Time to read: 23 minutes(s)

AMIRAN URUSHADZE: In general, the Russian Empire—unlike, for example, the British Empire—was a military-political project. While the British Empire was, one might say, a commercial project, where trade, financial, and economic interests played a very significant role, the Russian Empire also had these same factors, but military-strategic interests were ultimately the determining factor, and the Russian Empire was a kind of "empire in epaulettes." The highlanders were governed in such a way that the system of governance was an extension of the system of conquest of the North Caucasus.

STUDIO: Over the century and a half that the Caucasian territories were part of Russia, the imperial authorities tried various methods of governing them. However, as historian Amiran Urushadze puts it, all these methods ultimately allowed them to control the Caucasus, but did not turn it into a "simple extension of the internal Russian provinces," as Emperor Nicholas I had sought. This is the podcast "From Now on, We'll Manage It Ourselves." My name is Andrey Allahverdov. Hello.

The vast Caucasian lands, of course, weren't limited to the region we now commonly call the North Caucasus. The Caucasian Viceroyalty wasn't even an administrative unit of the empire. Over the years, this region, which included the territory of modern-day Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, and even lands that now belong to Turkey, was divided into various regions and provinces, inhabited by peoples with completely different ways of life and speaking different languages. We're talking with historian Amiran Urushadze, author of "The Caucasian War: Seven Stories," about how this vast region, still remote from the center, was governed. Hello.

AMIRAN URUSHADZE: Hello.

STUDIO: To what extent were all these differences in way of life and traditions taken into account during the incorporation of the Caucasian territories into the empire?

AMIRAN URUSHADZE: Georgia, like the entire Caucasus, was a completely unfamiliar territory for the Russian elite. It's no coincidence that one of the first Russian administrators in the Caucasus, Pavel Dmitrievich Tsitsianov—incidentally, a Georgian by birth, from the Georgian princely family of Tsitsishvili. He governed the Caucasus from 1802 to 1806, dying tragically beneath the walls of Baku—once remarked: "For them—that is, for the residents of Transcaucasia—everything is new, but for us—that is, for Russian administrators, civil servants, and military administrators—everything is strange." Governance was quite difficult because, of course, Russian officials lacked the necessary knowledge and training to confidently navigate the diverse legal, judicial, and everyday systems of the Caucasus. They also simply didn't know the local languages ​​and were forced, of course, to rely on local translators. And local translators, as we know, sometimes act in their own interests rather than in the best interests of the cause. The local population, too, faced with the new system of governance, was often completely disoriented. One can only imagine the shock of the local population, when the authorities spoke one language, while the locals spoke a completely different one, unable to understand each other. The same Tsitsanov wrote that all the orders posted in Tiflis, orders from the imperial tsarist administration, remained enigmatic to the local population. It was completely unclear what to do with this. And, of course, here it was necessary to rely, among other things, on these sorts of imperial intermediaries—that is, representatives of the local community who were familiar with Russia in one way or another. And by the early 19th century, the Georgian aristocratic elite already had a long history of contacts with Russia. Some influential Georgian aristocrats had visited Russia, Moscow, and St. Petersburg, and they took advantage of this status, becoming imperial intermediaries between the authorities and the "host" community.

STUDIO: Since when can we speak of the Caucasian lands actually becoming part of Russia? Since the early 19th century?

