ISSN: 2158-7051 ==================== INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF RUSSIAN STUDIES ==================== ISSUE NO. 1 ( 2012/2 ) |
ANALYTICAL ESTIMATION OF THE STATUS OF THE PROVINCIAL GOVERNMENT AND THE
POSITION OF A GOVERNOR BY URAL REGIONAL AUTHORITIES AT THE TURN OF THE XIX-XX CENTURIES[1]
SERGEY LYUBICHANKOVSKIY*
Summary
In the article the analysis of four
projects of reform of the local government that were written by Ural’s Region
governors was given. Being created independently of each other, but united at
the levels of time of their origin (1898-1903), of area of origin (the Urals),
of authorship (civil governors), of target setting mechanism (written in the
same context, as conclusions on the circular of the Minister of Internal
Affairs), these documents present to a
researcher the necessary basis for the correct comparison with the purpose to
determine the position of the Ural Region authorities in relation to provincial
reform and clarify the ratings given by the Ural regional leaders to the
provincial government system. That is what this article is devoted to.
Key words: Governor’s Status, status of the provincial
government, Ural
region, late-imperial
For centuries, in
In the Late Russian Empire Governorship Institution as well as the whole
system of local government experienced crisis[2]. It became the basis for developing by the government
of Nicholas II of the provincial reform projects. It was the period from
1895 to 1904 that was characterized by a regular
(after Kakhanov Commission activities in 1881-1885) wave of the active
consideration of the issue of local government reform
aimed at improving the efficiency of the latter.
Development of provincial
reform during investigated period entailed identification and analysis of the
positions of the local administrative elite. The Ural Region Administration[3] took a sufficiently active
part in this process. During many years of the targeted searching work at the
archives, we managed to find 4 documents in which the relevant officials
expressed their viewpoints on the problem. Their authors were V.I. Ershov,
Governor of Orenburg (1898), N.M. Klingenberg, Governor of Vyatka (1900), I.N.
Sokolovski, Governor of Ufa (1903) and P.F. Khomutov, Governor of Vyatka
(1903). It could be stated, with great degree of assurance, that the total number of their briefs to the Minister of Internal Affairs, if
accumulated, represent a comprehensive list of provincial reform
projects developed by leaders of the region and preserved up to our days. We’d
emphasize that the conclusions of the governors of the Urals on provincial
reform represent unique historical sources, first introduced in the scientific
turn-over.
The logics of further
discussion will be related to clarifying the attitude of the governors of the
Urals to the key problems of the local link of the public administration system
during investigated period: the status of the provincial government and the
position of a governor. The list of these questions is formulated on the basis
of preliminary study of analyzed projects and of identification of key
subjects, which attracted the attention of the governor.
Status of Provincial Government
In the analyzed notes, it was
marked that the provincial government did not meet their nominal, legally fixed
status of the main local counterpart.[4] This issue was closely linked
to the previous one, being, in fact, one of its facets. All projects proposed
to join the local authorities together using the provincial government as the
basis for such merge, and to spread the workflow rules existing within the
latter over a new institution to be created. It
is interesting to note that in briefs dated 1898-1900 the above mentioned
approach was presented in a veiled form, but was clearly revealed in the
analysis of functions of those offices, which were proposed to be created
within a new provincial authority: according to N.M. Klingenberg’s proposal not
less than half of 12 such units were actually repetition of the "old"
provincial government (the first, the second, medical, construction,
land-surveying, prison and in a modified form – economic ones); in V.I. Ershov’s project - at least 9 out of
It is important to note that
in historical science, until recently, the stereotype completely dominated
according to which in the 2nd half of the XIX - early XX centuries the
provincial government was not a kind of an affluent local administration body,
and its very existence was archaic. One of the strongest arguments in favor of
this thesis was considered to be the fact that all the pre-revolutionary
specialists on this issue adhered to such opinion.[6] It is now evident that there
was no consensus on this matter, and the viewpoint of local administrators -
practitioners as shown in the article is one more confirmation of such.
