William G. Rosenberg

Amidst the vast literature on the parties and politics of revolutionary Russia and its near constant appropriation for presentist purposes over the years, States of Anxiety assesses the effects of the great scarcities and enormous losses that Russia experienced between 1914 and 1921, a period of dramatic civil conflicts and Russia's “long World War.” Scarcities meant not only the deficits of necessary goods like food, but also their accompanying anxieties and fears. Using archival documents and materials of the period almost exclusively, this study explores how the tsarist, democratic liberal, democratic socialist, and Bolshevik regimes all addressed the forms and effects of scarcity and loss in ways they hoped would assure the revolutionary outcomes of their own historical imaginations. Looking closely at their efforts, it suggests how and why each failed to do so. Approaching the Russian revolutionary period in these terms involves exploring a broad range of connected issues. Material scarcities involved problems with market exchange, prices, and inflation, as well as procurement, production, and distribution. They involved fiscal policies, monetary emissions, and the effects of escalating debt. But they also directly engaged cultural understandings of fairness, sacrifice, and social difference, and were accompanied by what today would be called today the anxieties of “food insecurity,” the dangerous risks of unemployment, and a range of fears about family and community welfare. Officials and members of various state and public committees of various political orientations faced both the threats and actualities of market collapse, rampant speculation, black markets, increasingly visible social inequalities, and an array of emotional fields whose implications need to be understood. The statistical and other objective dimensions of scarcity and loss are generally described in ways that omit their complex emotional dimension, as the language of “food insecurity” obscures the actual effects of hunger. While taking into account important recent contributions to a large historiography, new efforts to decipher historical feelings and emotions, and attention to the languages through which events and feelings both were represented and given coherence, this book contributes to a broader understanding of the social and cultural foundations of uprisings and revolutionary upheavals.

Although many Russians thought that the Constitutional Democrats, or Kadets, would be the party that would lead them through the Russian Revolution into the ranks of the Western European democracies, the Kadets were easily crushed by the Bolsheviks in the struggle for power. How the Kadets responded to the events of the revolution and failed at the time of the party's greatest crisis is the subject of William G. Rosenberg's study. As political history, the book examines the values, programs, organization, and tactices of Russia's most priminent liberal party from 1917 to 1921. As a study of the Russian Revolution and Civil War, it probes the strengths and weaknesses of the one political group whose politices did more to influence the outcome of events that any other political organization except the Bolsheviks. Based largely on party journals and emigre archives, the book focuses not only on the role of the Kadets in the revolution, but also on the broader issue of the relationship of Russiasn liberal politics to revolutionary social forces. William G. Rosenberg is Associate Professor of History at the University of Michigan. Originally published in 1974. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

Although many Russians thought that the Constitutional Democrats, or Kadets, would be the party that would lead them through the Russian Revolution into the ranks of the Western European democracies, the Kadets were easily crushed by the Bolsheviks in the struggle for power. How the Kadets responded to the events of the revolution and failed at the time of the party's greatest crisis is the subject of William G. Rosenberg's study. As political history, the book examines the values, programs, organization, and tactices of Russia's most priminent liberal party from 1917 to 1921. As a study of the Russian Revolution and Civil War, it probes the strengths and weaknesses of the one political group whose politices did more to influence the outcome of events that any other political organization except the Bolsheviks. Based largely on party journals and emigre archives, the book focuses not only on the role of the Kadets in the revolution, but also on the broader issue of the relationship of Russiasn liberal politics to revolutionary social forces. William G. Rosenberg is Associate Professor of History at the University of Michigan. Originally published in 1974. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