AMIRAN URUSHADZE: It can be said that the beginning of the administrative integration of the Caucasus into the Russian Empire dates back to 1801, when eastern Georgia became part of the Russian Empire. However, Russian troops in Georgia, which were supposed to provide a certain military and political protectorate, protect Georgia from external threats, and ensure the permanent military and political presence of the Russian Empire in Transcaucasia, had been there not since 1801, but since 1783, with the signing of the Treaty of Georgievsk. Russian troops were then forced to withdraw from Georgia in the late 1780s, only to return in November 1799. Then, eastern Georgia, that is, Kartli-Kakheti, became part of the Russian Empire in 1801. In fact, it was the incorporation of eastern Georgia that, as historians generally believe, was a kind of trigger for the outbreak of the Caucasian War. The Caucasian War has no official declaration of war or peace date in its history. Here, it is necessary to define the Caucasian Line. The Russian Empire conquered the North Caucasus with a kind of moving wall. This Caucasus Line—a network of fortifications, redoubts, Cossack villages, and, of course, fortresses—began to take shape in the second half of the 18th century. This is the Azov-Mozdok Line. New fortifications followed, essentially pushing the highlanders, the population of the North Caucasus, from the plains, further and further into the mountains. Often, even the establishment of these fortresses became a new round of conflict between the Russian administration and the local community. It's enough to recall the founding of the Mozdok Fortress in 1763. It was from this moment, from 1763, that the Kabardians and many others traced the beginning of the Caucasian War. It is no coincidence that in Nalchik, on the famous "Tree of Life" monument, the chronology of the Caucasian War is 1763-1864, and every year, participants in this commemoration light 101 candles at the foot of this monument, each of which represents a year of the tragedy of the Caucasian War.

STUDIO: Over a century of war, the imperial authorities tried various methods to subjugate the Caucasian peoples, and military action was far from the only one. One method was the gradual clearing of forests and the destruction of food supplies, the mountaineers' They were driven from fertile plains and pastures into inaccessible mountainous terrain. Another method was forced resettlement, the deportation of some Caucasian peoples beyond the borders of the Russian Empire. But conquered territories had to be governed. And different territories were governed differently at different times. Am I correct?

AMIRAN URUSHADZE: If we talk about how Georgia was governed within the Russian Empire, we can say that imperial administrative templates were applied – that is, provinces were created, they were then reformatted, there was the Georgian province, then the Georgian-Imereti province, the Tiflis province, and then the Kutaisi province appeared. But alongside these general provincial administrative patterns, practices that could be called indirect management practices were used on the territory of historical Georgia. What this means is that the empire tried to govern through local elites, using their authority for its own purposes. For example, in Georgia, at the initial stage of integration, there was such an institution as the Supreme Georgian Government. It included Russian officials, well, high-ranking bureaucrats, of course, in uniform. And besides this, there are representatives of the Georgian aristocracy. This form of government was supposed to ensure the empire the necessary loyalty of the local population. In the North Caucasus, the situation was, well, I would say, probably even more complicated: the region was engulfed in the Caucasian War, and the system of governance was exclusively and entirely military. The system of governance in the North Caucasus was a continuation of the system of subjugation of the highlanders. Russian administrators themselves spoke about this, in particular the later famous Caucasian viceroy Alexander Ivanovich Baryatinsky, when he formulated the basic ideas of the famous system of military-popular governance, and wrote that the system of governance should become a continuation of the system of conquest. But before the introduction of military-national governance, which we will discuss later, there was also a military system of governance along the flanks of the Caucasian line. But this was not just a line of fortifications, but also an administrative system. And the commanders of the right flank, the left flank of the Caucasian line, and the center of the Caucasian line, they were not just military men who carried out military operations in order to establish Russian imperial sovereignty in the North Caucasus, but also administrators. The Caucasian line existed in this form until 1860, when new administrative entities were created in its place. First, the Terek and Kuban regions were created, which, in essence, divided the Caucasus into two parts administratively. A little later, a separate Dagestan region was created. In general, 1860 is a very important turning point, because the very nomination that is so familiar to us – the North Caucasus – was officially enshrined in law in 1860. For the first time, the imperial elite records the separation of the North Caucasus from Transcaucasia. Because before this, the Caucasus was considered as a single space. A space of heightened imperial sensitivity, a region engulfed in war, which is endlessly at war and, in general, is a constant headache for St. Petersburg. This system of dividing the North Caucasus into three corresponding regions existed in a more or less established form until the revolution, until 1917.

STUDIO: In one of your articles, you say that in governing the Caucasian lands, the emphasis was placed not on institutions, but on individuals, in particular the individuals of the governors.

