The Argument

The purpose of this chapter is to investigate whether the apparent and distinctive tradition of Russian autocracy, under its Tsarist or Soviet guise, is an entirely random phenomenon and, to the extent that it is not, to identify its permissive conditions. We do so admittedly with an eye on the present: How much have the historical and environmental circumstances that have sustained Russian autocracy changed? How susceptible to political intervention are these circumstances? Finally, how might these circumstances be changed or ameliorated by political action by Russians and their foreign partners?

The argument advanced in this chapter may be summarized as follows: Russian political development has been shaped by the same set of factors that influenced the contours of European political development and the evolution of the various European states in particular. Whatever the degree of Asiatic (that is, Mongol) influences on Russian political culture – and they were significant – as Russia emerged from the northern Russian forest zone under the leadership of Muscovy, Russian rulers found themselves increasingly constrained to participate in an international political system dominated by more powerful and technically more advanced European states.