Society
See also: History of Russian culture, Russian literature, Russian opera, Technology in the Russian Empire, and Cinema of the Russian EmpireIt was a rural society spread over vast spaces; in 1913, 80% of the people were peasants. Soviet historiography proclaimed that the Russian Empire of the 19th century was characterized by systemic crisis, which impoverished the workers and peasants and culminated in the revolutions of the early 20th century. Recent research by Russian scholars disputes this interpretation. Mironov assesses the effects of the reforms of latter 19th-century especially in terms of the 1861 emancipation of the serfs, agricultural output trends, various standard of living indicators, and taxation of peasants. He argues that they brought about measurable improvements in social welfare. More generally, he finds that the well-being of the Russian people declined during the most of the 18th century, but increased slowly from the end of the 18th century to 1914.
Read more about this topic: Russian Empire
Famous quotes containing the word society:
“Every individual necessarily labours to render the annual revenue of the society as great as he can. He generally, indeed, neither intends to promote the publick interest, nor knows how much he is promoting it.... He intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention.”
—Adam Smith (1723–1790)
“You cannot have one well-bred man without a whole society of such. They keep each other up to any high point. Especially women;Mit requires a great many cultivated women,—saloons of bright, elegant, reading women, accustomed to ease and refinement, to spectacles, pictures, sculpture, poetry, and to elegant society, in order that you have one Madame de Staël.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“As a remedy to life in society I would suggest the big city. Nowadays, it is the only desert within our means.”
—Albert Camus (1913–1960)