AMIRAN URUSHADZE: What was the point of the transition to a system of governance known as the Caucasus Viceroyalty? The first viceroy was Mikhail Semyonovich Vorontsov, a hero of the War of 1812 and a well-known figure in the 19th-century Russian Empire—the man who acted as the emperor's proxy in the Caucasus. For Nicholas I, appointing a viceroy was an attempt to maintain direct personal influence over the region's affairs, bypassing bureaucratic entanglements. Now, Nicholas I didn't have to write to the Minister of the Interior for internal affairs, the Minister of Finance for financial matters, and so on. It was enough to simply ask the viceroy, "What are you doing there?" "I'm telling you, do it this way." This was a kind of patrimonial rationality in a context where the bureaucracy was growing and bureaucratic and administrative work was becoming increasingly complex. It was essential to maintain influence through a trusted figure who embodied the emperor himself in this remote region.

From the book "The Caucasian War: Seven Stories"

Vorontsov traveled to St. Petersburg, where imperial instructions and new plans for the conquest of the Caucasus awaited him. In the capital, where the Count arrived in January 1845, the Tsar's Viceroy was greeted warmly. At a gala dinner at the English Club (where prominent statesmen, scholars, and writers gathered informally), the most flattering and inspiring words were spoken in honor of the Count's new appointment. […] Nicholas I vested Vorontsov with enormous power. The Viceroy of the Caucasus could make decisions without the ministers' control, who could not oversee his actions. Vorontsov received the right to address all important matters directly to the Tsar, bypassing numerous bureaucratic barriers. The Count's autocracy was limited only by imperial approval and extended throughout the entire southern empire, from the Danube to the Araks. Having granted power, the Tsar demanded victory. Nicholas I personally devised the path to victory, and Vorontsov was tasked with implementing it. Briefly, the plan boiled down to three laconic theses: "First, break up Shamil's hordes, if possible. Second, penetrate the center of his dominion. Third, establish ourselves there."

AMIRAN URUSHADZE: Theoretically, the Caucasian Viceroyalty could have continued to exist after Alexander III ascended the Russian throne. However, it appears that Alexander III simply couldn't find someone he fully trusted. This, coupled with the ministers' belief that the extraordinary circumstances that had given rise to this institution had disappeared in the Caucasus, forced Alexander III to abolish the Caucasian Viceroyalty and the Caucasian Committee in 1881-1882. Now, the highest representatives of the Russian administration in the Caucasus were the Caucasian Commanders-in-Chief. These were, of course, no longer figures of the same stature and lacking the necessary rights and official privileges. But what's interesting here is that the history of the Caucasus within the Russian Empire can be called a history of repetition. Many problems, unresolved by the Russian administration, periodically recurred. The situation of 1905-1907 became the latest crisis of Russian power in the Caucasus. This is the context of the first Russian revolution, which unfolded on a particularly large scale in the Caucasus, including numerous ethnic clashes and the rather horrific events of the Baku pogrom of 1905. In the midst of this crisis, Nicholas II decided to restore the Caucasus Viceroyalty, and the penultimate Viceroy of the Caucasus was Illarion Ivanovich Vorontsov-Dashkov, who resigned the post in 1915, ceding it to Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich.

STUDIO: You mentioned military-people's government. Wasn't that local self-government?

AMIRAN URUSHADZE: The military-popular governance system—much of this is clear from the name—that is, military and popular. The idea is that the Dagestan region was divided into departments. There was a commander of the Dagestan region, a military officer, a general. Further down were the departments of the Dagestan region, also led by Russian military personnel, which comprised districts and sections. Consequently, district precinct commanders were also Russian military personnel. Under them, at the district precinct level, existed even smaller administrative units—naibstvas. It's often believed that the history of the naibstvas essentially ends with the history of the Imamate of Shamil—as is well known, it was Imam Shamil's military-theocratic state that consisted of naibstvas. But the Russian Empire also utilized these structures, and naibstvas essentially formed the basis of this rather unimportant administrative unit of the Russian Empire. Furthermore, under the district precinct commanders, there also existed people's mountain courts. Here, civil cases—family matters, religious matters, and even the most minor criminal offenses—were tried according to the norms of adat and sharia. Accordingly, the decisions of these mountain people's courts were then confirmed by district or precinct commanders. Elected deputies from local Dagestani communities also participated in the sessions of these courts—there were also mountain verbal courts.

