Russian Liberalism 1880s–1890s and Its Ideological Doubles: Conservatism, "Neo-Slavophiles" and "Narodniki"

Abstract

Darina Grigorova’s article “Russian Liberalism in the 1880s–1890s and Its Ideological Doubles: Conservatism, Liberal Narodnichestvo and the ‘New-Old’ Post-Slavophilism” offers a comparative study of Russian liberal thought during the reign of Alexander III, a period often neglected by historiography. The author argues that the 1880s–1890s mark the formulation of the “Rossiiskii” (imperial) liberalism, a late romantic and predominantly rural-oriented form of liberalism, whose major representatives — K. K. Arseniev, L. Z. Slonimskii, M. M. Stasiulevich and others — articulated their views through Vestnik Evropy.
Rejecting the idea that liberalism “slept” between 1881 and 1905, Grigorova shows its continuous intellectual vitality and its defense of the peasant commune, social mobility and individual rights within the autocratic empire. Through comparison with contemporary conservatism (Katkov, Pobedonostsev), liberal populism (Vorontsov, Krivenko), and post-Slavophile thought (I. S. Aksakov), she constructs a typology of Russian liberalism:
– classical and romantic (remaining within the sphere of ideas);
– social (rejecting laissez-faire);
– democratic (protecting peasant interests);
– bourgeois (by social composition);
– imperial (opposed to ethnic nationalism);
– bureaucratic (in its official governmental expression).
The article concludes that Russian liberalism of the 1880s–1890s served as an intellectual bridge between the Great Reforms and the liberal constitutional movements after 1905, shaping the political mindset of early twentieth-century reformers.