Russian Serfdom the Bolshevik Revolution

Russian Serfdom

The Bolshevik Revolution that gripped Russia at the turn of the 20th century and produced a torrent of bloodshed also unveiled the Communist Manifesto in its first actionable form. Over the course of the next century, the ideas of agrarian and labor-based reform would sweep outward from the forming Soviet Union, permeating both Asia and Europe over the next several decades. Perhaps the best explanation for its origins deep in the heart of the Russian territories would be the subjugation of its masses on a scale unparalleled in the world. Amongst all the feudalist lands which persisted on a system of monarchy, nobility and peasantry, Russia was fully distinct in a number of regards which made it so. Comprised of the largest serfdom in the known world and a noble class constantly dispatched to its own borders to defend against a perpetually threatening Mongolian horde, Russia can perhaps be said to have been among the most grotesquely unequal of slave states.

The origins of the Russian serf system are distinguished from those in other parts of Europe for the lateness of its uptake. The height of feudalism for much of Europe would be the middle ages, a period during which the Rus Kiev territories endured the occupation of the Tatar Empire. By most accounts, this detained the Russian people from the economic developments which so enriched the kingdoms of Europe. Thus, it was not until the middle of the 18th century that the Russians would begin to develop an economy divided thusly. In particular, as the role of the Tsar and his nobles became evermore dependent upon the exhausting task of defending its frequently assaulted borders, larger and large scores of the peasant population began to fall under the sway of serfdom. Such is to say that the peasants who became absorbed into the jurisdiction of nobles owning lands were legally constructed as the property of said nobleman.

At a point in its history from the late 18th century and into the middle of the 19th century, Russia's peasant class comprised the largest majority of the land's population. Of these, a greater portion were viewed as the private property owned by nobleman. Such is to say that in a nation then of roughly 60 million people, there were by the middle of the 19th century roughly 23 million Russians living in slavery. As research denotes in fact, the new legislation composed during this period in Russia's history centered mainly on addressing such issues as the legal claims to ownership of the serf class and ways of punishing those guilty of fleeing from their bondage. Indeed, among the conditions of the serf's life were a determined restriction of movement throughout the land, a command to offer the claimed harvest to the nobleman presiding over the land and the obligation to be sold as property where such would be agreed upon between noblemen. And in such instances where one might be sold, the selling nobleman was given the right to retain the individual's family and property.

Though the laws would stop short of allowing the right of the noble to kill a serf, the penalty for doing so was a nominal monetary fine of a negligible sum to a member of the landed gentry. Therefore, prohibition on killing a serf was pointedly low. It is thus that the Russian feudalist system created a scenario in which the seeds of Communist revolution could ultimately be sowed. With literally half of its population living in abject slavery and the stability of the central government constantly threatened by invading Mongols and rebelling Cossacks, the slave population increasingly came to represent a serious threat to the continued survival of the ruling class. First through its constant undermining of the system by flight from ownership and thereafter by increasingly organized slave revolts, the serf population demonstrated the sheer irrationality of enslaving so large a population to the service of so few. Ultimately, the great many would come to recognize their power.

So would this be the recognition of the Tsar Alexander II, who in 1861 responded to a fear that ultimately the imbalance of this system would come to destroy the noble class by emancipating those in bondage and abolishing slavery. The impracticality of the system and the harsh survival imposed upon so great a population would have irreparable consequences though. For the people of Russia, emancipation would not ease its suffering or quell its anger. The 'agreement' forged in the name of emancipation would forge a system still deeply exploitive and absent of opportunity for those without land. The lives of the Russian peasantry would be little changed by emancipation, such as slavery had plunged so many into a condition of great inequality.