In general, it should be said that the traditions of self-government, such traditions of popular self-government, among the peoples of the North Caucasus, in general in the North Caucasus, have a history that goes back centuries, not even decades. That is, popular assemblies exist in the Chechen tradition, the Ossetian tradition, the Ingush tradition, and in the political and legal traditions of various societies in Dagestan and other peoples. As an example, just one example, we can recall the Adyghe khasa. The khasa is essentially a proto-parliament that played a very important political role in the life of Kabardian society and in the life of the Adyghe societies of the northwest Caucasus. The tradition of local popular self-government and representation was unknown, but gradually, before this story began, a very rich legal tradition was discovered in the North Caucasus, and we can even talk about the South Caucasus. And this is precisely why Russian administrators began to use various self-government institutions for their own, entirely imperial, purposes: to ensure the loyalty of the local population and, consequently, the military, political, and socioeconomic stability of the empire on its southern outskirts. Of course, these self-government practices, which were characteristic of the peoples of the North Caucasus, were very, very limited in the imperial system; their significance was reduced to local, everyday matters. The commanders of the central Caucasus Line restricted public gatherings of Kabardians and even ordered them to gather only upon orders from imperial authorities; if there was no such order, they were not required to gather at all. The agenda of these gatherings was entirely determined by the imperial authorities, but to ensure that the local population somehow felt that this was no longer just the whim of a local leader but also sanctioned by representatives—Kabardian representatives—such gatherings were held. Another example is the so-called congresses of trusted representatives, which, according to researchers, began to be held in the 60s. The Caucasus also underwent its own major reforms, related to the definition of class and land rights of the population, the abolition of slavery in the North Caucasus, and several other changes. Congresses of trusted representatives were a practice among many peoples of the North Caucasus during this period: the Ossetians, Kabardins, Ingush, and Chechens. But the most regular congresses of trusted representatives were held in Kabarda and Balkaria. They were held annually. They were intended to determine the economic structure of the region. And, of course, they took place under the control of the imperial administration and, accordingly, legitimized, among other things, various administrative and legal changes that the imperial authorities deemed necessary to introduce in the respective territories.

STUDIO: What issues did the trustees' congresses address? How serious were they?

AMIRAN URUSHADZE: It must be said that congresses of trusted representatives, especially in Kabarda, were essentially a kind of proto-zemstvo institution. That is, congresses of trusted representatives essentially addressed the same issues as the zemstvo in the Russian provinces, and this was quite a practice of local self-government. There, the community elected one to three trusted deputies, and at these congresses, they primarily discussed economic matters, including the most pressing issue for Kabardian and Balkar society in the second half of the 19th and early 20th centuries—pasture use regulations, primarily the Zol pastures. It was necessary to clarify, delineate, and, accordingly, prevent the conflicts that periodically arose over pasture lands. As is well known, the zemstvo reform in the Caucasus failed. Firstly, the authorities were reluctant to introduce the zemstvo system of self-government in the territory of the Terek Cossack Host, as the experience of zemstvo administration in the Don region had been extremely negative. The Don Cossacks protested against the introduction of zemstvo governance, considering it too expensive and too burdensome, and ultimately, zemstvo administration had to be abolished in the Don region. Secondly, the discussion of introducing zemstvo in the Caucasus dragged on. It is known that it was supposed to be discussed in the State Duma at the very beginning of 1914, but then, of course, the issue was put aside after the outbreak of World War I. These same problems, but without the Cossack factor, were also characteristic of the South Caucasus. Another very important issue in the Transcaucasus was that it was not entirely clear how the zemstvo would be elected – by class or by property qualifications? And here, of course, it turned out that different ethnic groups could benefit from a particular decision. If the zemstvo was based on class, it would have been a landslide for the aristocracy, and the Georgians would obviously have won, as the Georgian aristocracy is the most numerous. If the basis was property, then the decision would likely have favored the Armenians, as Armenian merchants were very influential, and the Georgian aristocracy was certainly unable to compete with the Armenian merchant class. Several congresses held before and during the First World War, chaired by the last Viceroy of the Caucasus, Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich, also largely failed to achieve anything.

