The Causes of the 1905 Russian Revolution

Before the events of the 1905 revolution Russia was a very turbulent place. The peasants who formed over 80% of the population were the victims of a famine on a biblical scale and wanted to own the land and not have to pay redemption payments. The Liberals who wanted to have a constitutional government to share and limit the Tsar’s power. The workers who wanted to reduce the working day and have better working conditions. So with these three main groups all wanted reform, something was going to have to change.

There were short term and long term effects that triggered the 1905 revolution. The long-term effects were the terrible famine that had struck the peasants, which made them unable to pay the redemption payments, this caused a lot of ill feeling towards the Tsar because the peasants felt that he should help them.

Another long-term effect was the industrial recession that happened after the “The Great Spurt”, the upper classes were furious because Russia was almost wholly dependant on foreign loans, especially from France, which the upper classes hated even more because it was a republic. This crippled the Russian economy, inflation rose by 40% and there was mass over crowding in the cities because of the people flocking to the cities during “The Great Spurt”, this meant that there was mass unemployment.

The short-term effects were slightly different catalysts. One important one was the Russo-Japanese war. This was a great humiliation to the Tsar because he thought that by starting a war with the weak nation of Japan and winning, he could divert attention from the problems in Russia. Unfortunately the Russian navy was comprehensively crushed by the Japanese in a series of quick decisive battles. This created outrage in Russia that such a weak nation could beat them. On top of this the army started to desert and mutiny because of the incompetence of the Tsar.

The other short-term effect was Bloody Sunday. This was the incident where industrial workers, led by Father Gapon, marched unarmed and singing patriotic songs to the Tsar’s palace in the hope of presenting a petition to use his powers to alleviate the working conditions and shorten the working day. However their intentions were misunderstood by the police force who began firing on the crown inducing mass panic. This massacre of innocent protesters led to a very negative attitude of the Tsar being formed who should have been protecting them.

All these effects combined caused the 1905 revolution. The long term effects are like petrol and the short term are like the match.