Stolypin's reforms (briefly)
Stolypin carried out his reforms from 1906, when he was appointed prime minister until his death on September 5, which came from the bullets of assassins.
Agrarian reform
The main goal of Stolypin's agrarian reform was to create a wide stratum of rich peasants. Unlike the 1861 reform, the emphasis was on the sole proprietor rather than the community. The former, communal form fettered the initiative of the hard-working peasants, but now, freed from the community and not looking back at the "poor and drunk," they could dramatically increase the efficiency of their management. The law of 06/14/1910 stated that from now on "every householder who owns allotment land on the basis of communal law can at any time demand that he be strengthened as his personal property, a part of the aforementioned land due to him." Stolypin believed that the well-to-do peasantry would become the real support of the autocracy. An important part of the Stolypin agrarian reform was the activities of the credit bank. This institution sold land to peasants on credit, either state owned or purchased from landowners. Moreover, the interest rate on loans for independent peasants was half that for communities. Through the credit bank, the peasants acquired in 1905-1914. about 9 and a half million hectares of land. However, at the same time, the measures against defaulters were tough: the land was taken away from them and again went on sale. Thus, the reforms not only made it possible to acquire land, but also encouraged people to actively work on it. Another important part of Stolypin's reform was the resettlement of peasants to vacant land. A bill prepared by the government provided for the transfer of state lands in Siberia to private hands without redemption. However, there were also difficulties: there was not enough money or land surveyors to carry out land surveying work. But despite this, resettlement to Siberia, as well as the Far East, Central Asia and the North Caucasus was gaining momentum. Moving was free, and specially equipped "Stolypin" carriages made it possible to transport railroad livestock. The state tried to equip the life at the places of resettlement: schools, medical centers, etc. were built.
A farm is a peasant farm separate from the village. Cut - different sections combined into one. At the same time, the peasant owner remained to live in the village.
Zemstvo
As a supporter of the zemstvo administration, Stolypin extended zemstvo institutions to some provinces where they had not previously existed. It was not always politically easy. For example, the implementation of the zemstvo reform in the western provinces, historically dependent on the gentry, was approved by the Duma, which supported the improvement of the situation of the Belarusian and Russian population, which constituted the majority in these territories, but met with a sharp rebuff in the State Council, which supported the gentry.
Industry reform
The main stage in the solution of the working question during Stolypin's premiership was the work of the Special Conference in 1906 and 1907, which prepared ten bills affecting the main aspects of labor at industrial enterprises. These were questions about the rules for hiring workers, insurance of accidents and illnesses, working hours, etc. Unfortunately, the positions of industrialists and workers (as well as those who incited the latter to disobedience and rebellion) were too far from each other and the compromises found did not suit either one or the other (which was readily used by all kinds of revolutionaries).
National question
Stolypin perfectly understood the importance of this issue in such a multinational country as Russia. He was a supporter of unification, not disunity of the peoples of the country. He proposed creating a special ministry of nationalities, which would study the characteristics of each nation: history, traditions, culture, social life, religion, etc. - so that the greatest mutual benefit they pour into our great power. Stolypin believed that all peoples should have equal rights and obligations and be loyal to Russia. Also, the task of the new ministry was to be to counteract the country's internal and external enemies, who sought to sow ethnic and religious strife.
researchers call the reasons for the incompleteness and inconsistency of the Stolypin agrarian reform:
1) The agrarian reform was actually carried out for only 8 years and actually stopped in 1914 with the outbreak of World War I, in which Russia took part. Agrarian transformations in Russia turned out to be limited in time
2) The pace of reform was constrained by strong, well-established communal traditions and the entrenched communal way of life in the Russian countryside. Many peasants found it difficult to break with their community and start running their own individual farm. A significant part of the communal peasantry not only did not accept this reform, but also opposed it. ... In the prevailing situation for the government, often the only way to carry out reform was by violence against a large part of the peasantry. The specific methods of violence were very diverse - from intimidating rural gatherings to drafting fictitious contracts, from canceling the decisions of gatherings by the zemstvo chief to making decisions by county land management commissions on the allocation of householders to obtain "consent" from gatherings to expelling opponents of the division. That is, the government was forced by the emerging situation to apply authoritarian methods when carrying out reforms.
