Russia's History vs. the West . . . Comparable?

[Tsarfan]

I would agree with what you say here, too, except that you threw Hitler into the mix, and Nazi Germany was a totalitarian, not an authoritarian regime. Authoritarian regimes are at least more representative than totalitarian ones! And mass terror isn't the foundation of authoritarian regimes, another important distinction.

Sorry.  I used the phrase "other authoritarian systems" to encompass all non-representative forms of government.  But your more technical distinction between authoritarian and totalitarian systems is, I think, more literally correct.

However, a totalitarian system shares the trait with an authoritarian system of usually favoring a dominant group . . . hence my inclusion of Hitler on the list.  In fact, he's the poster child of the murderous extreme of this tendency.

[Tsarfan]

To give just one example, in the last days of the monarchy, Kerensky gave a speech in which he actually stated, "To prevent a catastrophe, the Tsar himself must be removed, by terrorist methods if there is no other way." Imagine a Western politician advocating terrorism in a parliamentary session. It's unimaginable, no matter how desperate the political situation. And Kerensky wasn't even considered an extremist!  

I guess you missed Tom DeLay's speech in Congress where, on the heels of one judge's family being murdered because of a decision she handed down and another judge having received death threats for his rulings in the Terry Shiavo case, DeLay intimated that judges were going to pay a price if they kept thwarting the will of the people as expressed through the Republican Congress.

[Elisabeth]

I guess you missed Tom DeLay's speech in Congress where, on the heels of one judge's family being murdered because of a decision she handed down and another judge having received death threats for his rulings in the Terry Shiavo case, DeLay intimated that judges were going to pay a price if they kept thwarting the will of the people as expressed through the Republican Congress.

But DeLay is an extremist by reputation, and even he could only "intimate" threats, not directly state them. He was then roundly criticized for making such outrageous remarks.

I believe the vast majority of Americans don't countenance even indirect threats on federal judges, much less the open advocation of terrorist means of removing political figures they don't like. Whereas Rasputin's murder was greeted by public rejoicing in cities all over Russia.

[Tsarfan]

But DeLay is an extremist by reputation.

Not where I grew up.

But I guess I'd better get over my recent tongue-in-cheek mood.  It's been getting me into trouble lately.

[Elisabeth]

However, I have never argued that it would have been easy for Nicholas to set Russia on a course toward more representative government.  I have argued only that making the attempt was Russia's sole hope of developing a form of government that would have served Russia well in the 20th century.

I agree, I just think that by this point, so late in the day, it could only be but the very feeblest of hopes. I am not trying to absolve Nicholas II of blame in the demise of the Russian monarchy and the Romanov dynasty, I am simply pointing out that earlier tsars were equally or even more to blame than he: Nicholas I, Alexander III.

Setting aside the argument about whether Russia was developing along European lines, I think we agree that Peter I decided to put Russia on the European stage militarily, diplomatically, and commercially.  Once there, she had to compete with the other actors for the big parts in the play.

I think this was one of Peter's fateful legacies to Russia, the idea that she was a European power and had to compete on an equal footing with the other European powers even when she was still rapidly falling behind them in almost every sector of the economy and administration. If we look at Russia's foreign entanglements after the Napoleonic era, almost every one of them was a disaster on a large scale, leading to the implementation of much-needed reforms: the Crimean War, the Russo-Japanese War, and finally World War I, which led to revolution and the overthrow of the tsarist regime itself. Russia would have done far better to eschew the idea that she was equal with other European countries and to concentrate instead on developing her own internal resources. But this was of course impossible, given the "imperial" legacy of Peter.

The western world was industrializing rapidly in 1900.  Education was spreading, standards of living were rising, social impediments were breaking down and unblocking the upward flow of talent from below.  The ability of other countries to project their influence (militarily, but especially commercially) further beyond their borders was advancing rapidly.  As Japan and Germany proved after WWII, a robust economy fuelled by an educated population with attainable hopes of better material lives is a very creditable substitute for a large standing army.

For Russia to maintain her desired role in this changing world and to hold at bay the social forces unleased by these changes was beyond the reach of one-man rule.

