging in "back-breaking (neposil'nyi), unjust work, or more accurately, illegal exploitation ... evidently because his wife is employed as a cleaner receiving wages and benefits but has never worked even one hour." Her repeated appeals to the rector of the Institute produced no results except that the matter was turned over to Shkil'.2 Having blamed her boss, Malomakhova felt compelled to add that her request to leave service in February had been approved (by Shkil'?), but only on condition that she vacate her apartment and give up her food rations. Then, on 15 March, she stayed away from work "to do laundry at home," whereupon she was given notice of her dismissal as of 1 April. Twice thereafter, the trade union committee ordered her to vacate her apartment but "this I cannot do as it is not easy to find apartments." At this point, she returns to the denunciatory mode, asserting that "[T]his is all the result of Shkil' having it in for me because unlike others, I will not keep quiet about his wife receiving maintenance even though she does not work."
A Perfect Match : Women and Schoolteaching in Tobol'Sk Guberniia, 1870-1914
Authors: Young Nicole 
Published: July 2010

AbstractTobol'sk Gubemiia may be distinguished from all other provinces of the Russian Empire by the unique role of female schoolteachers in its educational development. There is no question that they played a significantly greater role in the teaching profession in Tobol'sk Gubemiia after 1870, and hence in the development of primary education, than did their colleagues in European Russia. It is generally accepted by most historians of education that the inclusion of women in the teaching profession was essential for the successful development of primary schooling.1 In this article I examine the conditions that enabled them to assume a more important position in Tobol'sk educational affairs than elsewhere in the Russian Empiie, as well as how this expanded role influenced the emerging school system. In order to do so, it is necessary to examine the position of female schoolteachers in Tobol'sk classrooms, as well as the training they received. Their effect on girls' education will also be investigated, in particular, how the presence of women influenced the number of female students attending Tobol'sk primary schools. This is an important question, because these girls would become the next generation of primary schoolteachers. Indeed, the unique position of women in Siberia can be under
East Meets West: A Cross-Generational Analysis of Jewish Immigration from Russia to the United States
Authors: Katz Polina , Katz Naum 
Published: July 2010

AbstractThe article is comparative analysis of two waves of Russian Jewish immigration to the United States. It based on archival documents and sociological studied that were conducted in Pittsburgh. The authors replicated the sociological conducted in 1968 with a new group of immigrants and compared the results focusing primarily on the areas of adaptation, assimilation, and religious observance as well as other experiences in becoming part of what is known as the American “melting pot”.
Soviet Foreign Policy Factionalism Under Stalin?: A Case Study of the Inevitability of War Controversy
Authors: Marantz Paul 
Published: July 2010

AbstractThere has been a great deal of controversy among Western scholars concerning the direction of Soviet foreign policy in the final years and months of Stalin's rule.1 One of the crucial questions at issue is whether or not there were significant divisions of opinion within the Politburo over foreign policy matters. This article attempts to explore this particular question through an examination of a doctrinal controversy that surfaced during Stalin's last years. In one of his most famous works, Imperialism: The Highest State of Capitalism, Lenin argued that war was an inevitable concomitant of the capitalist system. He contended that the unending struggle for markets meant that periodic wars among the capitalist powers were unavoidable and inevitable.2 Stalin adhered to this view throughout his long reign, and it was not until three years after Stalin's death, in Khruschchev's speech to the Twentieth Party Congress, that it was finally revised. Yet despite Stalin's strict adherence to the Leninist analysis of imperialism, and despite the harsh discipline that characterized his rule, there is evidence that the official interpretation was being publicly questioned even while Stalin was still alive. Given the nature of esoteric communication in the Soviet Union,and the close connection between doctrinal and policy debates, an examination of the controversy concerning the inevitability of war can provide important evidence having a direct bearing upon our understanding of this period.3
The Soviet Perception of American Goals in Vietnam 1966-70
Authors: Papp Daniel S. 
Published: July 2010

AbstractAmerican objectives in Vietnam have long been a source of considerable confusion to most Americans. Even the publication of the Pentagon Papers did little to clarify American goals in Vietnam. While it was clear that the intent of American involvement was some combination of containment of Communism, defense of an ally, and protection of trading lanes or resource areas,1 many unknowns still existed. What "brand" of Communism was being contained? How reliable was the ally the United States was defending? How important were the trading lanes or resource areas being protected, and were they even being threatened ? These and similar other uncertainties lay at the heart of the answer to the question "What were American goals in Vietnam?" Today, more than two years after the Republic of Vietnam succumbed to the Democratic Republic of Vietnam, these uncertainties still exist. However, as is so often the case, a nation's objectives appear much more complicated to intimate observers than to distant observers.2 While Americans debated the objectives of U.S. intervention, American allies and enemies had in many instances already arrived at conclusions about U.S. objectives. This was particularly true of the Soviet Union. To the Soviet leadership, U.S. policy toward Vietnam emanated from the alleged imperialist nature of American society itself. The Soviet perception of American goals in Vietnam was thus relatively stable throughout the height of the American involvement, and American policies toward the Southeast Asian area were continually interpreted in light of a relatively unchanging objective. The "Johnson Doctrine," "Asian Doctrine," and "Nixon Doctrine" were all viewed as different manifestations of American "neo-colonialism." This essay will examine the Soviet perception of American objectives in Vietnam during and immediately after the height of U.S. involvement in Vietnam (1966-70), explore the reasons the Soviet Union adopted the perceptions it did, and examine the effects of those perceptions on Soviet policy.
On Critical Compassion in the Historical Judgment of Stalin
Authors: Alker Hayward R. 
Published: July 2010

AbstractI write my comments on Von Laue's encomium to Stalin's "Tragic greatness" not as a specialist in Soviet affairs but as someone primarily concerned with humanizing the practice and possibilities of contemporary world politics. In reacting to his essay, first let me applaud Von Laue's effort to convey a "compassionate understanding" of Stalin's evil "greatness." Secondly, I shall comment critically on his standards for judging, or refraining from judging, Stalin's political greatness and moral responsibility. Thirdly, I shall address certain issues which these views raise when reapplied to the contemporary Soviet-American foreign policy context from which they originate.