1. Nation and Memory in Russia, Poland and Ukraine
Week 7
Peasants into ... (Russians, Ukrainians, Poles)

2. Peasants into…
Russia and the Russian Empire
Poles
Ukrainians

3. Nation building in 19th century Eastern Europe
Task: Make peasants into Russians, Poles, Ukrainians
Problem: Serfdom, abolished in Prussia 1807/10, in Austria 1848, in Russia 1861
Liberation without land (peasants have to pay for it)
Gulf between nobility and nationally mobilised urban elite on the one side and peasants on the other side
Problem of literacy: 1850 in Prussia 85%, 1873 in Austrian Galicia 20%, 1897 in Russian Empire 21.1%
Fear of estate owners and conservatives of effect of literacy on behaviour of peasants
National movement: since last third of 19th century challenge by socialism

4. Peasants into…
Russia and the Russian Empire
Poles
Ukrainians

5. Russia
Feodor Vasilyev, Village (1869)

7. Almost all ethnic Russians, ‘Little Russians’, ‘White Russians’ are orthodox
since 1870s some sort of local self-administration
Existence of an educated elite
Russians have a state (Russian Empire
Long state tradition: existence of a Russian history generally acknowledged
Existence of a Russian high culture
44% of population are Great Russians
The Russian Empire is one of the five Great Powers
Weakness of Russian Orthodox Church – since 17th c. tool of autocracy
Late introduction of self-administration (zemstva)
Gulf between autocracy and educated elite
Empire vs. Russian nation (enormous role of non-Russians in imperial bureaucracy)
Tension between Russian nationalism and Russian imperial interests
Great Russians are not absolute majority of population
National movements in periphery: especially Poland
The Russian Empire is overstretched
Dilemma 1: to compete with the other Great Powers modernisation needed, effective modernisation based on co-operation of elites, education of population…
But… end of autocratic rule, sharing of power, education also vehicle for ‘wrong’ – revolutionary or reformist ideas – elites scared of peasant uprising
Dilemma 2: Russification of minorities needed to transform Russia into a Russian nation state. But… Russification could provoke resistance of other ethnic groups

8. Major Ethnic Groups in the Russian Empire 1897 (125,640,000)
Russians %
Ukrainians %
Belarusians %
Poles %
Jews %
Other ethnic groups in the West %
Ethnic groups in the North %
Ethnic groups Volga/Ural %
Ethnic groups in Siberia %
Ethnic groups in the Steppe %
Ethnic groups in the Transcaucasia %
Ethnic groups in the Caucasus %
Ethnic groups in Central Asia %
Diaspora groups (1.43% Germans) %

9. Domestic Policy 1856 - 1881 1860-1873 First railway boom 1861 Feb 19
Emancipation of the serfs
Law (courts) and education reform, Zemstvo instituted
1873
1874
Populist movement To the People (V narod)
Universal Military Training Act, military reforms
1879
People's Will Party – terrorism
1881 March 1
Asassination of Alexander II

10. Alexander II

11. Three varieties (Thaden)
What is Russification?
Three varieties (Thaden)
Unplanned: certain individuals take on Russian culture and language, takes several generations
Administrative: demand by the Russian government that Russian must be used in administration everywhere in the empire
Cultural: active policy that aims to replace a population’s native culture with Russian
Edward C. Thaden et al., Russification in the Baltic Provinces and Finland, (Princeton, 1981), pp. 7-8
Theodore R. Weeks, ‘Russification: Word and Practice ’, in Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society Vol 148, No. 4, December 2004, pp

12. Monument of field marshal Ivan Paskevic in Warsaw

13. Alexander Nevsky Cathedral,
Warsaw, before 1914

16. Peasants into…
Russia and the Russian Empire
Poles
Ukrainians

17. Poland Uprisings before 1900 1794 Kosciuszko-Uprising (Russia)
Also in Greater Poland (Prussia)
1806 Uprising in Greater Poland (Prussia)
1830 November Uprising (Russia)
1846 Greater Poland (attempt, Prussia)
and Galician Slaughter, Kraków (Austria)
1848 Greater Poland (Prussia)
1863 January Uprising (Russia)

18. November Uprising, 1830

19. Polish lands,

21. January Uprising, 1863/64

22. 1863

23. 1795 Third Partition of Poland
1794 Kosciuszko uprising
1795 Third Partition of Poland
After the Battle of Racławice (1794), painting by Jan Matejko (end of 19th c.) 23

24. Realism and Positivism vs. Romanticism
Cracow School:
Michał Bobrzyński
A short history of Poland, 1879
The Birth of the Polish State, 2 vols.,
Warsaw School:
Tadeusz Korzon

25. Starting point: failed insurrections
Organic Work
Starting point: failed insurrections
Poland culturally and economically too underdeveloped to sustain an independent state
New strategy:
Improve industry and trade in the Polish provinces
Build towns and railways
Organize cooperatives and organize Polish peasantry
Raise the literacy and the national consciousness of the population
Important advocates: Stańczyk group in Cracow and Warsaw positivists