The absence of consensus on
the provincial government may explain the inconsistency of the central
apparatus of the MIA in determining its own attitude to this issue. Thus, in
the research note "on revising the statutes of the provincial institutions"
dated February 27, 1903 and sent out to the governors the Department of General
Affairs of the Ministry of Internal Affairs stated that "the Provincial
Board is excluded from the project ... as intended to eliminate.”[7] However, at the subsequent meetings of the committee,
V.K. Plehve formulated an opposite statement: "The provincial government,
although it lost its primary importance, but still occupies a prominent place
among the provincial institutions. Its abolition would inevitably result in
need for one or several installations that have the same function, so that, in
essence, it would only change its name.”[8] Basing on the conclusions of
the Ural governors it became clear that they did not deem it possible and
necessary to abandon the provincial government as an
institution of power, but preferred it to improve.
Governor’s Status
In close connection with the
above stipulated information, in each of the projects there was the idea
present in some form or another that the governor of the Russian Empire was...
weak. Specifically, merging of provincial boards in a single institution or
their accession to the provincial government should have been accompanied by
subordinating of the latter to the governor to the same extent as the
"old" provincial government. This certainly would increase the value
"of the Governor" in administration apparatus .
The governor was regarded as
an unconditional general chairman of the general office of the projected
provincial central authority in V.I. Ershov’s version[9], while N.M, Klingenberg
considered him to be a chairman of not only the main board, but also of each of
the boards, anticipated to be established in the new facility.[10] P.F. Khomutov stressed that
"in relation to the matters referring to the governing the province, the personal
orders of Governor [shall be] put to the forefront.»[11] This idea was most vividly
expressed by I.N.Sokolovski, who formulated the basic principle of future
reforms, as he saw it: "... it is only a governor who can and should be
unifying power in the province, who ... should be provided with all the means
and methods to be valid, but not a nominal master and head of the
province", "one should ... adequately support the governor's power by
rigorously protecting it from any attempts to interfere with its integrity on
the part of other departments, subordinate to the Governor, otherwise no
transformation of the provincial administration would produce good results, at
which such reforms are aimed."[12]
Such a radical formulation of
the question received its logical development in his project. Leader of
Seeming the paradoxical at the
first glance, the idea of weakness of governor's power which existed in the
Russian Empire was with anger rejected before the revolution by the opposition
- both liberal[15] and revolutionary ones. For
example, V.I. Lenin in 1901 published an article in which there was the
following phrase: "If up to now (before there appeared the circular of the
Minister of Internal Affairs dated August 17, 1901. - SL) a Governor in the
Russian province would be a true satrap, on whose good graces the existence of
any institution or even any person in the "entrusted" province
depended, now there is being created a real "martial law" in this
regard."[16] Do I need to say that in the
Soviet science the idea expressed by V.I. Lenin in reference to the very
particular case and not aspiring to be of scientific and general character,
however, for many years it used to be absolutized. And
it is only in recent decades that some historians have initiated to discuss the
issue that the governor’s power in
When the structural-functional
approach was applied to the history of the local government of the Russian
Empire it helped to reveal that during this period the implementation of many
of the functions entrusted to a governor was linked to the activities of such
management structures which were only indirectly and relatively dependent on a
governor, or were not at all dependent on him. The range of institutions
subordinate to governor was deceptive; the power of governor was an illusion.[18]
American researcher Robert
Robbins came to the conclusion that in the late XIX - early XX centuries legal
mechanisms of implementing the governor's decisions were far from being
perfect, but to some extent they were restored by "charisma" the
governor's power, by way of an image of
Sovereign’s personal representative in the region. However, such vulgar
notions had little to do with real circumstances. And the revolution of 1905
inflicted a powerful blow on this psychological factor.[19]
Thus, the position of the
bureaucratic elite of the Urals at the turn of
XIX-XX centuries finds today numerous supporters in academic circles,
both domestic and foreign, and, therefore, does not allow to reject immediately the proposals expressed in the Ural drafts as
ineffective ones. Of course, it was suggested to improve the situation by
purely administrative methods, and this revealed the narrow-mindedness (or
political caution?) of the authors. In their drafts the Governors, of course,
did not include the crucial break of the autocratic administrative system (and it was specifically such a criterion in
the Soviet science that often measured
progressiveness of the reform), but we are convinced that even within the named
system their proposals could help to optimize it, to improve its efficiency.
