Russian Relovution

Russia in the 1880s

  • Russia was an absolutist system with no constitutional constraints on the power of the Tsar

  • They had surfs (slaves) until 1861

  • 82% of the population were peasants

  • Industrial backwardness and slow economic development

  • They lost the Crimean war and the Russo-Japanese war, which brought conflict to the country - people were dissatisfied with the Tsar

  • Opposition to the Tsar was brutally suppressed (hanging)

  • Narodnaya Volya - The people’s will, a terrorist group wanting social revolution formed in 1879. Responsible for Tsar Nicholas’ assasination in 1881. They were all hanged upon their arrest.

Tsar Nicholas II - the last Tsar

  • Generally considered a weak ruler who made bad decisions

  • His only son, Alexei, was very sick and weak with haemophilia and could therefore not follow in his father’s footsteps

WWI

  • Russia entered the war to support Serbia against Austria and Germany

  • WWI doomed Tsar Nicholas’ empire

The February/March Revolution

  • February/March 1917 Strikes and demonstrations started in St. Petersburg

  • The Tsar lost support from traditional allies (Duma, military), and was forced to abdicate

The Provisional Government

  • Members of the Duma replaced the Tsar’s government in March 1917