Evsey Domar’s 1970 article, “The Causes of Slavery or Serfdom” (The Journal of Economic History. Vol. XXX, March, 1970) made him a one-hit wonder in the field of economic history. But what a hit!
He shared some of his life-long passion for Russian economic history with M.I.T. graduate students back when M.I.T. could boast having three professors teaching economic history — Charles Kindleberger covered modern European history, Evsey Domar focussed on his Russian peasants, and Peter Temin was there for U.S. economic history of the new cliometric fashion. Just about ten years ago Peter Temin wrote a memoir on “the rise and fall of economic history at MIT“.
One salient memory I took from Domar’s Russian economic history class is associated with the very first meeting when Domar, not a very tall man, lugged into the classroom a huge rolled-up map of Russia to hang on the blackboard. He hardly referred to the map so I presumed he once ordered it in a fit of enthusiasm that far exceeded its pedagogical usefulness. Or maybe Domar was a kindred spirit of The Dude (see “Lebowski, Big”) and thought his Russia map really tied the classroom together.
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PROBLEMS IN RUSSIAN ECONOMIC HISTORY
14.732
E.D. Domar
Spring Term 1974-75
The purpose of this list is to indicate to the student the sources in which the more important topics of the course are discussed from several points of view. He will be held responsible for the topics rather than for “who said what.”
Since it is difficult to understand the economic and social developments in a country without a good general background in the country’s history, it is suggested that students who have not had a course in Russian history familiarize themselves with some standard textbook, such as A History of Russia by Nicholas V. Riasanovsky (New York: Oxford University Press, 1963), to which some references will be made here.
The book which will be used from cover to cover is Jerome Blum, Lord and Peasant in Russia from the Ninth to the Nineteenth Century (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1961). It would be best to buy a copy. (Paperbacks are available).
Each student is expected to write a term paper of about 30 double-spaced pages on a subject agreed upon with the instructor.
There will be a 80 minute final examination on the last day of class in May.
PART I – KIEVAN RUSSIA
PART II – APPANAGE RUSSIA
REQUIRED
Riasanovsky, Parts I, Il, and III.
Blum, Introduction, Chapters 1-7.
RECOMMENDED
Karl Bosl, Alexander Gieysztor, Frantisek Graus, M. M. Postan, and Ferdinand Seibt, Eastern and Western Europe in the Middle Ages (Harcourt Brace, Jovanovich, Inc., 1971).
Francis Dvornik, The Slavs in European History and Civilization (Rutgers University Press).
James Gregory, Russian Land, Soviet People: A Geographical Approach to the U.S.S.R. (London, 1968).
V. O. Kliuchevsky, A History of Russia, translation by C. J. Hogarth.
Peter Liashchenko, History of the National Economy of Russia to the 1917 Revolution, translated by L. M. Herman (New York: 1949, 1970).
Frank Nowak, Medieval Slavdom and the Rise of Russia (Greenwood Press, Inc.)
W. H. Parker, An Historical Geography of Russia (London: 1968).
Henry Paszkiewicz, The Origin of Russia (New York: 1969).
M. N. Pokrovaky, History of Russia from the Earliest Times to the Rise of Commercial Capitalism(Bloomington, Indiana: 1966).
B. H. Slicher (van Bath), The Agrarian History of Western Europe, A.D. 500-1850.
Arnold J. Toynbee, A Study of History, Vol. III, pp. 391-454.
George Vernadsky, Kievan Russia (New Haven: 1948).
George Vernadsky, The Mongols and Russia (New Haven: 1953).
Warren B. Walsh, Readings in Russian History from Ancient Times to the Post-Stalin Era, Vol. I, (Syracuse University Press, 1963).
PART III — THE DEVELOPMENT OF SERFDOM BEFORE PETER I
XVI and XVII CENTURIES
REQUIRED
Riasanovsky, Part IV (as a background)
Blum, Chapters 8-14.
