Vol 23, No 2 (2024): The Russian Empire in Context of its Period and Geopolitical Environment

The author gives an expanded interpretation of the “Greek Project” as not only a foreign policy undertaking, but also as an internal political project used in order to buttress state authority with specific ideological components. The source base for the project, in addition to the letter of Catherine II to Joseph II, are the papers of G.A. Potemkin, A.V. Khrapovitsky, the letters of Alexei and Grigory Orlov, and correspondence of the Russian Empress with Voltaire and other ideologists of the European Enlightenment. In addition, the writings of Greeks, in particular Eugenios Voulgaris, along various documents of foreign and domestic policy, and Russian cultural monuments are important to the project. It is shown that a characteristic feature of the imperial ideology of the reign of Catherine II was philhellenism, which included, above all, the noble elite’s awareness of the heritage of ancient Hellas as the source of pan-European civilization. On one hand, this ideology also included sympathy for the descendants of the great Hellenes, co-religionists who fell under the foreign Ottoman yoke, and on the other hand, the authorities and Russian society unanimously positioned the Russian Empire as the legitimate successor of Byzantium, which could and should return fellow Greeks to European civilization.

The author examines the problem of forming new foundations of the managerial ethos in the Rus-sian Empire in the first years of the reign of Alexander II. As an example, there is analyzed the Note of legal adviser of the Naval Ministry V.E. Wrangel, as well as the opinions of high-ranking officials on it. The purpose of the research is to establish the foundations of new ethical standards that the authorities intended to apply to officials. The article shows an important aspect of the problem of reforming the administrative apparatus - the change in the moral character of senior officials, most of whom were never classified by either contemporaries or researchers as the so-called enlightened bureaucracy. There are also identified new ethical standards that laid the basis for the formation of new ethical principles. The author comes to the conclusion that the appearance of the Note indicated the continuation and acceleration of the important process of professionalization of the bureaucracy, a change in the moral guidelines of officials, which was fully consistent with the very spirit of the times. Although the Note itself was never officially enforced, the problems it raised, and the changes planned served as an important basis for the development of new manage-rial ethos in the future.

The author identifies the role of the economic factor as an integral part of the broad Russian-Austrian rivalry in the Balkans, as well as its role in the implementation of the global political strat-egy of St. Petersburg ruling circles. The source base is the materials from the Archive of Foreign Policy of the Russian Empire. The article analyzes the plans of the Russian Empire for economic penetration into the Serbian markets in the late XIX - early XX century, as part of the global political strategy of St. Petersburg ruling circles to strengthen their influence in the region. Particular attention is paid to the activities of the Russian Danube Shipping Company, since its development at the end of the XIX - beginning of the XX century allowed the Russian Empire to gain a foothold in the oil markets not only of the Balkan countries, but also of Austria-Hungary and Germany. Its strategic role increased significantly after the coup of 1903, when big Russian capital began to penetrate into Serbia; it was connected with Belgrade’s interest in military supplies from the Russian Empire. The author comes to the conclusions that Russian diplomacy did not always correctly use its capabilities to strengthen its influence in the country. The Russian Empire products failed to gain absolute dominance on the Serbian market. However, obtaining a monopoly on the sale of kerosene in Serbia, despite the general unprofitability of the Russian Danube Shipping Company, provided St. Petersburg with important strategic presence in the Balkan region, being a serious argument in the political confrontation with the Austro-Hungarian Empire, which was especially evident during the First World War.

The research is devoted to the reflection of the economic activity of citizens of the Czechoslovak Republic in the Russian Far East during the Civil War. The main focus is on the Czechoslovak Central Economic Commission created to solve the economic problems of the considerable military contingent concentrated in Vladivostok awaiting departure to Europe. The activities of the commission have not yet been reflected in historiography; there have not been introduced into scientific use the documents that allow reliably presenting the structure, personnel, main field of activity, and contribution to the solution to problems vital for former prisoners of war and members of their families who were in a foreign land. The research is based on documents of the Russian State Historical Archive of the Far East, primarily on the funds of government institutions located in Vladivostok. Particular attention is paid to the agreements concluded by the Czechoslovak Central Economic Commission with the Provisional Government of the Far East - the Primorsky Regional Zemstvo Administration, the Central All-Russian Union of Consumer Societies (Tsentrosoyuz). It is shown that the status of the Czechoslovak Central Economic Commission changed during the Civil War. If initially it acted as a government agency, then later as a private commercial enterprise, the activities of which ended in criminal prosecution.

The article considers the phenomenon of everyday anti-Semitism based on mass statistical data on the elections to local Soviets of Workers' Deputies. The ethnic composition of deputies sheds light on the attitude of the population towards not only Jews, but also the national policy of the authorities. The author shows that the election results indicate persistent negative attitude of the population towards Jewish candidates and, accordingly, towards Jews in general. In the local government Jews were always underrepresented, since their share among deputies was almost always lower than that in the population. However, the representativeness of Jews grew along with the enhancing of the status of the Soviets, as the influence of the authorities on the composition of deputies increased. In the All-Union and Republican Soviets before the war, Jews were even overrepresented. Thanks to the state, the anti-Jewish sentiments did not exclude Jews from the public life, elite and governance of society. Only the moving of many Jews into the opposition to the regime and the mass emigration to the West which began in the 1950s fundamentally worsened the attitude towards them on the part of the Soviet authorities and voters.

The authors consider the problem of the Central Caucasus peoples’ joining Russia in Soviet and modern historiography. The purpose is to determine the main trends of the regional segment of Soviet historiography which remain relevant in the modern discourse, and to present the modern vector of research of the problem under consideration. There is given the periodization of the Soviet historiography. It is revealed that in the 1930s the formula of “absolute evil” was replaced by that of “the lesser evil” from the point of view of non-Russian peoples’ joining Russia. In the 1950s, there was taken a course to substantiate the progressive role of non-Russian peoples’ joining Russia and there appeared the idea of the voluntary nature of their joining. The article shows the fate of those historians who could not unconditionally accept the change in the research paradigm. Particular attention is paid to the analysis of modern historiography; its fundamental difference from the Soviet one is shown - the study of the issue without any ideological guidelines and its transfer exclusively into a scientific plane. The motive for addressing the problem is the research interest in the modernization processes of the post-reform period. As a result of the multifaceted research, there has been revised the assessment of the role of the socio-cultural institutions that served the goals of the peaceful conquest of the Central Caucasus peoples, and their positive role has been identified.