Russian Rightists in 1906 to 1916: Their Relations with the Power Structure and Society, and Their Prescriptions for Preserving the Monarchy

Abstract

The current state of scholarly literature on the prerevolutionary Russian right-wing parties is highly impressive, expressing as it does a variety of viewpoints on that phenomenon in Russia’s political life. This topic, which was at one point virtually off limits and was for quite a long time thereafter treated simplistically and with bias, began in the 1990s to attract the close attention of scholars who by now have studied the most important story lines in the history of the rightist movement. Despite the persistent lacunae, contemporary historiography and the corpus of accessible sources do allow for a number of generalizations and narrower observations to be made on the subject. Rather than professing that the scope of this article could possibly encompass all the aspects of the topic set forth in the title, I will touch here on just a few features that in my view present the greatest interest.