Evsey D. Domar, “The Causes of Slavery or Serfdom,” The Journal of Economic History. Vol. XXX, March, 1970, pp. 18-32.
Richard Hellie, Enserfment and Military Change in Muscovy (Chicago: 1970). Introduction, Parts I, II (omit the details and get the man ideas).
Joseph T. Fuhrmann, The Origins of Capitalism in Russia: Industry and Progress in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries (Chicago: 1972), Chapters 1, 2, 10-13 (omit the details).
RECOMMENDED
Paul Avrich, Russian Rebels, 1600-1800 (Schocken Booke, 1972).
Lloyd E. Berry and Robert O. Crummey, editors, Rude & Barbarous Kingdom (The University of Washington Press, 1968).
V. O. Kliuchevsky, A Course in Russian History: The 17th Century (Quadrangle Books, Inc.)
James Mavor, An Economic History of Russia (New York: 1965), two volumes.
R. E. F. Smith, The Enserfment of the Russian Peasantry (Cambridge: 1968).
George Vernadsky, The Tsardom of Moscow, 1547-1682, in two volumes, (London and New Haven: Yale University Press, 1969).
Jerome Blum, “The Rise of Serfdom in Eastern Europe,” American Historical Review, Vol. LXII, 1957, pp. 807-836.
T. S. Wellan, The Early History of the Russia Company (New York: 1969).
See also Part I and II of the Reading List.
PART IV – FROM PETER I TO THE EMANCIPATION OF THE PEASANTS
1700 — 1861
REQUIRED
Blum, Chapters 15-27.
James Mavor, An Economic History of Russia (New York: 1925, 1965), pp. 100-141 (omit the details).
A. Kahan, “Continuity in Economic Activity and Policy During the Post-Petrine Period in Russia,” The Journal of Economic History, Vol. XXV, March, 1965, pp. 61-85.
A. Kahan, “The Costs of ‘Westernization’ in Russia: The Gentry and the Economy in the Eighteenth Century,” The Slavic Review, Vol. XXV, March, 1966, pp. 40-66.
R. Portal, “The Industrialization of Russia,” The Cambridge Economic History of Europe, Vol. VI, Part II, (Cambridge: 1965), pp. 801-810.
W. Blackwell, The Beginnings of Russian Industrialization, 1800-1860 (Princeton: 1968), (Get the main ideas and omit all details).
RECOMMENDED
Clifford M. Foust, Muscovite and Mandarin: Russia’s Trade with China and its Setting, 1727-1805 (Chapel Hill, N.C.: The University of North Carolina Press, 1969).
Baron August Von Haxthausen, Studies on the Interior of Russia (University of Chicago Press, 1972).
Baron August Von Haxthausen, The Russian Empire, Volume 1 and 2.
James Mavor, An Economic History of Russia (New York: Russell and Russell, Inc., 1925, 1965), pp. 142-374, Volume I.
Anatole G. Mazour, The First Russian Revolution, 1825: The Decembrist Movement — Its Origins, Development, and Significance (Stanford: 1937).
Walter McKenzie Pintner, Russian Economic Policy Under Nicholas I (Cornell University Press, 1967).
Charles H. Pearson, Russia by a Recent Traveller (Frank Cass and Co. Limited, 1970).
S. P. Turin, From Peter the Great to Lenin: A History of the Russian Labour Movement with Special Reference to Trade Unionism (W. Heffer and Sons)
PART V — FROM THE EMANCIPATION OF THE PEASANTS TO
THE SOVIET REGIME 1861-1917
REQUIRED
A. Gerschenkron, “Agrarian Policies and Industrialization: Russia 1861-1917,” The Cambridge Economic History of Europe, Vol. VI, Part II, (Cambridge: 1965) , pp. 706-800 (Get the main ideas and skip the details).
