Abraham Lincoln and Tsar Alexander II
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Alexander II did some very non autocratic things like freeing serfs, ending various political and legal privileges for nobility, promoting local governance, and other similar things.
Nicholas was fairly out of touch and absorbed in familial issues, but similarly I don’t believe he was an autocrat like many we’ve seen since. Technically they ruled Russia, but in practice there was more distribution of leadership and some degree of autonomy in the country.
Someone who knows anything about this could and should correct me if I’m wrong. I haven’t read much about Russian history for 15 or 20 years.
I'd start from the fact that Nicolas I was not supposed to be an emperor. His elder brother Constantine should've, except secretly renounced his claim to the throne in 1823. Very few people knew it and Nicolas was not among them.
After the death of Alexander I, Nicolas proclaims Konstantin as an emperor in Saint Petersburg. While at the same time in Warsaw Konstantin abdicates the throne.
For short period of time Russia even had a coin with Konstantin I on it and part of the army even swore allegiance to him. Which was also a problem.
Anyhow - Nicolas was never taught of how to be an emperor. He has his strong sides (in international politics at least) but in the end this played a bad joke on him as he became overconfident. At the same time he ruined his own army by paying more attention to the looks instead of read education and improvements. He also managed to build the vertical system of yes sayers similar to the one Putin has now.
All of this led to Crimean War (yes, also very similar to the current situation) which led to many reforms later. Including freeing serfs, local governance etc.
Also regarding the vertical system of yes sayers, if I’m not mistaken a lot of those people were essentially telling Nicholas that he should maintain the autocracy in various ways because he had some hesitations about it.
I should read up again and refresh my memory. The empire was incredibly fascinating.
How were they non autocratic? It was him imposing them, because he was the only one who had power, and that didn't change until the 1905 revolution briefly, and really February 1917.
Alexander II might have had some liberal tendencies ( freeing the serfs could be seen as just a modernising effort), but his son and grandson, Alexander III and Nicholas II, were reactionary autocrats to the fullest extent possible.
Ever since the Enlightenment, the Enlightened Despot was something Russian Tsars saw themselves as. It was their destiny to rule as Fathers of their people, but with an iron fist. Dissent was punished with exile or execution.
I think the parent comment’s question of how autocratic it was is relevant though. Things had changed. Emperors from previous generations had been far more autocratic and ruthless as I recall.
> and many serfs simply walked away to start new lives in the growing towns
it was my understanding that before that there wasnt much anything to run to...?
Under Alexander II, Russia was on its way to becoming yet another European constitutional monarchy. His son Alexander III reversed the course, and Nicholas II continued with nationalistic autocratic rule, which ultimately ruined the backward empire and and paved the way to communism.
Monarchy is really nothing but autocracy. Leaders like Putin and Xi Jinping might as well give themselves the title "King", except they won't because that might make people start asking question like "Why are you the king and not I? . "Why does all power have to be concentrated in one person?"
This makes it sound like there was some evolutionary pressure of something.
I hope everyone understands that ~2 generations is insufficent to have any selective pressure (Putin was born in 1952)
Indeed, WW2 and the Ukranian famine in the 1930s had much more effect on the population than any political system.
And it's unclear what "negative population selection" means anyway. There's no evidence that Russians are in any way inferior to any other population group.