Emancipation

Emancipation by Peter Kolchin is a sequel to his landmark study, offering a comparison between the transition to freedom after American emancipation and the Russian Great Reforms.

An enlightening comparative history. . . . Often revelatory for those who may think of the emancipation of enslaved Americans as an almost unique event."—Fergus M. Bordewich, Wall Street Journal

The two largest transitions from unfree to free labour during the nineteenth century took place in the United States and Russia. Both transitions occurred in the 1860s, with former slaves and serfs striving to maximise their autonomy and freedom, while former masters endeavoured to preserve as many of their prerogatives as possible. Both groups were only partially successful in these efforts.

In this magisterial and long-awaited work, Kolchin demonstrates that a more radical break with the past was possible in the United States compared to Russia. Southern freedpeople came to enjoy republican citizenship, whereas Russian peasants remained subjects rather than citizens. Both countries experienced conservative reactions triumphing in the late nineteenth century. This conservatism, common in most emancipations, was particularly pronounced in Russia and the American South, in part as a reaction against significant efforts to restructure the social order known as Reconstruction in the United States and the Great Reforms in Russia.