G. T. Robinson, Rural Russia Under the Old Regime (New York: 1962).
A. Gerschenkeron, “Russia: Patterns and Problems of Economic Development, 1861-1958,” Economic Backwardness in Historical Perspective (Cambridge, Mass.: 1962), pp. 119-151.
A. Gerschenkron, “The Rate of Industrial Growth in Russia Since 1885,” The Tasks of Economic History, Supplement VII, 1947, to The Journal of Economic History, pp. 144-174.
R. W. Goldsmith, “The Economic Growth of Tsarist Russia, 1860-1913,” Economic Development and Cultural Change, Vol. IX, April, 1961, pp. 441-475 (only pp. 441-443 are required).
Paul Gregory, “Economic Growth and Structural Change in Tsarist Russia: A Case of Modern Economic Growth?” Soviet Studies, Vol. XXIII, January, 1972, pp. 418-434.
T. H. Von Laue, Sergei Witte and the Industrialization of Russia (New York: 1963), (not in detail), pp. 1-35, 262-308.
RECOMMENDED
Dorothy Atkinson, “The Statistics on the Russian Land Commune, 1905-1917,” Slavic Review, Vol. 32, Number 4, December, 1973, pp. 773-787.
Alexis N. Antsyferov, Russian Agriculture during the War: Rural Economy (New Haven: 1930).
Haim Barkai, “The Macro-Economics of Tsarist Russia in the Industrialization Era: Monetary Developments, the Balance of Payments and the Gold Standard, The Journal of Economic History, Vol. XXXIII, June, 1973, pp. 339-371.
A.V. Chayanov, The Theory of Peasant Economy (Homewood, Illinois: 1966).
T. Emmons, The Russian Gentry and the Peasant Emancipation to 1861 (Cambridge: 1968).
A. Gerschenkron, Continuity in History and Other Essays (Cambridge, Mass.: 1968).
A. Gerschenkron, Europe in the Russian Mirror: Four Lectures in Economic History (Cambridge University Press, 1970).
Geoffrey A. Hosking, The Russian Constitutional Experiment: Government and Duma, 1907-1914 (New York and London: Cambridge University Press, 1973).
Isaac A. Hourwich, The Economics of the Russian Village (New York: Columbia University, 1892).
Stefan Kieniewicz, The Emancipation of the Polish Peasantry (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1969).
V. I. Lenin, The Development of Capitalism in Russia, (second Russian edition, Moscow: 1907; English translation, Moscow: 1956).
James Mavor, An Economic History of Russia (New York: Russell & Russell, 1925, 1965).
John P. Mckay, Pioneers for Profit: Foreign Entrepreneurship and Russian Industrialization, 1885-1913(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1970).
Margaret Miller, The Economic Development of Russia, 1905-1914, second edition, (New York: 1967).
W. H. Parker, A Historical Geography of Russia (London: 1968).
Alfred J. Rieber, editor, Politics of Autocracy: Letters of Alexander II to Prince Bariatinskii, 1857-1865 (New York: 1966).
Amende Roosa, “Russian Industrialists and ‘State Socialism’, 1906-1917,” Soviet Studies, Vol. XXIII, January, 1972, pp. 395-417.
Teodor Shanin, The Awkward Class: Political Sociology of Peasantry in a Developing Society: Russia 1910-1925 (Oxford: 1972).
Mikhail I. Tugan-Baranovsky, The Russian Factory in the 19th Century, Richard D. Irwin, 1970.
Wayne S. Vucinich, editor, The Peasant in Nineteenth-Century Russia (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1968; London: 1970).
Reginald E. Zelnik, Labor and Society in Tsarist Russia: The Factory Workers of St. Petersburg, 1855-1870(Stanford: April, 1971).
Male, D. J., Russian Peasant Organisation Before Collectivisation. A Study of Commune and Gathering 1925-1930. (Cambridge University Press, 1971).
Source: Personal copy of Irwin Collier.
Image Source: MIT Economics Facebook post (Evsey Domar, In Memoriam) of October 10, 2014.