On March 22 and 24, the Moscow and St. Petersburg
offices of the Russian United Democratic Party YABLOKO hosted
the launch of Reform or Revolution: The Quest for Responsible
Government in the First Russian State Duma, a book by Russian
historian and journalist Vladimir Kara-Murza, Jr. The book
recounts the unsuccessful attempt by the Constitutional Democratic
Party (Kadets) to form a government during the short period
of existence of the first Russian Parliament in April–July
1906.
The Kadets, who won Russia’s first parliamentary election
and formed a majority in the Duma, maintained that only a
fully-fledged constitutional system and far-reaching political
and social-economic reforms could forestall a revolution and
ensure the country’s peaceful development. In their quest
to form a government – and thus establish the precedent of
parliamentary rule – the Kadets found allies at the top levels
of the Czarist regime. The book recalls a secret meeting between
Kadet leader Pavel Milyukov and imperial palace commandant
Dmitri Trepov at the Cubat restaurant in St. Petersburg. But
the plans for a Kadet government were disrupted by Interior
Minister Pyotr Stolypin, who convinced Nicholas II to dissolve
Parliament.
“Having dashed the hopes for a peaceful legislative transformation
of the country, the Czarist authorities laid the ground for
future revolutionary upheavals”, said Kara-Murza, who called
the failure to establish parliamentary government in 1906
“one of the greatest missed opportunities in Russian history”.
The book’s epigraph is a saying by German statesman Otto von
Bismarck: “The strength of revolutionaries lies not in the
ideas of their leaders, but in a small dose of moderate demands
not satisfied in time”.
Photo: Vladimir Kara-Murza
Speaking at the launch, YABLOKO’s founder Grigory Yavlinsky
congratulated Vladimir Kara-Murza on his book. “Politics to
a great extent means knowing the past, understanding the present,
and looking into the future”, Yavlinsky said, “All of this
is nearly impossible to find in today’s Russia”.
Photo: Griogry Yavlinsky, Vladimir Kara-Murza
and Galina Mikhalyova, Executive Secretary of YABLOKO's Political
Committee
Reform or Revolution: The Quest for Responsible Government
in the First Russian State Duma (in Russian) is available
online:
http://www.yabloko.ru/books/Kara_Murza_sait.pdf
See also:
Understanding Russia |
