Talk:Emancipation reform of 1861

"Long overdue"

is POV (there are probably some people who think Russia should still have serfs today). Rewriting for NPOV. --Daniel C. Boyer 17:36, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Please find something more useful to do. Your edits border on trolling. --Ghirla ^-трёп- 17:38, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Not really; that is no argument. I'm going to revert. --Daniel C. Boyer 21:03, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

External link no longer works

The external link to the Emancipation Edict in English is no longer valid. Would it be possible for someone to create it as a wikisource text? I would do this myself if i could find a copy somewhere other than the Durham website. Jameshfisher 11:10, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

I did it myself. I have left the link to the original Russian version. Someone who understands Russian and cross-language Wiki stuff, maybe we could transfer that to ru.wikisource? Jameshfisher 12:36, 17 April 2006 (UTC)

Implementation

Can someone explain to me what the following paragraph means or re-word it so it flows better?

Although well planned in the legislation, the reform did not work smoothly.

The land-owners and nobility were paid in government bonds and their debts were removed from the money before it was handed over. The bonds soon fell in value, combined with the generally poor management skills of the land-owners under the new conditions there

--Jd147703 20:48, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

I assume it means that landowners were given bonds for the value of the land, minus any mortgages on the land. So, the land might have been worth 1000 rubles, but if 300 rubles were owed on it, the landowner would only receive bonds for 700 rubles. --Cphoffman (talk) 01:30, 1 October 2010 (UTC)

POV issue

Why was my edit reverted? I explained my edit, but the revert was not explained. Look, when you say "previously suffered by the peasants", are you not editorializing? Is it not enough to say that the serfdom was abolished? I may be missing something here, and in my long history of anon editing, I rarely immediately revert. I'm only doing so right now to get your attention, to try to hold a discussion, not start an edit war. I look forward to your comments. HuskyHuskie 20:57, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

when you say "previously suffered by the peasants", are you not editorializing?. No I am not. Of course, if you doubt they suffered, then you may request a quotation, but it is a historical fact. Or you claim it was OK for slaves to be slaves? `'mikka 22:41, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

Is it not enough to say that the serfdom was abolished? Not enough. Otherwise the question is "what's the big deal?" `'mikka 22:44, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

Well, of course I do not approve of serfdom, slavery, or any form of involuntary servitude. But I would point out that what one considers suffering, the suffrigents (did I just make up a word?) may see differently. For example, many in the West would have felt, five years ago, that life in Iraq, given the capricious nature of the killing and torturing that existed under Saddam's government, was so horrible as to justify his overthrow. Now, given the capricous nature of the killing and maiming that exists under the inept Shia government, the verdict is probably more mixed. My memory regarding the end of serfdom in Russia (a very faint memory; I should research this before I open my mouth—too late!) is that it did little to change the status of the once-serfs, and indeed, by the standards of Stalinist Russia, serfdom might even have been preferable.

I guess I just thought it was sufficient to say serfdom was eliminated, and leave the judgement of that to the individual reader. Nonetheless, I can see that one might hold the interpretation that eliminating this language might indicate an acceptance of said state, and I do not wish this. I yield. HuskyHuskie 00:14, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

An alternative would be to use another word instead of "suffering", which is indeed may appear too poetic for wikipedia style. E.g., something related to "discrimination", which would be a more exact description at the same time. Regarding the end of serfdom, please don't conflate this with October Revolution. In fact I have a first-hand family experience related to Stolypin Reform: my family comes from not very prosperous peasants in Belarus who actually bought the land after de-serfing, using state subsidies; in fact the whole village did so. Since Stolypin's reforms were aimed at strenthening of the new class of private property owners ("bourgeoisie" in Marxist parlance), no wonder it was bashed by Bolsheviks and other lefties. As for standards of "Stalinst Russia", these things are simply incomparable in the context of this article. `'mikka 00:47, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

Very interesting, truly. Thanks for the lesson, and the perspective. HuskyHuskie 03:10, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

Reform in Poland/Baltic not part of 1861 legislation

The following sentence is not technically accurate: "The uneven application of the legislation did leave many peasants in Congress Poland and northern Russia both free and landless (batraks), while in other areas peasants became the majority land owners in their province(s)." Instead, Poland and the Baltic regions had been reformed in earlier legislation (I believe in the 1820s) as a sort of test run for the later liberation of serfs in the rest of the country. Because liberation without land had not worked out very well, the 1861 legislation included land, but at an excruciatingly high price (which, itself, led to problems). —Preceding unsigned comment added by Cphoffman (talk • contribs) 01:34, 1 October 2010 (UTC)