3) Opposition (hidden and explicit) to Stolypin's reformist course on the part of the extremely conservative part of the ruling circles of Russia. This was expressed in constant conflicts with the conservative State Council. Emperor Nicholas II often took an hesitant and even hostile and restrained position regarding the political events held by Peter Arkadyevich. The influential courtier Trepov actively opposed Stolypin. G. Rasputin, the favorite of the royal family, was “unfriendly” towards the reformer.
4) On the other hand, State Duma deputies often obstructed the adoption of Stolypin's reform laws. He had to constantly fight with his political opponents within the walls of the Duma. As a result, in 1911 Stolypin was shot dead in Kiev by the terrorist Bogrov. Thus, the reform lost its main guide in government circles.
A set of broad measures carried out the Russian government under the leadership of Prime Minister P.A. Stolypin (1906-1911) and touched upon various areas of Russian life.
Pyotr Arkadyevich Stolypin came to power in the midst of the revolution. In April 1906, he was appointed Minister of the Interior in the government of I.L. Goremykin. On July 8 of the same year, on the day of the dissolution of the First State Duma (or inspired), Stolypin replaced Goremykin as chairman of the Council of Ministers, thus heading the government Russian Empire... Prior to his high appointment, Stolypin was governor for several years - in 1902 in the Grodno province, since 1903 in the Saratov province - and had a fairly good idea of \u200b\u200bthe state of affairs in the country and had his own program of action. In particular, he was sincerely convinced of the need for the most serious reforms, especially in the agrarian sphere, but believed that they could be carried out only by suppressing the revolution. In general, his position was well expressed by the phrase: "First, calm, then reforms."
June 3rd political system
Stolypin fought the revolution completely mercilessly and by the middle of 1907 had achieved "pacification". He marked this success by revising the electoral law to the State Duma, which can be regarded as the beginning of a consistent policy of reforms (although Stolypin was also not going to give up repressive measures aimed at maintaining order). The fact is that, unlike many other representatives of the authorities, Stolypin was convinced of the need to preserve the Duma with legislative functions defined by the famous Manifesto signed by Nicholas II on October 17, 1905. The head of government saw its existence as a serious factor of stabilization, a means that distracts the masses from striving to change the existing order in a revolutionary way. At the same time, the First and Second Duma, elected on the basis of the electoral law given at the height of the revolution, were democratic, oppositional in nature: they had many representatives of the peasantry, on the one hand, and representatives of the liberal intelligentsia, on the other. Both of these thoughts were equally opposed to the authorities and did not calm down, but agitated the country. Stolypin, on the other hand, sought to create an obedient thought, which he managed to do with the help of the new electoral law, approved by the tsar on June 3, 1907 (one of Stolypin's closest associates, S.E. Kryzhanovsky, played a decisive role in its development).
In the new, III The State Duma a balance was reached between reaction and opposition. The rightists, the Black Hundreds, who made up about a third of the Duma, unconditionally supported any measures of a repressive nature, strongly opposing the reforms. Another third - the liberals, represented primarily by the Cadet faction, on the contrary, supported the reforms, while trying to soften the repressive policy. With such a sharp confrontation between the two sides, the decisive role was played by the "third force" - the Octobrist faction, which unconditionally supported Stolypin. Thus, an "Octobrist pendulum" was constructed: the members of this faction voted sometimes together with the liberals, sometimes with the Black Hundreds, securing the necessary majority, allowing Stolypin to legally carry out reforms, while maintaining a fairly strict order.