This is all true, but let's go back to an earlier point made repeatedly by Silja and myself. The middle class was still too small and weak to make any real difference in 1917. The educated classes were a very tiny percentage of the total Russian population. As you point out, this was not the case in other European (and non-European) countries.

Imagine there had been no revolution in Russia.  What would an autocratic Russia ruled by the Romanovs look like in 2005?

But a revolution was all but inevitable. That's the conundrum of Russian history, all roads seem to lead to revolution. It's simply impossible to imagine an autocratic Russia of 2005, or even a constitutional monarchy in its place. I think a phrase Silja used earlier in reference to post-Nazi Germany is relevant here, too: by 1917 autocratic Russia was morally bankrupt. Its ideology was dead. And by this time it was far too late to replace it with a new and more accomodating ideology.

[Tsarfan]

But a revolution was all but inevitable. That's the conundrum of Russian history, all roads seem to lead to revolution. It's simply impossible to imagine an autocratic Russia of 2005, or even a constitutional monarchy in its place.

So depressingly true, with one possible exception.  It's difficult to imagine a constitutional monarchy, but not quite impossible . . . at least for me.

My reasoning goes back to a much earlier post, in which I said that the revolution unfolded by stages between late 1916 and October of 1917.  Even on the train on March 15, the Duma representatives were expecting the abdication to produce a new tsar.  I think it was possible -- just possible -- that if Nicholas had seriously tried to work with the Duma from 1906 forward instead of trying to cut it off at the pass by creating the State Council, by refusing to accede to a responsible ministry, by insisting on a veto on all topics of legislation instead of just military and foreign policy and their accompanying budgets -- that he could have pulled it off.

Granted, it would have been an unruly process, with a lot of people needing to grow up (as you so aptly pointed out in your recent post about the political naivete of the Russian middle classes).  And getting a positive outcome over time would have been a very close-run thing.  But it might have been possible.

Instead, Russia got a sullen, pontificating tsar at the opening session, attended by a host of bejewelled female Romanovs with their hankies out.  At one of the critical junctures in Russian history, that's what she got.

[Tsarfan]

The middle class was still too small and weak to make any real difference in 1917. The educated classes were a very tiny percentage of the total Russian population. As you point out, this was not the case in other European (and non-European) countries.

And the ruling classes were a far tinier percentage than the educated classes, but they managed to rule the roost for centuries.

I think the real business of government is always in the hands of a small elite, even in modern democracies.  Russia did not have to include every person and element of society in order to start her evolution toward a more limited monarchy.  She had to include a few key elements beyond the current ruling class and to share a few key prerogatives of the ruling class.

Not all seeds sprout.  But you cannot grow a crop without planting them.  

[Elisabeth]

And the ruling classes were a far tinier percentage than the educated classes, but they managed to rule the roost for centuries.

I think the real business of government is always in the hands of a small elite, even in modern democracies.  Russia did not have to include every person and element of society in order to start her evolution toward a more limited monarchy.  She had to include a few key elements beyond the current ruling class and to share a few key prerogatives of the ruling class.

Not all seeds sprout.  But you cannot grow a crop without planting them.  

Ah, but what if the weeds outnumber the crop?

Not to equate the Russian peasantry with weeds, exactly, but one of the major differences between Western European history and Russian history in the 19th and 20th centuries is that in the latter country virtually every major political reform was overshadowed by the fear of a mass revolt by the peasantry. Indeed, in the number and size of peasant revolts, and in their continuance well into the twentieth century, Russian history far more resembles Chinese history than its European counterpart. "God forbid the Russian riot, senseless and merciless," in the words of Pushkin. Not so senseless, as Solzhenitsyn among others has since pointed out. The peasants wanted land. They believed that the land was actually theirs and that the nobility was usurping their rights to it. At the time of the Napoleonic Wars, and again during the emancipation of the serfs, the government feared the peasantry would stage another mass rebellion. The populists who "went to the people" in the 1870s pinned their hopes (wrongly, as it turned out) on the peasantry's presumably innately revolutionary nature, as did the People's Will (Narodnaia Volia) in its assassination of Alexander II in 1881 - they fully expected the peasantry to take the assassination as a signal to revolt. Which it did not. However, the miseries inflicted by both the Russo-Japanese War in 1904-05 and World War I moved the normally rather politically apathetic peasantry to take control of their destinies and seize the land for themselves. IMO, it would have been exceedingly difficult in the spring and summer of 1917 for any government that persisted in fighting World War I to find the resources to stem the peasant onslaught on the countryside. Ultimately the mass of the Russian population rejected tsarism in favor of some brand of socialism - just not the one they ended up with.  

