Michael Speransky Statesman of Imperial Russia 1772–1839

"An autocracy tempered by assassination", clever foreigners used to say about the Russian empire in the 18th and 19th centuries. With this bon mot the average curiosity about the Tsars' government was satisfied and there seemed to be no need to look further into the matter. There was, on the surface of things, some justification for such a definition: many rulers had suffered violent death and little did the autocracy abate between 1725 and 1905. The impression created by travelers, by historians and journalists, as well as by Russia's own discontented intelligentsia was that nothing really ever changed in Russia, that the autocracy was the same in 1905 as it had been at the death of Peter the Great in 1725. Not that the outside world had remained ignorant of the efforts at reform, the changes, and the modernization wrought in Russia since the day Peter I had "cut a window into Europe. " But the prevailing opinion was that such changes as occurred were merely external and did not affect the fundamental structure of the government or of society. Front Matter....Pages I-XII The Beginnings....Pages 1-28 The “Constitutionalism” of Emperor Alexander I....Pages 29-48 Administrative Activities 1802–1812....Pages 49-81 Reform of Russia’s Finances and Central Administration....Pages 82-118 Plans of Reform....Pages 119-169 Disgrace and Exile....Pages 170-203 Philosophical Views and Political Theory....Pages 204-227 Governing Russia’s Provinces....Pages 228-279 Projects for Reforming the Provincial Administration....Pages 280-307 An Unpleasant Interlude Speransky and the Decembrists....Pages 308-319 Codifying Russian Law....Pages 320-346 Last Years — Conclusion....Pages 347-367 Back Matter....Pages 368-394