Agrarian reform
While developing projects for his reforms, Stolypin, obviously, pursued one main goal. A convinced monarchist, he strove to strengthen the autocratic system as much as possible, while recognizing the need for inevitable "concessions to the times." Meanwhile, the revolution of 1905-1907 clearly showed that the autocracy is losing its social support. The local nobility, which for the most part always unconditionally supported the autocratic power, became impoverished and ruined. Being himself a nobleman and landowner, Stolypin was by no means going to refuse to cooperate with this social stratum and leave it to the mercy of fate. To prove this, he constantly declared that the landlord's land property, on the confiscation of which the left parties insisted, "is sacred and inviolable." At the same time, it was quite obvious that the government could not rely only on the landlords. Another social stratum - the communal peasantry, which in government circles are accustomed to perceive as a single whole, unconditionally loyal to the throne - this peasantry literally revolutionized before our eyes, seizing landlord lands and setting fire to estates. Stolypin saw the only way out in this catastrophic situation in the destruction of the community. He tried with all his might to single out and strengthen that layer of relatively wealthy peasants, which had already begun to form in the community, despite the unfavorable conditions. Thus, Stolypin hoped to create another reliable support for the autocracy. Refusing at the same time to even discuss the issue of confiscating the landowners' lands, Stolypin could provide certain prospects for the new social stratum only at the expense of the rest of the peasantry. In his usual harsh manner, the head of government defined his priorities in one of the Duma speeches: "... The main thing that is necessary when we write a law for the whole country is to keep in mind the reasonable and the strong, not the weak and drunk."
Stolypin took the first step in the right direction even before the "pacification": on November 9, 1906, a decree was issued that allowed the peasant to leave the community at will, securing the personal property of the piece of land that he used for the last redistribution. The process went on and on until 1917. In total, about 3 million householders left the community, which was about 30% of the total number of peasants in those provinces where the reform was being carried out. Accordingly, about 22% of the land was withdrawn from the communal turnover. It should be borne in mind that the community collapsed from two ends: not only potentially "strong owners" emerged from it, but also to an even greater extent the poorest peasants who sought to "change their fate" - to go to the city or move to new places. Having secured the land for themselves, they almost immediately sold it, along with their working cattle, implements and simple belongings. Some part of the poor lands and property was returned to the community; but, as a rule, all this was acquired by the same "strong owners" who, thus, further increased their wealth. Ultimately, on January 1, 1917, farms organized on the basis of personal property accounted for 10.5% of all peasant farms.
However, Stolypin himself believed that "strengthening the areas is only half the battle, even just the beginning of the business ...". He had in mind the fact that the communal economy was characterized by overlap: distributing communal land among themselves, the peasants sought to observe justice not only in relation to its quantity, but also to its quality. This led to the fact that one and the same owner could have in use up to ten or more small plots of land - strips located in different places. Leaving the community, he, naturally, assigned all these strips to ownership. From Stolypin's point of view, it was necessary to bring them together by dividing the communal lands into separate farms, completely independent from each other. For this purpose, on October 16, 1908, the "Provisional Regulations for the Granting of Allotment Land to One Place" were issued. The ideal type of ownership in them was proclaimed a farm in which land, a peasant estate and other land were brought together into a single whole. In the case - very common - when it was technically impossible to open up the entire communal land for a farm, a cut was recommended, when all arable land assigned to the peasant was also reduced to one place, but was "at some distance from the estate." Unlike the decree on November 9, the Provisional Rules were implemented with great difficulty: farms in Russia did not take root well - for a number of reasons, both purely economic and psychological. A significant part of the peasants, having secured their own strips, was limited to this.
In order to push the peasants to create independent farms, Stolypin sharply intensified the activities of the Peasant Bank, created back in 1883. For a long time, the bank gave loans to peasants-community members for the purchase of land at a fairly high interest rate; the peasants went to this operation without much desire. Now the bank began to act differently: in 1906, it began a massive purchase of landowners' lands. Stolypin's position on this issue was extremely clear: he did not intend to confiscate the landowners' lands, but if the owners themselves, for one reason or another, sold them, then the state went to help the peasants and, above all, the wealthy, buy them. Having received at its disposal a huge land fund - in 1906-1907 alone, he bought about 2.7 million acres of land from landlords - the bank split these lands into separate plots and sold them to peasants on preferential terms, providing significant loans. At the same time, the creation of precisely cut and, especially, farmsteads was encouraged in every possible way. So, if from rural societies when they bought land they required significant sums of money, then the otrubniks had to immediately pay only 5% of the cost, and the farmers were given a loan in the amount of the entire value of the land and for a sufficiently long period. And yet, farmsteads were created by the Russian peasantry reluctantly and in small numbers.