27. The Polish lands
Russian Empire
Kingdom of Poland becomes Vistula land
Russification
Discrimination of Roman Catholic Church, destruction of Uniate Church
University of Warsaw replaced by Imperial University of Warsaw (Teaching in Russian)
German Empire
Anti-Catholic policy under Bismarck
Germanisation of School system
School strike after attempt to introduce German language in religious instruction
Policy to promote settlement of ethnic Germans
Discrimination of ethnic Poles

28. Michał Drzymała, his wife and his wagon

30. West Galicia in % East Galicia Together Roman-Catholic 2,381,940 88.6
Austrian Crownland Galicia and Lodomeria, 1910
Population: 8 Million
West Galicia
in %
East Galicia
Together
Roman-Catholic
2,381,940
88.6
1,349,630
25.3
3,731,570
46.5
Greek-Catholic
86,585
3.2
3,294,420
61.7
3,381,005
42.1
Jewish
213,173
7.9
658,722
12.4
871,895
10.9
Protestant
7,953
0.3
30,371
0.6
28,324
0.5
Orthodox
165
0.0
2,680
2,845

31. Austria-Hungary after 1867
Crownland Galicia and Lodomeria
Polish elite profits from imperial reforms
Close cooperation with Polish elites
Social, political, economic and cultural dominance of Poles
Polonisation of administration, education
Dominance of Polish language in universities in Cracow and Lwów
Modern political parties develop,
Hundreds of Polish newspapers and journals, thousands of books are published
Polish politicians (Polish club in Austrian parliament) very influential
Polish ministers and gouvernors
Galicia – the Polish Piedmont

32. The Making of the Polish Nation
PRO
Polish language and long tradition of literate culture
Influence in Galicia since 1867
German Empire: rule of law
Roman-Catholic faith
Common history of most of the territory until the end of the 18th c.
Existence of a numerous, genuinely Polish elite – the nobility
Cultural bonds: similar traditions, costumes, songs and so on
Emancipation/liberation of peasants in Prussia, Austria, Russia
Paradox: creating precondition for Polish nation building
CONTRA
Partitions of Poland: no state
Living in the Russian Empire, Prussia/German Empire and the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
No common present
Opportunities for educated Poles in the service of the Empires
Small middle class
Sharp social conflict between peasants and estate owners
Unclear borders
Unclear national boundaries (for ex. Polish Jew or Jewish Pole)
National 'awakening' of Ukrainians, Lithuanias etc.
Policy of Russification and Germanization

33. Peasants into…
Russia and the Russian Empire
Poles
Ukrainians

34. Ukrainians in the Russian Empire
Assimilation
“Little Russians”
Valuev Decree and Ems Ukaz
Orthodox faith
Attraction of Russian culture
Upward mobility - chances
Ukrainian nationalism
Ethnicity and historical traditions
Small group of pro- Ukrainian noblemen
Ukrainian language and literature
Partial coincidence of social and ethnic boundaries

37. West Galicia in % East Galicia Together Roman-Catholic 2,381,940 88.6
Crownland Galicia and Lodomeria, 1910
Population: 8 Million
West Galicia
in %
East Galicia
Together
Roman-Catholic
2,381,940
88.6
1,349,630
25.3
3,731,570
46.5
Greek-Catholic
86,585
3.2
3,294,420
61.7
3,381,005
42.1
Jewish
213,173
7.9
658,722
12.4
871,895
10.9
Protestant
7,953
0.3
30,371
0.6
28,324
0.5
Orthodox
165
0.0
2,680
2,845 37

38. 38

39. Options Polish option – “gente ruthenus, natione polonus”
Ruthenian option – “Rusyny”
Russian option – Russophiles
Ukrainian option – Ukrainophiles
(Panruthenian option) – including Belarusians
John-Paul Himka, ‘The Construction of Nationality in Galician Rus’: Icarian Flights in Almost All Directions’, in Ronald Grigor Suny and Michael D. Kennedy (eds.), Intellectuals and the Articulation of the Nation (Ann Arbor, 1999), pp

40. Phase B/C 1848 Ruthenian Council Reading Clubs (Prosvita)
Co-operative movement
Emergence of a secular elite
Ruthenian-Ukrainian parties (since 1890s)
Ruthenians/Ukrainians represented in Austrian parliament and in Galician Diet

41. Volodymyr Antonovych 41

42. History of Ukraine-Rus’ 10 volumes,
Main work
History of Ukraine-Rus’
10 volumes,
Mykhailo Hrushevsky 42

43. traditional elites have become Russians or Poles
The Making of the Ukrainian Nation
CONTRA
Ukrainian language not yet a fully developed “high language”, Russian and Polish available as alternative languages for higher education
Since 1667/1772 Eastern part has common history with Russia, Western part with Poland/Austria
traditional elites have become Russians or Poles
no uncontested Ukrainian state in history
Potential members of the nation live in different empires as non-dominant ethnic groups
Opportunities for educated Ukrainians in Russian Empire
almost no middle class
Different religious denominations
Politics of Russification/Polonisation
PRO
Ukrainian language and literature in the vernacular since 1798
Greek-Catholic faith in Galicia a barrier to assimilation by the Polish nation
Common history until the 17th c.
Social antagonism to Polish/Polonised or Russian/Russified overlords
Cossack autonomy in early modern Europe and short period of independence
Cultural bonds: similar traditions, costumes, songs and so on
Children of Orthodox and Uniate Priests – core of educated national elite