 The economic power of elites, human capital, and industrial change in late Imperial RussiaViktor Malein Explorations in Economic History, 2025, vol. 97, issue C Abstract: This paper studies the economic impacts of land ownership concentration among the aristocratic elite in the Russian Empire. I document that areas with a higher concentration of noble land ownership were associated with lower levels of primary education during 1880–1911. Exploring the mechanisms, I show that by controlling local governments the landed elites decreased public spending on education, shifting the financial burden to peasant households in the 1880s–1890s. I also demonstrate that the extension of school provision through a government program of schooling subsidies after 1905 led to a relatively large increase in enrollment rates in regions with high noble landownership concentration, suggesting initial underinvestment in education in these areas. Finally, the paper identifies a significant negative influence of landed elites on industrial growth and firm productivity, with up to 56% of this effect attributable to the human capital channel. Keywords: Land concentration; Education; Serfdom; Industrialization (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:exehis:v:97:y:2025:i:c:s0014498325000440 DOI: 10.1016/j.eeh.2025.101697 Access Statistics for this article Explorations in Economic History is currently edited by R.H. Steckel More articles in Explorations in Economic History from Elsevier |
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