If the first two measures - free withdrawal from the community and the activities of the Peasant Bank - were clearly aimed at supporting wealthy peasants - "reasonable and strong" - then resettlement was offered to the "weak and drunk". It should be recognized, however, that Stolypin's resettlement policy was incomparably more organized and consistent than his predecessors. Already in 1906, the Resettlement Administration began to play a very important role in the structures involved in the implementation and preparation of the agrarian reform. It was occupied, first of all, by the fact that it was looking for territories in Siberia suitable for agriculture. These territories were then distributed between the provinces of the European part of Russia - each of them received a certain amount of land in different regions of Siberia. The peasants of this or that province, who wanted to resettle, chose walkers from among their midst, who were given the opportunity to get acquainted with certain Siberian lands at public expense. According to the walkers, the peasants made their choice, after which whole parties of immigrants were sent along the corresponding route. At the same time, the government sought to facilitate the very process of resettlement - in Russian conditions it is usually extremely difficult and exhausting. The peasants were transported by rail at the lowest tariff; at the same time, a relatively comfortable type of car was developed especially for the migrants - they had never dreamed of anything like it before. To this it must be added that the peasants received the land for free; if this land was in the taiga zone, then they were also entitled to a loan of 300 rubles.
And yet it was precisely in this area - the resettlement policy - that it became clear that the agrarian reform, while solving some problems, gives rise to others. A significant part of the peasants who left for Siberia faced such difficulties there, which were beyond their strength to cope with. After all, only the poor left for Siberia, who had nothing but their own hands and hungry wives and children. Raising virgin soil and even alone - land in Siberia was provided to settlers, of course, as personal property - it was very difficult for such peasants. Especially if the land was provided to them in the taiga zone - here the loan did not help either. Not all peasants have coped with the cultivation of virgin lands in other, more fertile regions. Many of them were forced to abandon the virgin lands allocated to them, renting more or less well-maintained land from local old-timers or hiring them as farm laborers. All this led to the fact that many peasants, having lost hope of establishing their individual farming in Siberia, began to return to European Russia, "in the ashes." If at first there were relatively few such peasants, then since 1910 their flow has increased sharply. In total, in 1910-1916, about 30% of all peasants who went to Siberia at one time followed the return route. These "return migrants", desperate, embittered, having lost even what little they had, have become another explosive element of Russian life. And in general, Stolypin's hopes to strengthen the autocratic system with the help of the agrarian reform turned out to be unrealizable. The transformations he carried out undoubtedly contributed to the formation of a layer of wealthy peasants; but as subsequent events showed, the "strong masters" were completely unwilling to support the tsarist power.
Unimplemented reforms
It should be noted that Stolypin understood quite well that the new social stratum, which he so stubbornly tried to form, could not be placed in power by measures of an exclusively economic nature (and even if landed estates). Stolypin's government also conceived serious transformations in the field of local government, in the field of education, which were supposed to convince the "strong masters" that the government sincerely stretches out a hand to them. If the reform of education, which was supposed to make it easier for children of peasants to access all levels of education, was under development, then the reform of local government was, in fact, prepared and was only waiting for legislative confirmation. The meaning of this reform was, first of all, to force the local nobility, which under Alexandre III received almost complete control over the management of the peasants (through the zemstvo chiefs), to cooperate with the wealthy peasantry. In the course of this reform, it was supposed, first of all, to transform the volost, including in this small administrative-territorial unit not only peasant lands, as before, but also landlord estates. Management in the parish passed into the jurisdiction of the parish zemstvo, which was elected on the basis of a moderate property qualification; accordingly, it should have included both landlords and individual peasants. It was this body, in which local and peasant owners sat at the same table, that had to solve local problems. The administrative center was transferred to the county; the district chief who headed it was appointed by the government. As for the governors, freeing them from the mass of small current affairs, the Stolypin project provided them with the opportunity to fully strategically manage the province, coordinate the actions of the district administration. At the same time, Stolypin proposed to take a whole range of measures that were supposed to tear the governors away from the court circles and the camarilla, whose henchmen they were all too often, unconditionally subordinating them to the government.
