 Secularization and Pious Subversion: To the Constitution by RailSylvia Sztern ()
Chapter Chapter 7 in Russia on the Move, 2022, pp 271-318 from Palgrave Macmillan Abstract: Abstract Here I investigate the crucial role of railroads in Russian modernization from by focusing on additional aspects of the institutional change that technological innovation brought about in nineteenth-century Russia. Supplementing tangible aspects of modernization, I argue that the new technology challenged the Greek Orthodox legitimacy of Tsarism by thrusting Russia’s spiritual cultures into a state of flux. Massive canonization gatherings, defection to the revolutionary Old Belief (Starovery), and retreat to other piously subversive sects, as well as secularization, destabilized the empire’s spiritual base. The emerging institutional competition caused the intra-ecclesiastical structure of the parish to transition from hierarchical-authoritarian to egalitarian and participatory. The Russo-Japanese War, instigated to distract discontent, ended in a debacle in 1904, destabilizing the army. By launching allodial reform in 1906, Tsar Nicholas II sought to re-legitimize the empire by improving the peasantry’s living standards. Bearing in mind the incongruence of individual property rights and autocratic rule, I find that the railroads paved the way to the Constitution. Date: 2022 There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it. Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pal:stuchp:978-3-030-89285-2_7 Ordering information: This item can be ordered from DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-89285-2_7 Access Statistics for this chapter More chapters in Studies in Economic Transition from Palgrave Macmillan |
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