[Tsarfan]

Not to equate the Russian peasantry with weeds, exactly, but one of the major differences between Western European history and Russian history in the 19th and 20th centuries is that in the latter country virtually every major political reform was overshadowed by the fear of a mass revolt by the peasantry.

That's what makes Nicholas' explanation of the 1905 pogroms as the populace exacting vengeance against the Jews for revolutionary unrest and all Alexandra's subsequent certainty that the peasants loved their little father tsar so astonishing to me.  Were they really capable of that much rationalization or were they just utterly out of touch with conditions in Russia?

IMO, it would have been exceedingly difficult in the spring and summer of 1917 for any government that persisted in fighting World War I to find the resources to stem the peasant onslaught on the countryside.

True . . . but, as I said a couple of posts earlier, I think Nicholas really missed the turn in the road in 1906.  By 1917 what had been perhaps a long shot had turned into a scenario in need of a miracle.

[Elisabeth]

That's what makes Nicholas' explanation of the 1905 pogroms as the populace exacting vengeance against the Jews for revolutionary unrest and all Alexandra's subsequent certainty that the peasants loved their little father tsar so astonishing to me. Were they really capable of that much rationalization or were they just utterly out of touch with conditions in Russia?

You bring up a very good point and one which I have often wondered about myself. I can't believe that Nicholas at least was so unaware of Russian history that he would not view the peasantry as a potentially hostile force to the crown. Wouldn't he have read about Pugachev's Revolt at the very least? How was Russian history taught to Romanov children? Were all the nasty bits ellided? I can understand Alexandra having certain illusions about the Russian peasantry... but Nicholas was educated by Pobedonostsev, who thought Russia was occupied by the "bad man" and who took an utterly cynical view of the peasantry. It's a mystery, it truly is. Perhaps Rasputin really did exert such an influence over Nicholas that he lost all grounding with reality.

As for the pogroms, I hate to say it, but the Russian populace was and still is (if I believe the stories I hear from Jewish friends) very anti-Semitic. At least in this area I think it quite possible that Nicholas wasn't far off the truth. The pogroms might have been orchestrated, aided and abetted by local police authorities but they might at the same time still have represented popular (just not spontaneous) outbursts of the people's "will." I know I'm going to take flak for this... we're supposed to view the Russian people as a benign force as opposed to the evil oppressing tsar... but I think the evil of anti-Semitism was pervasive at all levels of Russian society and this needs to be made clear.

True . . . but, as I said a couple of posts earlier, I think Nicholas really missed the turn in the road in 1906.  By 1917 what had been perhaps a long shot had turned into a scenario in need of a miracle.

We're in essential agreement here. But how does the tsar avoid fighting World War I? That's another major problem, even or especially with a truly representative government.

[Tsarfan]

As for the pogroms, I hate to say it, but the Russian populace was and still is (if I believe the stories I hear from Jewish friends) very anti-Semitic. At least in this area I think it quite possible that Nicholas wasn't far off the truth. The pogroms might have been orchestrated, aided and abetted by local police authorities but they might at the same time still have represented popular (just not spontaneous) outbursts of the people's "will." I know I'm going to take flak for this... we're supposed to view the Russian people as a benign force as opposed to the evil oppressing tsar... but I think the evil of anti-Semitism was pervasive at all levels of Russian society and this needs to be made clear.

No argument from me when it comes to the breadth and depth of anti-semitism.  To me, the mystery is not that Nicholas was also anti-semitic.  The mystery is that he could have seriously asserted that revolutionary ardor was largely limited to the Jewish population (which he claimed formed "90%" of the revolutionary ranks).