This project caused an extremely negative attitude in the noble environment. If the noble landowners reacted to the agrarian reform with a rather restrained attitude, since it did not directly affect their interests, then the local reform, even at the project level, sharply restored the defenders of the noble "rights and privileges" against Stolypin. The head of government began to be publicly accused of “destroying the estate and democratizing the local way of life,” destroying the historically established - that is, pro-noble - system of government. Nicholas II, who was beginning to feel more and more burdened by his energetic and, as it seemed to him, overly independent prime minister, was inclined to listen to these accusations. In 1911, persistent rumors began to circulate in court circles about the imminent resignation of Stolypin. However, the question was decided differently: on September 1, 1911, this remarkable in many respects statesman was killed by a terrorist. Its reforms remained unfinished.
Municipal educational institution medium comprehensive school the village of Novostroevo, Ozersky District, Kaliningrad Region
The reforms of P.A. Stolypin.
Work completed
11th grade student
MOU SOSH pos. Novostroevo
Avagimyan Yulia
Head: Mosina Galina
Alexandrovna,
a history teacher
1. Introduction 3
2. Main part 4
2.1 Agrarian reform 5
2.2 Education reform 10
2.3 Military reform 12
3. Conclusion 14
4. Used literature 16
Introduction.
“Homeland demands service to itself
so sacrificially honest
that the slightest thought of a personal
benefit darkens the soul and steam-
lizes his work "
P.A. Stolypin
Each nation nominates from its midst the most prominent representatives, whose fates are inextricably linked with its fate, personify the most important, joyful or tragic stages. At the turn of the millennium, against the background of our Russian losses, the tragic appearance of the Russian reformer, Pyotr Arkadyevich Stolypin, is becoming more and more significant.
Looking into the face of a man whose name is Pyotr Arkadyevich Stolypin, it is clear that his features radiate intelligence, strength, will, dignity. This was recognized by everyone: both his associates and obvious enemies. Some called Peter Arkadievich the savior of the Motherland, the support of the Fatherland, the hope of Russia in times of troubles, others - the executioner.
Statesman and politician P.A. Stolypin was a deeply Orthodox person, but along with the Christian humility, deep faith in the Savior, a staunch warrior lived in him, the defender of the Russian Land, ready for her sake to take up the sword in order to stand to the end
The "Name of Russia" program was recently completed. Stolypin P.A. took 2nd place. I had questions: “Who was the great Russian reformer after all? What is the most important thing in his work? What was he aiming for? What did he manage to do? "
In my work, I tried to answer these questions.
2.The main part
P.A. Stolypin's reforms
Petr Arkadievich's reforms affected all key spheres of the country's life. The task was to carry out systemic reforms, the semantic core of which was the formation of the initial institutions of the rule of law and civil society. The following main directions of the reformatory policy of the Stolypin government can be distinguished:
Military reform
Land (Agrarian) Reform
Education, science and culture
Stolypin's strategic goals domestic policy were not in land management. Reform cannot be the goal. Both the agrarian reform and the modernization of the economy are all means. What is the purpose? The goal was to preserve the country and not lose in the global competition without losing centuries-old traditions.
The innovation of P.A. Stolypin as a reformer was that he pursued a policy of consistent modernization of all political and social institutions of the Russian Empire.
2.1 Agrarian reform
Stolypin, being a landowner, the leader of the provincial nobility,
knew and understood the interests of the landlords; in the post of governor during the revolution saw the insurgent peasants, so for him the agrarian question was not an abstract concept.