More than seventy years since the Bolsheviks came to power, there is still no comprehensive study of workers' activism in history's first successful workers' revolution. Strikes and Revolution in Russia, 1917 is the first effort in any language to explore this issue in both quantitative and qualitative terms and to relate strikes to the broader processes of Russia's revolutionary transformation. Diane Koenker and William Rosenberg not only provide a new basis for understanding essential elements of Russia's social and political history in this critical period but also make a strong contribution to the literature on European labor movements. Using statistical techniques, but without letting methodology dominate their discussion, the authors examine such major problems as the mobilization of labor and management, factory relations, perceptions, the formation of social identities, and the relationship between labor protest and politics in 1917. They challenge common assumptions by showing that much strike activity in 1917 can be understood as routine, but they are also able to demonstrate how the character of strikes began to change and why. Originally published in 1990. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

More than seventy years since the Bolsheviks came to power, there is still no comprehensive study of workers' activism in history's first successful workers' revolution. Strikes and Revolution in Russia, 1917 is the first effort in any language to explore this issue in both quantitative and qualitative terms and to relate strikes to the broader processes of Russia's revolutionary transformation. Diane Koenker and William Rosenberg not only provide a new basis for understanding essential elements of Russia's social and political history in this critical period but also make a strong contribution to the literature on European labor movements. Using statistical techniques, but without letting methodology dominate their discussion, the authors examine such major problems as the mobilization of labor and management, factory relations, perceptions, the formation of social identities, and the relationship between labor protest and politics in 1917. They challenge common assumptions by showing that much strike activity in 1917 can be understood as routine, but they are also able to demonstrate how the character of strikes began to change and why. Originally published in 1990. The Princeton Legacy Library uses the latest print-on-demand technology to again make available previously out-of-print books from the distinguished backlist of Princeton University Press. These editions preserve the original texts of these important books while presenting them in durable paperback and hardcover editions. The goal of the Princeton Legacy Library is to vastly increase access to the rich scholarly heritage found in the thousands of books published by Princeton University Press since its founding in 1905.

Processing the Past explores the dramatic changes taking place in historical understanding and archival management and in the relations between historians and archivists. Written by an archivist and a historian, it shows how these changes have been brought on by new historical thinking, new conceptions of archives, changing notions of historical authority, modifications in archival practices, and new information technologies. The book situates archives as subjects rather than places of study and examines the increasingly problematic relationships between historical and archival work. The authors contend that though historians and archivists once occupied the same conceptual and methodological space, they have divided into two separate professions with distinct conceptual frameworks and understandings of the authorities that govern their work: historians now ask questions not easily answered by traditional documentation, and archivists confront the challenges of new technologies and increases in the amounts of material they process. Blouin and Rosenberg conclude by raising the question of what future historical archives might be like if historical scholars and archivists no longer understand each other.

Processing the Past explores the dramatic changes taking place in historical understanding and archival management, and hence the relations between historians and archivists. Written by an archivist and a historian, it shows how these changes have been brought on by new historical thinking, new conceptions of archives, changing notions of historical authority, modifications in archival practices, and new information technologies. The book takes an "archival turn" by situating archives as subjects rather than places of study, and examining the increasingly problematic relationships between historical and archival work. The book sets the background to these changes by showing how nineteenth- and early twentieth-century historians and archivists in Europe and North American came to occupy the same conceptual and methodological space. For both, authoritative history was based on authoritative archives and mutual understandings of scientific research. The authors then show how these connections changed as historians began to ask questions not easily answered by traditional documentation, and archivists began to confront an unmanageable increase in the amount of material they processed and the challenges of new electronic technologies. The book situates these changes in a review of contemporary historical concepts and archival practices. The authors contend that historians and archivists have divided into two entirely separate professions with distinct conceptual frameworks, training, and purposes, as well as different understandings of the authorities that govern their work. Processing the Past moves toward bridging this divide by speaking in one voice to these very different audiences as well as to general readers. The book concludes by raising the worrisome question of what future historical archives might be like if historical scholars and archivists no longer understand each other, and indeed, whether their now different notions of what is archival and historical will ever again be joined.

In the best tradition of historical writing, this fascinating study concentrates on the distinguishing characteristics of the Russian and Chinese experiences of revolution during the same time period. Using quotations, anecdotes, and colorful descriptive material, the authors unravel the tangle of people, places, and events central to understanding the nature of revolutionary change.