WH II H Russian Revolution & Stalin

Conditions in Tsarist Russia

The following flash cards are based on the Conditions in Tsarist Russia slideshow.

Geography

Two continents Europe + Asia (Asian area known as Siberia); Capital: St. Petersburg

Language + Religion

Russian is a Slavic language; the main religion/official state religion was Eastern Orthodox Christianity

Ruling Dynasty

The ruling dynasty of tsarist Russia was the Romanov Dynasty

Political conditions

Ruled by a tsar who had absolute power; Russian people had no rights or freedoms

Tsar Liberator

Tsar Alexander II

Why was he called Tsar Liberator?

Abolished serfdom and set serfs free (serfs are peasant farmers who were bound to the land they farmed on) in 1861

Where many serfs ended up living after becoming free

Communal villages

The radical group that assassinated Tsar Alexander II in 1881

Peoples’ Will

Tsar Alexander III was a ___ and son of ___

reactionary, son of Tsar Alexander II

Three actions Tsar Alexander III took to keep control of the Russian people after his father’s assasination

Imposed censorship laws; Set up secret police to watch for government opposition; Sent political prisoners to Siberia

What did he do in an attempt to make everyone in the Russian Empire “Russian”?

Instituted Russification (where people in non-Russian cultures, languages, and customs were suppressed and replaced with Russian norms).

Russia’s last tsar

Tsar Nicholas II

The self proclaimed holy man that was believed to have cured Nicholas II’s son’s hemophilia

Rasputin

Russia = ___ country

Agricultural where most worked on land using traditional agricultural practices 

Land hunger

When there is not enough land which caused unrest between Russian peasants

Late + fast

These two terms were characteristics of Russian industrialization

What Nicholas II’s government did to help build industry

Attracted foreign investors; raised tax; boosted heavy industry (steel); continued to work on the Trans-Siberian Railway

Trans-Siberian Railway

Railroad that connected east and west Siberia with its two endpoints being St. Petersburg and Vladivostok

Size of Russian factories compared to other European counterparts

Russian factories were huge in terms of employees, often housing 500. European factories like those in France or GB often did not exceed 50

Strikes and revolutionary movements

What Russians did to improve lives and protest low standards of living

Russification

What Tsar Alexander III implemented with the goal of forcing non-Russian groups to adopt parts of Russian culture like religion

Pogroms

Organized massacres, similar to genocides

Give one example of a group of people that were targeted by pogroms

Jewish people

Proletariat

The name of the working class

Bolsheviks

A radical revolutionary group against tsarist rule

V.I. Lenin

Leader of the Bolsheviks

Communism

Lenin’s ideas were communist based off Karl Marx’s Marxist ideas