708 Ch. 1 8 • The Dominant Powers in the Age of Liberalism
with the tsarist autocracy than it cared to admit. Unlike the Westernizers,
the Slavophiles celebrated the religious faith of the Russian masses,
believing that an era of social harmony and equality had existed in Russia
before Peter the Great transformed the Russian state in the late seven
teenth century by importing Western ideals and bureaucracy. “We are a
backward people,” wrote one young Slavophile, “and therein lies our salva
tion. We must... not repeat the stale old lessons of Europe.”
The Emancipation of the Serfs
The emancipation of the serfs in 1861 by Tsar Alexander 11 (ruled 1855
1881) was the most ambitious attempt at reform in Russia during the nine
teenth century. Serfdom dictated the organization of taxation, the army,
the courts, and virtually every other institution of government. Indeed, the
state had little active presence in the village—as the peasants put it, “God
is in heaven and the tsar far away.” Because landowners had a virtually
unlimited source of labor, many showed little inclination to try to increase
agricultural yields.
Alexander II, who succeeded his father Nicholas I as tsar in 1855, was
shocked by Russia’s defeat in the Crimean War. The tsar and some of his
officials began to believe that his country could not compete with the West if
the serfs were not emancipated. Despite an increase in agricultural laborers
hired for wages, Russian industrial development and effective agricultural
production required free wage labor that could be taxed. Even if some lords
had attempted to increase the productivity of their land, serfs only worked
halfheartedly—and who could blame them. Most Russian peasants still used
the wasteful three-field system (with one field left fallow each year).
Serf rebellions—more than 1,500 during the first half of the century—
periodically shook the empire. Many serfs had joined the army during the
Crimean War, believing that they would be freed upon returning home. The
flight of thousands of serfs toward the open spaces of the east, or to Crimea,
undermined the agricultural economy upon which Russia depended. As
rumors spread that the tsar, whom many peasants considered the father of his
people, would end Russia’s “peculiar institution,” peasant rebellions became
even more widespread. Intellectuals continued to denounce serfdom, as did
bureaucrats, at least in private. Tsar Alexander II told assembled landowners,
“It is better to abolish serfdom from above than to wait until serfs begin to lib
erate themselves from below.” Some nobles now believed emancipation
inevitable. In 1858, a Slavophile noble wrote the tsar that the “abolition of
the right to dispose of people like objects or cattle is as much our liberation
as theirs.”
On April 5, 1861, Russia became the last European state to abolish serf
dom. Alexander II emancipated the 22 million serfs by a proclamation
made through the Orthodox Church. For two years, however, the old sys