GOVERNING RUSSIA'S PROVINCES 271statute on the natives, PSZ 29,126, also issued in 1822.
As we have noted, since about the accession of Catherine II, there
had been a decisive change in the economic, social, and political condi-
tions of the natives. On the one hand there was a serious deterioration
among the primitive trappers and hunters of the far North and North-
east. On the other, an important, more positive transformation was
taking place among the advanced, socially better organized peoples
of Central and South-eastern Siberia. But as these changes had as yet not
been integrated into either the native or the Russian patterns, there
was a: great deal of disorganization and confusion. Speransky undertook
to clarify the situation and to bring order into the social and adminis-
trative relations of the natives as part of his reorganization of Siberia.
He followed in the wake of Catherine's humanitarian protectionism
of the native customs and way of life. But at the same time he favored
a synthesis between the cultural values, the economy, and social ways
of both the native and Russian populations. As point of departure he
took the fact that Siberia was already a Staatsgemeinschaft, and now
he wanted to help it on the way to a true Kulturgemeinschaft. With
such a goal in mind he devoted most attention to those natives who
could be easily integrated into the social community of Siberia, the
more advanced and economically differentiated peoples (e.g. the
Buriats).
As he had done with the Russian population, Speransky cultivated
social contacts with the natives so as to bring them closer to the
administration. He showed a keen interest in Buddhism and the Buriat
traditions and philosophies. He aided and promoted the study of
oriental languages at Irkutsk (and later St. Petersburg). Finally, he
took steps which led to a more active and positive approach to the
education for the natives, in particular among the Buriats.^1
In regard to the administration, Speransky believed that it was
mainly a question of adapting the existing agencies to the actual needs
of the situation. He based his approach on five principles: 1. divide the
natives into three categories - settled, nomads, and vagrants - according
to their way of life and basic economic character; 2. the administration
of the nomads and vagrants should be based on their old customs,
but these had to be better defined and organized; 3. local authorities
should have only general supervisory police functions, and the inter-
nal autonomy of the tribes should be left untouched; 4. the freedom
1 N. M. Iadrintsev, Sibirskie inorodtsy, ikh byt i sovremennoe polozhenie (St. Pbg.
1891), pp. 230-240 passim; Bogdanov, Ocherk istorii buriat-mongol'skogo naroda,
p. 164; F. A. Kudriavtsev, Istoriia buriat-mongal'skago naroda at XVIII v. do 60kl!
godov XIX v. (MOSCOW-Leningrad 1940) p. 219.