The management capacity of the proposed solutions was significant.
* * *
Analysis of the position of
the Ural governors on provincial reform carried out in two major directions,
suggests that, in general, the regional administration possessed the unity of
views on key issues of local links of the state government apparatus and
methods for their solutions.
There could be traced another
common feature of the analyzed reform projects - their radicalization within
the period starting from 1898-1900 and by 1903. This could be caused only by
increasing problems in the field of local administration in the absence of real
progress in addressing them. As well known, the situation developed by the end
of XIX century in this area was not affected by changes until the last days of
the Russian Empire which appeared to be an important contribution to the
development of a revolutionary situation in the regions.
[1]The
article is executed with support of the grant МD-122.2011.6
[2]For more details see: Любичанковский С.В. Губернская администрация и проблема
кризиса власти в позднеимперской России (на материалах Урала, 1892-1914). Самара-Оренбург, 2007.
[3]During the period under
investigation the Ural Region included Vyatka,
[4] «Губернское правление есть высшее в губернии место, управляющее оною в силу законов, именем Императорского Величества» ("Provincial Government is
the highest place in the province that governs it as such by force of the laws
in the name of Imperial Majesty") // Свод законов Российской империи. Т.2. Общее Учреждение Губернское (издания
[5]Заключение П.Ф. Хомутова, вятского губернатора //
Государственный архив Кировской области (ГАКО). Ф.583. Оп.603. Д.607. Л.1-1об.
[6]Богатырева О.Н. Эволюция системы местного управления
Вятской и Пермской губерний (1861-февраль 1917). Екатеринбург, 2004. С.155;
Ерошкин Н.П. История государственных учреждений дореволюционной России. Москва,
1983. С.223; Зырянов П.Н. Социальная структура местного управления
капиталистической России // Исторические записки. Т.107. Москва, 1982. С.286-287; Красняков
Н.И. Западные национальные регионы в системе государственного управления
Российской империи в XVII – начале XX вв. Закрепление автономистской традиции в российской
государственности. Екатеринбург, 2008. С. 207; Лысенко Л.М. Губернаторы и
генерал-губернаторы в системе власти дореволюционной России. Москва, 2001.
С.178-179 и др.
[7]Записка департамента общих дел МВД от 27 февраля
[8]Журнал Комиссии по реформированию местного управления
// ЦГИА РБ. Ф.И-9. Оп.1. Д.655. Л.70.
[9]Государственный архив Оренбургской области (ГАОО). Ф.10. Оп.1. Д.175. Л.62об.
[10]Записка Н.М. Клингенберна, вятского губернатора // ГАКО.
Ф.582. Оп.43а. Д.90. Л.3.
[11]ГАКО. Ф.583. Оп.603. Д.607. Л.6об.
[12]ЦГИА РБ.
Ф.И-9. Оп.1. Д.655. Л.4-4об.
[13]Там же. Л.10-10об.
[14]Там же. Л.10об.
[15]
See, for example: Гессен В.М.
Вопросы местного управления. СПб.: Право, 1904.
[16]Ленин В.И. Борьба с голодающими // Полное собрание
сочинений. 5-е изд. Т.5. С.279-280.
[17]See, for example: Шумилов М.М. Местная администрация и центральная власть в России в 50-х – начале 80-х гг. XIX в.
Москва, 1991. С.23,
188; Матханова Н.П. Губернаторская власть в XIX веке: Закон и жизнь // Проблемы истории местной администрации Сибири в XVII-XX веках. Новосибирск, 1997. С.25; Секиринский С.С. Роль губернаторов в управлении
// Проблемы управления: теория и практика. 2001. №2. С.20.
[18]Любичанковский С.В. Указ. Соч. С.54-91.
[19]РоббинсР. Сатрапы? Вице-короли? Губернаторы // Родина. 1995. №6. С.28-29.
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*Sergey
Lyubichankovskiy - Doctor of
Historical Sciences, Professor, Chair of History of
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