The agrarian reform was Stolypin's main and favorite brainchild. Goals
the reform had several: socio-political - create in the village
a solid support for the autocracy from strong owners, splitting them from
the bulk of the peasantry and opposing them to it; strong farms
should have become an obstacle to the growth of revolution in the countryside;
socio-economic - to destroy the community, to plant private farms in the form of cuts and farms, and send the surplus of labor to the city, where it will be swallowed up by the growing industry; economic - provide lifting agriculture and further industrialization of the country in order to close the gap with the advanced powers.
The first step in this direction was taken in 1861. Then the agrarian question was solved at the expense of the peasants, who paid the landowners for the land and for freedom. The agrarian legislation of 1906-1910 was
second step, with the government to consolidate its power and
the power of the landowners, again tried to solve the agrarian question at the expense of
peasantry.
of the year. This decree was the main work of Stolypin's life. It was a symbol of faith, great and last hope, obsession, its present and future
Great if the reform succeeds; catastrophic if failure awaits her, and Stolypin was aware of this.
1908, i.e. two years after he entered life. The decree was discussed for more than six months.
entered for discussion by the State Council and was also adopted,
after which, by the date of his approval, the king began to be called law 14
june 1910. In its content, it was, of course, liberal
bourgeois law promoting the development of capitalism in the countryside and,
hence progressive.
The decree introduced extremely important changes in the land tenure of the peasants. All peasants received the right to leave the community, which in this case allocated land to the person who was leaving for their own possession. Moreover, the decree
provided for privileges for wealthy peasants in order to induce them
to leave the community. In particular, those who left the community received "in the ownership of individual householders" all the lands "in its permanent use." This meant that people from the community received surpluses in excess of the per capita norm. Moreover, if no redistributions were made in a given community over the past 24 years, then the householder received the surplus free of charge, if there were redistributions, then he paid the community for the surplus at the redemption prices of 1861. Since prices have increased several times over 40 years, this was also beneficial to wealthy people.
Communities in which, since the transition of the peasants to the ransom, there have been no
redistributions, were recognized as mechanically transferred to the private property of individual householders. For the legal registration of ownership of their land, the peasants of such communities, it was enough to submit an application to the land management commission, which executed documents for the property of the householder actually in their possession. In addition to this provision, the law differed from the decree in some simplification of the procedure for leaving the community.
In 1906, the "Provisional Regulations" on land management were adopted.
Land management commissions created on the basis of this law,
the right was given in the course of the general land management of communities to allocate
efficient householders without the consent of the gathering, at their discretion, if
the mission was of the opinion that such a delineation did not affect the interests of the community.
The commissions also had the final say in defining land disputes. This right opened the way for the arbitrariness of the commissions.
In 1906-1907. by decrees of the tsar, some of the state and
specific land was transferred to the Peasant Bank for sale to peasants in order to weaken the land tightness. In fact, this land was bought mainly by kulaks, who thus received additional opportunities for expanding the economy.
The Stolypin government also introduced a series of new laws on the resettlement of peasants to the outskirts. The possibilities for the wide development of resettlement were laid down in the law of June 6, 1904. This law introduced freedom
resettlement without privileges, and the government was given the right to make decisions on the opening of free privileged resettlement from certain areas of the empire, "eviction from which was recognized as particularly desirable."
For the first time, the law on privileged resettlement was applied in 1905: the government "opened" resettlement from the Poltava and Kharkov provinces, where the peasant movement was especially wide.
In general, the series of laws of 1906-1912. was of a bourgeois character.
The medieval allotment land tenure of peasants was abolished, the withdrawal from the community, the sale of land, free resettlement to cities and the outskirts were allowed, redemption payments, corporal punishment, and some legal restrictions were abolished.
Simultaneously with the issuance of new agrarian laws, the government is taking measures to violently destroy the community, not fully relying on economic factors. Immediately after November 9, 1906, the entire state apparatus is set in motion by issuing the most categorical circulars and orders, as well as by repressions against those who are not too energetically implementing them.
