scholarly journals French Industrial Enterprises in the Russian Empire: Big Business in a Transnational Perspective

2020 ◽  
Vol 16 (4) ◽  
pp. 375-387
Author(s):  
Volodymyr A. Kulikov
Keyword(s):  
World War I ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Russian Empire ◽  
International Standards ◽  
Organizational Capabilities ◽  
World War ◽  
Free Standing ◽  
Big Business ◽  
Industrial Enterprises ◽  
The Russian Empire

Introduction. The article explores the presence of French enterprises in the late Russian Empire in order to better understand the role and weight of French firms in global big business on the eve of World War I. The author argues that the presence of large industrial enterprises operated by French businesses should be taken into consideration when discussing the organizational capabilities of modern French enterprises. This may change the perception of France as a “follower in Western Europe” in the historiography of big industrial businesses. Materials and Methods. Large French enterprises operated in the late Russian Empire are identified based on primary sources (lists of enterprises and joint-stock companies), the RUSCORP database of Russian corporations compiled by Thomas Owen, and with the help of secondary sources. Results. The paper demonstrates that several companies operated in the Russian Empire, and owned or controlled by French businesses meet the criteria of “big business” by international standards. However, because they operated beyond the borders of France, scholars did not include these firms in the lists of French big business. In addition, many companies in the Russian Empire were established on French capital and run by French managers but registered as Russian firms. It seems that French businesses were more successful in establishing and running large industrial enterprises abroad than in the territory of their own country. This might explain why French companies are relatively poorly represented in the global ranks of the largest companies before World War I. Discussion and Conclusions. It was not only French businesses that created large industrial enterprises in Russia. There were also several British, German, Belgian, and American big businesses, so these should all be taken into account when discussing the presence of big foreign businesses in Russia. To have precise evaluations, we need to develop further the global list of the largest enterprises, which would include multinationals and free-standing companies as well. The argument of researchers who placed France to the cohort of the “followers in Western Europe” was that France, in principle, was retarded with creating large industrial enterprises. The transnational approach revealed that while in France, there were few big industrial businesses, French entrepreneurs developed them successfully outside the country. The Russian case demonstrates that French business was able to establish and operate large industrial enterprises. The presence of many large French manufacturing and mining enterprises abroad is the evidence against the thesis that French industrialists were unable to benefit from the scale and scope effect.

scholarly journals Na gruzach imperium. Ukraina po upadku cesarstwa rosyjskiego: od rewolucji lutowej 1917 do traktatu brzeskiego 1918

2018 ◽  
Vol 69 (1) ◽  
pp. 83-129 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wiktor Hołubko ◽  
Adam Lityński
Keyword(s):  
Civil War ◽  
World War I ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Common Knowledge ◽  
Russian Empire ◽  
Peace Treaty ◽  
Russian Civil War ◽  
World War ◽  
The Russian Empire ◽  
Set Up

Revolution of 1917 in the Russian Empire took place in February (according to the Julian calendar) or in March (according to the Georgian calendar used in Western Europe). As a result, Tsar Nicholas II of Russia abdicated in the first phase of the revolution which caused the fall of the Romanov dynasty. Consequently, the Provisional Government was brought into power. At the time, the First World War was ongoing and Russia suffered severe defeats in the conflict. The country was ruled by chaos and various political groupswere fighting against each other. Furthermore, many nations started their fight for independence from the Russian Empire. The most significant events took place in Ukraine. The national activists set up their own governmental authority – Central Council of Ukraine. And, at the same time, various domestic conflicts took place in Ukraine as well. The situation was very complicated then as a 600 kilometer-long front line ran across Ukraine.Moreover, most of the country was occupied by German and Austria-Hungarian armies. It is common knowledge that the Bolsheviks led their forces against the Provisional Government in Petrograd, which was the contemporary capital of Russia (modern-day Saint Petersburg), in October / November 1917. The Bolsheviks seized power in Russia and, in consequence, the Russian Civil War started. The Bolsheviks were in no position to continue fighting in World War I and so they signed a separate peace treaty with Germany and Austria-Hungary in March 1918 in order to focus on the Russian Civil War. Ukraine, which was independent at the time, also signeda separate peace treaty with Germany and Austria-Hungary. A new phase in the war between Russia and Ukraine started which Ukraine eventually lost.