[Elisabeth]

No argument from me when it comes to the breadth and depth of anti-semitism.  To me, the mystery is not that Nicholas was also anti-semitic.  The mystery is that he could have seriously asserted that revolutionary ardor was largely limited to the Jewish population (which he claimed formed "90%" of the revolutionary ranks).

Well, it fits in with the delusional fantasy, doesn't it? Loyal, tsar-worshipping peasants... disloyal, revolutionary Jews. No doubt Nicholas couldn't maintain his fantasy of a loyal Russian peasantry without blaming all the revolutionary activity on the "outsiders" in the Orthodox community, the Jews. Thus all evils in society were understood to flow from one pernicious, external source.  

[Tsarfan]

Well, it fits in with the delusional fantasy, doesn't it?

I'm going to head out on another limb of weird analysis here and do an about-face on some of my own arguments . . . .

Maybe Nicholas wasn't all that delusional.  Maybe he was acting like too many CEO's of big companies.

There is a discipline of statistical process control used in business these days called "six sigma".  One of the tenets of six sigma is that when people try to reach quick conclusions about the root causes of problems, they almost invariably hit on the wrong causes and consequently impose the wrong fixes.  One of the simpler tools of six sigma is "asking the 6 why's".  Every time you ask why something happened, you get an answer.  You then ask why that happened, and you get another answer -- and so forth.  Each time you ask the question and get an answer, you get closer to root cause.  Six tries almost always gets you there.

The deepening crisis of General Motors is a good example.  Ever since the oil crisis of the early 1970's caught them off guard, they have been rushing to judgment about root causes without any six sigma discipline to their thinking.  Instead, the answers they derived originated from their own habits and prejudices.  Where the Japanese car makers focused on engineering, GM was a marketing and brand management company.  They tried to market their way out of their problems and came up with bizzare products such as the Cadillac Cimarron (a shoddily-engineered Chevrolet on which Cadillac slapped a bunch of chromed plastic insignia).  Where the Japanese car makers recognized that oil price instability was becoming a permanent fixture of the landscape, GM was used to selling cars by weight (bigger is better).  So they spent the past decade engineering the Hummer (a 3-ton behemoth driven mostly on urban streets) instead of hybrid fuel and other advanced propulsion technologies. *

Today GM's choice is shaping up to be bankruptcy or open warfare with their unions -- or both.

On one level, this feels eerily like Russia in 1900.  I think there are some parallels to how Nicholas approached problems.  His answers derived from his habits and prejudices, not from any kind of analysis.  And it's a very common syndrome (which was the point of the rather strange comparison to GM).

One of the reasons I think that representative government was Russia's only hope of rescue is that representative government essentially does in the government sphere what six sigma does in the business sphere.

When government encompasses differing constituencies and viewpoints, those differing voices perform the function of asking the "six why's".  As one faction puts forth its answer based on its own prejudices, another argues against that answer based on its own prejudices.  The compromise that comes out of the iterations of this process approximates the six sigma processes for getting closer to root cause.  The first answer seldom stands.

In the modern world, successful CEO's tend to be those that impose disciplined analysis on themselves.  And successful governments tend to be those that embrace representative pluralism.  

___________

* Please don't conclude I'm a rabid left-wing environmentalist from any of this diatribe.  I drive a 493-hp car that gets 11 miles per gallon . . . and I speed.  Had I been a Romanov in 1895, I'd have been rooting for autocracy and hoping to avoid paying the piper.  I don't call myself Tsarfan for nothing.  But at least when I live in sin, I don't call it God's will.

[rskkiya]

Well, I am a rabid left wing enviromentalist...(LOL) so do feel free to abuse me as you wish.

   The more that I consider this, the more I find myself looking to a national understanding or collective/group comprehension of "THE LAW" as being somewhere at  the root of this question.
   Of course Tsarfan and Elizabeth have wandered far from me, and I can scarcely catch up...{pant pant...gasp}

Do prepare your rotten fruit to throw my way.

rskkiya

[Tsarfan]

Well, I am a rabid left wing enviromentalist...(LOL).

Aha!  I thought as much.