Describe the condition of the Russian farmers and workers before the Russian revolution of 1917
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Absolutism had always placed great pressure on the living conditions of the working masses, but the war raised these pressures to new levels.
In spite of 6-8 percent yearly growth in industry, the conditions of the Russian working class had been worsening in the 10 years prior to the 1917 revolution. The mood within the working class was increasingly bitter and the few rights which had been gained by the workers’ movement were gradually undermined by years of reaction and the First World War.
The Tsarist factory management reflected the combined and uneven development of Russia. At its inception, it managed the extremely modern factories with the same crudeness and violence of the early stages of capitalism. Threats, sanctions, fines and physical violence were acceptable methods of “encouragement” to raise productivity levels. The 1905 revolution had a sobering effect on the industrialists, but after it was defeated, management wanted to reassert itself and restored many of its old methods.
The beating of workers, the degrading ritual of searching workers as they left the factories and fining them for the most arbitrary reasons was normal practice. The hated foremen, the low ranking managers who ruled the shop floors like their own small private kingdoms, were in charge of carrying out these methods, supported by the even more hated sluzhashchie, a layer of white collar workers who were used as the extended arm of management amongst the workers.
When the war began, the ruling class was temporarily strengthened by the sweeping mood of patriotism. Under the banner of “defence of the fatherland” overtime limits were lifted - working hours actually increased for the first time since 1905 - and laws protecting female and child labour were annulled. Management, unhindered by the law and with the active support of the state, increasingly used threats of sending workers to the front, jail or exile to assert itself.
The safety and wellbeing of the workers were of secondary concern for the industrialists. In 1912, the director of the Okhta explosives factory, General Somov, remarked to the Duma after an accident which killed five and injured fifty, “Such accidents do happen and will go on happening. I for one never enter the factory without first making the sign of the cross.” This statement is revealing of the attitude of the Russian capitalists towards the working class. A female worker described the conditions in the melinite shop of the same factory in 1915: “In the part where they do the washing and spraying, the air is so suffocating and poisonous that someone unused to it could not stand it for more than five or ten minutes. Your whole body becomes poisoned by it.” It is true that the Okhta explosives factory was notoriously unsafe, but the attitude of General Somov was not far from that of the bourgeoisie in general.
Outside the factory gates the bosses inflicted a more brutal type of violence on the workers - that of chronic poverty. Sergei Prokopovich, a Russian Menshevik, estimated that one needed about three times the average annual wage of a worker to support a family in Petrograd. In the context of wartime expansion of production, wages - which started from a low base - increased slightly, mainly as a result of increased overtime and longer working hours. But this increase was soon eaten up by spiralling inflation. Throughout the country, real wages fell during the war, in particular in the course of 1916. Petrograd, home to the crucial defence industries, was probably the only region of Russia where real wages rose in industry. But that only lasted until the winter of 1916, after which wages fell rapidly. By the time of the February Revolution, Petrograd wages were around 15% to 20% below the level of 1913.
Food, the largest element in the budgets of working class families, took up about half of all income. A survey in the Baltic shipyard in 1917 showed that 60% of income was spent on food and lighting. The second largest item of expenditure for working class families was accommodation. Only a minority could afford separate accommodation. The majority of workers lived in partitioned rooms in badly sanitised neighbourhoods.
Hope it helps you!
Absolutism had always placed great pressure on the living conditions of the working masses, but the war raised these pressures to new levels.
In spite of 6-8 percent yearly growth in industry, the conditions of the Russian working class had been worsening in the 10 years prior to the 1917 revolution. The mood within the working class was increasingly bitter and the few rights which had been gained by the workers’ movement were gradually undermined by years of reaction and the First World War.
The Tsarist factory management reflected the combined and uneven development of Russia. At its inception, it managed the extremely modern factories with the same crudeness and violence of the early stages of capitalism. Threats, sanctions, fines and physical violence were acceptable methods of “encouragement” to raise productivity levels. The 1905 revolution had a sobering effect on the industrialists, but after it was defeated, management wanted to reassert itself and restored many of its old methods.
The beating of workers, the degrading ritual of searching workers as they left the factories and fining them for the most arbitrary reasons was normal practice. The hated foremen, the low ranking managers who ruled the shop floors like their own small private kingdoms, were in charge of carrying out these methods, supported by the even more hated sluzhashchie, a layer of white collar workers who were used as the extended arm of management amongst the workers.
When the war began, the ruling class was temporarily strengthened by the sweeping mood of patriotism. Under the banner of “defence of the fatherland” overtime limits were lifted - working hours actually increased for the first time since 1905 - and laws protecting female and child labour were annulled. Management, unhindered by the law and with the active support of the state, increasingly used threats of sending workers to the front, jail or exile to assert itself.
The safety and wellbeing of the workers were of secondary concern for the industrialists. In 1912, the director of the Okhta explosives factory, General Somov, remarked to the Duma after an accident which killed five and injured fifty, “Such accidents do happen and will go on happening. I for one never enter the factory without first making the sign of the cross.” This statement is revealing of the attitude of the Russian capitalists towards the working class. A female worker described the conditions in the melinite shop of the same factory in 1915: “In the part where they do the washing and spraying, the air is so suffocating and poisonous that someone unused to it could not stand it for more than five or ten minutes. Your whole body becomes poisoned by it.” It is true that the Okhta explosives factory was notoriously unsafe, but the attitude of General Somov was not far from that of the bourgeoisie in general.
Outside the factory gates the bosses inflicted a more brutal type of violence on the workers - that of chronic poverty. Sergei Prokopovich, a Russian Menshevik, estimated that one needed about three times the average annual wage of a worker to support a family in Petrograd. In the context of wartime expansion of production, wages - which started from a low base - increased slightly, mainly as a result of increased overtime and longer working hours. But this increase was soon eaten up by spiralling inflation. Throughout the country, real wages fell during the war, in particular in the course of 1916. Petrograd, home to the crucial defence industries, was probably the only region of Russia where real wages rose in industry. But that only lasted until the winter of 1916, after which wages fell rapidly. By the time of the February Revolution, Petrograd wages were around 15% to 20% below the level of 1913.
Food, the largest element in the budgets of working class families, took up about half of all income. A survey in the Baltic shipyard in 1917 showed that 60% of income was spent on food and lighting. The second largest item of expenditure for working class families was accommodation. Only a minority could afford separate accommodation. The majority of workers lived in partitioned rooms in badly sanitised neighbourhoods.
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Answer:
Prior to 1917, the working class of Russia lived in abject poverty under the Tsars who encouraged capitalists.
The wages were very low that the workers could not buy proper food or live in decent houses. The working hours were long and conditions of work unhygienic in most cases. There was no medical cover or medical facilities that the workers could afford. Many of them died of work-related diseases. This led the working class to unite and revolt against the Tsarist regime in 1917 and ultimately resulted in the birth of communism.
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