ABSTRACT
The emancipation of the serfs has been variously described as the ‘most important single act of legislation in the entire history of Russia’, and as being ‘not worth the paper it was written on’. The arguments over the reasons for the government’s decision to undertake this enterprise need not detain us here. What is important are the conditions and consequences of the settlement. It is, however, worth noting briefly that Alexander II (r. 1855-81) did not abolish serfdom out of any altruistic desire for an improvement in the lot of the Russian narod. Fear, rather than philanthropy, forced him to embark on a process which, following the Crimean débâcle, was seen to be essential to the economic and political survival of the Empire. The memory of Pugachev’s hordes cannot have been far from Alexander’s mind when he declared in 1856 that, if serfdom was to be abolished, ‘it is better that it should be abolished from above, rather than wait until it abolishes itself from below’.
