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The Revolutionary Masses
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The early
years of Alexander’s reign brought liberal trends in education.
A statute of 1863 had given the universities elected boards of
professors and rectors and thus self-administration. The close
supervision placed over the universities which had prevailed in
the era of the Nicholas I was now lifted, opening the way for
the formation of numerous circles and associations and thus to
greater public activity. Major changes were begun too in the
field of female education: many courses for women appeared
providing an education which followed university curricula.
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General primary education began to develop. Following the
institution of the
zemstvos,
numerous elementary schools were established on their initiative in
European Russia. By 1880 such schools had more than a million students. |
The
liberalizing trends in education led to the flowering of Russian
science and culture in consequent decades.
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Under Alexander II censorship
was also revised. In 1865 edicts were issued easing rigid
censorship regulations for a significant number of books and
periodicals with the exception of newspapers of mass
circulation. The abolition, at the end of Alexander’s reign, of
the Third Section of the Imperial Chancellery, which had
originally been set up by his father to enforce thought control,
also helped ease the constraints of censorship. As a result,
progressive journalism flourished presenting the Russian
educated public with a truthful and critical picture of the
country’s social and political problems.
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The ‘Great
Reform’ laws of 1861-1865 altered the structure of the empire
fundamentally, but it would take years before their practical effect
was fully felt. Officials learned only gradually to work within the
new system, their minds and the mentality of the masses had to be
adjusted to radically changed circumstances. Yet these progressive
changes initiated by Alexander II’s government were all symptomatic
of the transition that Russia was slowly undergoing from a
semifeudal to something approaching a modern capitalist society.
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Tsarist Russia |
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Images &
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