The Russian Empire and the National Periphery: Between the Theory of Autocracy and Management Practices

Authors

  • Amiran Urushadze
  • Oleg Grom
  • Natalia Dmitrieva

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.15826/qr.2018.3.331

Keywords:

Russian Empire; national outskirts; Romanovs; autocracy; imperial policy; geopolitics

Abstract

This article considers the relations between the Russian Empire and its national peripheries. The authors focus on the deformation of imperial principles of the organisation of power under the influence of the periphery instead of the traditional analysis of imperial methods of incorporating it. The work is based on documents from federal archives and published historical evidence and is structured around three main problems of the Romanov Empire, i. e. first, geography as a hard struggle with distances; second, politics as administrative practice; and third, economy as the price of the peripheries. The article defines the fundamental principle of Russian autocracy regarding the periphery as its desire for political and cultural integration of the periphery into the state. At the same time, the implementation of this principle forced the imperial authorities to seek other mechanisms to integrate outlying territories. The authors conclude that the experience of the Russian Empire demonstrates an inconsistency between state theory and practice. The periphery was not only an object of imperial policy, but also an agent in the development of the empire itself.

Author Biographies

Amiran Urushadze

PhD (History), Head of the Laboratory of History and Ethnography, Southern Scientific Centre of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Associate Professor, Southern Federal University.

41, Chekhov Ave., 344006, Rostov-on-Don, Russia.

105/42, Bolshaya Sadovaya Str., 344006, Rostov-on-Don, Russia.

aturushadze@sfedu.ru

Oleg Grom

Junior Researcher, Southern Scientific Centre of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

41, Chekhov Ave., 344006, Rostov-on-Don, Russia.

gromescu@gmail.com

Natalia Dmitrieva

Junior Researcher, Southern Scientific Centre of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Senior Lecturer, Southern Federal University.

41, Chekhov Ave., 344006, Rostov-on-Don, Russia.

105/42, Bolshaya Sadovaya Str., 344006, Rostov-on-Don, Russia.

nvdmitrieva@sfedu.ru

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Published

2018-09-30

How to Cite

Urushadze, A., Grom, O., & Dmitrieva, N. (2018). The Russian Empire and the National Periphery: Between the Theory of Autocracy and Management Practices. Quaestio Rossica, 6(3), 835–853. https://doi.org/10.15826/qr.2018.3.331

Issue

Section

Disputatio