The practice of the reform showed that the peasantry in its mass was
opposed to being separated from the community - at least in most
localities. A survey of the mood of the peasants by the Free Economic Society showed that in the central provinces the peasants
belonged to the isolation from the community (89 negative indicators in the questionnaires
against 7 positive). Many peasant correspondents wrote,
In this situation, the only way for the government
carrying out the reform was the way of violence against the main mass of peasant women.
The specific methods of violence were very diverse - from intimidation
rural gatherings to the preparation of fictitious sentences, from the cancellation of decisions
Stolypin Pyotr Arkadievich, 2 (14) April 1862 - 5 (18 September) 1911, - the largest Russian reformer, head of government in 1906-1911. According to A. I. Solzhenitsyn - the greatest figure russian history XX century.
Stolypin's opinion on the peasant community
Pyotr Arkadievich Stolypin came from a noble family. He graduated from St. Petersburg University and began civil service in the department of agriculture. In 1902 Stolypin became the youngest governor of Russia (Grodno). From February 1903 he was the governor of Saratov and after the beginning of bloody revolutionary unrest in 1905 he bravely fought against anarchy, having survived several assassination attempts.
The tsar, who did not understand the scale of Stolypin's personality and reforms, did not change the festive program of celebrations after the shooting on September 1, did not meet with the wounded in the hospital in his last days and did not stay for his funeral, having left for rest in Crimea. The court circle was glad that an inconvenient figure had left the stage, who was interfering with all his energy and talents. The officials of the pygmies did not realize that together with Stolypin the most reliable support of the Russian state and the throne had disappeared. According to the figurative expression of A.I.Solzhenitsyn (Red Wheel, Chapter 65), Bogrov's bullets became the first of Yekaterinburg (this is about shooting in Yekaterinburg of the royal family).
With the agrarian reform of the early XX century. the name of PA Stolypin, who was the main leader, organizer and executor of all reforms in the field of agriculture and land use, is closely related.
The economic situation of the Russian peasant worsened after 1861, and in 1900 he was generally poorer than in 1800.
Reasons for the deterioration of the situation of the peasants:
- payment of redemption payments (for the purchase or lease of land it was necessary to borrow from usurers, and then from the Peasant Bank; debts grew, and after the revolution of 1905-1907, the government canceled redemption payments in 1907 and forgave arrears);
- shortage of land for peasants;
- imbalance in agriculture.
The state supported the community. The community was considered the most reliable support of the autocracy in the countryside. But the tension between the community and private property gradually grew. In 1905, these contradictions resulted in a real "war for the land." The authorities suppressed the unrest with the help of military expeditions. In the course of the peasant unrest in 1905, it became clear that it was impossible to maintain the former situation in the countryside. In this regard, the idea of \u200b\u200bliquidating the community, the transfer of land to private ownership appeared. The creation of the June third system, which was personified by the Third Duma, along with the agrarian reform, was the second step in transforming Russia into a bourgeois monarchy. Stolypin singled out two tasks as priorities: the fight against the revolution and the implementation of the agrarian law of November 9, 1906. By its content, it was a liberal bourgeois law that promoted the development of capitalism in the countryside and, therefore, progressive.
Stolypin adhered to purely economic principles of economic reform.
The main goals of the Stolypin agrarian reform:
1) transform Russia from a landlord-monarchical state into a bourgeois-monarchist state;
2) to create, by stratification of the peasantry, a middle stratum - the peasant bourgeoisie;
4) relieve social tension in the countryside, distract the peasants from thoughts about the compulsory alienation of landlord lands.
The achievement of these goals presupposed the implementation of three main tasks: the destruction of the community, the creation of individual peasant farms (private peasant land property) and the resettlement of peasants from the central provinces of Russia to the outskirts.
Components of the reform:
- Decree of November 3, 1905 on the reduction of the redemption payments of peasants from January 1, 1906 by half, and from January 1, 1907 - completely.
- Decree on the Peasant Bank, which was transferred state land for sale to needy peasants.