Transition of the Rusins of Austria-Hungary to the bosom of Orthodoxy in the end of 19th - beginning of 20th century: Lost perspective for Russia

2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 (10-4) ◽  
pp. 196-205
Author(s):  
Vadim Mikhailov ◽  
Konstantin Losev
Keyword(s):  
World War I ◽  
Cultural Identity ◽  
Russian Empire ◽  
Orthodox Church ◽  
Negative Consequences ◽  
World War ◽  
The Russian Empire ◽  
The 19Th Century ◽  
The Military ◽  
Church Policy

The article is devoted to the issue of Church policy in relation to the Rusyn population of Austria-Hungary and the Russian Empire. In the second half of the 19th century, the policy of the Austro-Hungarian administration towards the Rusyn Uniate population of the Empire underwent changes. Russia’s victories in the wars of 1849 and 1877-1878 aroused the desire of the educated part of the Rusyns to return to the bosom of the Orthodox Church. Nevertheless, even during the World War I, when the Russian army captured part of the territories inhabited by Rusyns, the military and officials of the Russian Empire were too cautious about the issue of converting Uniates to Orthodoxy, which had obvious negative consequences both for the Rusyns, who were forced to choose a Ukrainophile orientation to protect their national and cultural identity, and for the future of Russia as the leader of the Slavic and Orthodox world.

Two Tolstoys and a Lenin—Temperance and Prohibition in Russia

2021 ◽  
pp. 25-52
Author(s):  
Mark Lawrence Schrad
Keyword(s):  
World War I ◽  
Russian Empire ◽  
Leo Tolstoy ◽  
World War ◽  
Joseph Stalin ◽  
State Revenue ◽  
State Finance ◽  
Leon Trotsky ◽  
The Russian Empire ◽  
The Way

Part I of the book—covering Europe’s continental empires—begins with Chapter 2 on the Russian Empire. The state’s overreliance on revenues from the imperial vodka monopoly is laid bare beginning with the temperance revolts of the 1850s, when the empire was almost bankrupted when peasants refused to drink. The understanding of temperance as opposition to imperial autocracy is traced through the antistatist teachings of Leo Tolstoy and early Bolsheviks, including the prohibitionists Vladimir Lenin and Leon Trotsky. Despite official opposition to “subversive” temperance activism, at the outbreak of World War I in 1914 Tsar Nicholas II made Russia the first prohibitionist state, though the loss of state revenue paved the way for the revolutions of 1917. Lenin maintained a prohibition against the vodka trade, which was only undone after Lenin’s death by Joseph Stalin, who reintroduced the tsarist-era vodka monopoly in the interests of state finance.

National Minority Problems in Romania: Continuity or Change?

1994 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 71-81
Author(s):  
Stephen Fischer-Galati
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
World War I ◽  
Interwar Period ◽  
Body Politic ◽  
Russian Empire ◽  
National Minority ◽  
World War ◽  
National Minorities ◽  
Large Numbers ◽  
The Russian Empire

The national minorities question in Romania has been one of crises and polemics. This is due, in part, to the fact that Greater Romania, established at the end of World War I, brought the Old Romanian Kingdom into a body politic (a kingdom itself relatively free of minority problems), with territories inhabited largely by national minorities. Thus, the population of Transylvania and the Banat, both of which had been constituent provinces of the defunct Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, included large numbers of Hungarians and Germans, while Bessarabia, a province of the Russian empire, included large numbers of Jews. While the Hungarian (Szeklers and Magyars), Germans (Saxons and Swabians), and Jewish minorities were the largest and most difficult to integrate into Greater Romania, other sizeable national minorities such as the Bulgarians, Russians, Ukrainians, Tatars, Serbians, Turks, and Gypsies also posed problems to the rulers of Greater Romania during the interwar period and, in some cases, even after World War II.