- Decree of November 9, 1906 on peasant land tenure and land use. This most important decree gave each owner of a communal allotment the right to secure it in his personal property in the form of a farm or a cut. The patchwork was mostly preserved.
- The decree of December 5, 1906 introduced the freedom of choosing a place of residence for peasants, abolished corporal punishment by the verdict of volost peasant courts, abolished the right of zemstvo and peasant chiefs to arrest and fine peasants for administrative violations.
- The law of June 14, 1910, in fact, forcibly recognized all householders of those communities where no redistributions had been made for 24 years as personal owners.
- Organization of the resettlement movement to Western Siberia with the aim of allotting land to landless and land-poor peasants and solving the problem of overpopulation in the European part of Russia.
- Extensive construction of rural schools and the involvement of huge masses of the population in the public education system.
Development of the cooperative movement
The loans of the Peasant Bank could not fully satisfy the peasant's demand for money goods, so credit cooperation became widespread. As a result, a wide network of small peasant credit institutions, savings and loan banks and credit partnerships, which served the money turnover of peasant farms, was created. Peasants on a cooperative basis created dairy and oil artels, agricultural societies, consumer stores and even peasant artel dairy factories.
Consequences of the agrarian reform
It is important to note not only the withdrawal of the peasants from the community, but also the destruction of the striped area, the development of cuts and farms, partially within its framework. The reform qualitatively changed the community itself, increasing the efficiency of its functioning.
By 1913, the grain harvest rose to 5.6 billion poods (86 million tons) against 4 billion poods at the beginning of the century. The sown area since the beginning of the century (until 1914) increased by 10.6 million dessiatines. At the same time, the export and yield of many agricultural crops, the production and import of agricultural machinery increased. In some southern regions, the peasant community has almost completely disappeared (for example, in the Bessarabian and Poltava provinces). In other regions (Kursk province) the community lost its dominant position.
a) Reasons for the incompleteness of the reform
- Minor time periods.
- Resistance from the right and left political forces.
- The complex relationship between the entourage of the tsar and P.A.Stolypin.
From an economic point of view, the initiated agrarian reform was necessary and progressive.
For the success of the agrarian reform, it was necessary overcome three obstacles:
1) the resistance of the conservative landlord-bureaucratic leaders (from 1907 to 1911, until the law on farms and cuts was approved by the tsar);
2) the conservatism of the peasant community: the idea of \u200b\u200b"black redistribution" was widespread among the peasants, many of the peasants, even having the opportunity, did not buy land;
3) the resistance of the Russian "socialist" intelligentsia and the Russian Orthodox Church, who believed that the reform would enrich 10-15% of the peasants, and let the rest go into the world without community protection.
However, certain changes have taken place. Over 8 years of reform, 26.1% of the peasants left the community, but only 15% of them went to the farm. This was due to objective reasons: the farm is an autonomous economy, where everything should be - both a field, and grazing, and a watering hole; the farms were small and weak; as before, the bulk of the peasants did not have horses or had only one.
The vast majority of those leaving the community were poor. Many sought to sell their land and go to the city or go to Siberia. 2.44 million peasants settled permanently in Siberia, many of them became quite strong masters. However, this did not solve the problem of overpopulation in the European part of Russia.
b) Contradictory results of agricultural reform
Positive results:
- up to a quarter of the farms separated from the community, the stratification of the countryside increased, the rural elite began to provide up to half of the market grain;
- 3 million households moved from European Russia to sparsely populated areas, 4 million acres of communal lands were involved in the market turnover;
- the cost of agricultural implements has increased, the consumption of superphosphate fertilizers has increased;
- per capita income of the rural population has increased.
Negative results:
- 70-90% of the peasants who left the community retained ties with the community;
- the bulk of the peasants were the labor farms of the community members;
- up to half a million migrants returned to European Russia;
- unresolved problem of land shortage;
- the prevalence of primitive tools of labor, traditional methods of land cultivation.
As the most serious consequence, it should be noted that in 1911-1912. the country was struck by a famine that affected 30 million people.