scholarly journals Ethnic Cleansing and Its Alternatives in Wartime: A Comparison of the Austro-Hungarian, Ottoman, and Russian Empires

2017 ◽  
Vol 41 (4) ◽  
pp. 169-201 ◽  
Author(s):  
H. Zeynep Bulutgil
Keyword(s):  
World War I ◽  
Ottoman Empire ◽  
Minority Groups ◽  
Russian Empire ◽  
Ethnic Violence ◽  
Ethnic Cleansing ◽  
Political Organizations ◽  
World War ◽  
South Caucasus ◽  
The Russian Empire

According to the extant literature, state leaders pursue mass ethnic violence against minority groups in wartime if they believe that those groups are collaborating with an enemy. Treating the wartime leadership of a combatant state as a coherent unit, however, is misleading. Even in war, leaders differ in the degree to which they prioritize goals such as maintaining or expanding the territory of the state, and on whether they believe that minority collaboration with the enemy influences their ability to achieve those goals. Also, how leaders react to wartime threats from minority groups depends largely on the role that political organizations based on non-ethnic cleavages play in society. Depending on those cleavages, wartime minority collaboration may result in limited deportations and killings, ethnic cleansing, or minimal violence. A comparison of the policies of three multinational empires toward ethnic minority collaborators during World War I—the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Italians, the Ottoman Empire and Armenians, and the Russian Empire and Muslims in the South Caucasus—illustrates this finding.

scholarly journals The Revolt of 1916 and its Influence on the Formation of Kazakh Nation Identity

2019 ◽  
pp. 55-66
Author(s):  
O. Demenko
Keyword(s):  
World War I ◽  
Direct Consequence ◽  
Russian Empire ◽  
Self Determination ◽  
Economic Factors ◽  
World War ◽  
Political Factors ◽  
Colonial Policy ◽  
The Russian Empire ◽  
Colonial Police

The article explores the revolt of Kazakh people against the Russian colonial policy which took place during World War I in 1916. There are analyzed the main reasons of the revolt, amongst whichsocio-economic factors as well as political factors are determined. In spite of the fact that the revolt of 1916, which had taken the form of National Liberation Revolution, generally was defeated, it causedthe growth of national self-determination, the increase in political participation and also formed certain experience of independent Kazakh people’s state-building. The revolt swept almost the whole territory of modern Kazakhstan and took an unprecedented scale and cruelty within the Russian empire. In consequence, the significant losses were incurred and hundreds of thousands of people were forced to leave their homelands. These events are considered to be the direct consequence of the colonial police of the Russian Empire towards the subdue peoples.

scholarly journals Everyday Life of German Prisoners of War in the Russian Empire during World War I (on the basis of personal documents)

2020 ◽  
pp. 67-75
Author(s):  
С.Р. Повалишникова ◽  
О.В. Захарова
Keyword(s):  
World War I ◽  
Everyday Life ◽  
Present Article ◽  
Russian Empire ◽  
Prisoners Of War ◽  
Eastern Siberia ◽  
World War ◽  
Prisoner Of War ◽  
The Russian Empire ◽  
Russian Research

Основной массив современных отечественных исследований направлен на изучение положения русских военнопленных в годы Первой мировой войны. В настоящей статье сделана попытка проанализировать бытовые условия содержания военнопленных, находившихся на территории Российской империи. Эти условия во многом зависели от звания и национальности пленных. В статье делается акцент на источники личного происхождения. Особое внимание уделяется воспоминаниям немецкого генерала Э. Людендорфа, немецкого журналиста А. Курта и находившегося в Восточной Сибири немецкого военнопленного Э. Двингера. The vast majority of modern Russian research is aimed at the investigation of the position of Russian prisoners of war during World War I. The present article attempts to analyze the conditions of everyday life of German prisoners of war who lived in the Russian Empire during World War I. The conditions largely depended on the rank and nationality of prisoners of war. The article analyzes personal documents. It focuses on memoirs written by E. Ludensdorff (German general), A. Kurt (German journalist), who lived in Eastern Siberia, and E. Dwinger (German prisoner of war).

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