STUDIO: You mentioned the Cossacks; they also played a major role in the conquest of the Caucasus. How did Cossack self-government fit into the overall governance structure?

AMIRAN URUSHADZE: I wouldn't exaggerate what remained of Cossack self-government in the 19th century. Certainly, when we speak of the Cossacks, and especially of the oldest of the Russian Cossack communities, the Don Cossacks, the first thing that comes to mind is the military circle that elects the ataman. It's no coincidence that many historians studying the history of the Don Cossacks have written about the Don Cossack Republic, about the military circle as a kind of parliament, and about the ataman as an elected president. Well, if we speak of the 16th and 17th centuries, we see that these traditional institutions of self-government were clearly expressed and had political significance. But from the 18th century onward, this practice ceased, even during the reign of Peter the Great. And by the beginning of the 19th century, one might even say by the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries, absolutely nothing, absolutely nothing, remained of the former practices of Cossack autonomous self-government. And the Cossacks became part of the imperial structures of the Russian Empire, which was governed exclusively through bureaucratic, military-administrative means. That is, the military circle was replaced by various chanceries and military administrations; the acting ataman became the ataman, who was not elected by the local community but appointed from the center. The military circle reappeared in the history of Russian Cossack communities after the 1917 Revolution. This was a brief period of revival of Cossack self-government. But that's another story. Therefore, the Cossacks did not bring any self-government practices with them to the Caucasus. Cossacks in general, not just the Don Cossacks, were extremely negative about the idea of ​​resettlement to the Caucasus. It is well known that the large-scale resettlement of Don Cossacks to the Caucasus at the very end of the 18th century resulted in a major rebellion on the Don in 1792–1793, the Rebellion of the 50 Stanitsas, which was suppressed quite brutally, with many participants exiled from the Don region. And the Cossacks certainly didn't migrate to the Caucasus voluntarily. The Caucasus, in general, both in the minds of the Cossacks and in the minds of many Russian peasants who were also resettled there, was perceived as a land of doom. And there are known cases of Cossacks fleeing the Caucasus. For example, the Cossacks of the Azov Cossack Host were resettled in the 1860s, and the Azov Cossacks also protested, albeit quietly, against this resettlement; they certainly didn't welcome it. Consequently, here, in the North Caucasus, the Cossacks were governed by exactly the same methods, and no such self-government existed. The same can be said of the Terek Cossacks, who formed on the Terek River. In fact, researchers and ethnographers believe that the Terek Cossacks were the product of a symbiotic relationship: on the one hand, the Russian population, on the other, a very important local Caucasian element.

From Leo Tolstoy's story "The Cossacks"

“The entire part of the Terek line along which the Grebensky villages are located, about eighty versts in length, has a uniform character both in terrain and in population. The Terek, separating the Cossacks from the highlanders, flows muddy and swiftly, but is already wide and calm […]. Along the right bank are peaceful, but still restless auls; along the left bank, half a mile from the water, at a distance of seven and eight versts from one another, are located villages. From village to village there is a road cut through the forest at cannon shot. Along the road there are cordons in which the Cossacks are stationed. […] A very, very long time ago, their ancestors, the Old Believers, fled from Russia and settled beyond the Terek, among the Chechens on Grebna, the first ridge of the wooded mountains of Greater Chechnya. Living among the Chechens, the Cossacks intermarried with them and adopted the customs, way of life and morals of the highlanders; But they preserved the Russian language and the old faith there in all their former purity. To this day, Cossack clans are considered related to the Chechens, and a love of freedom, idleness, robbery, and war constitute the main traits of their character. Russia's influence is expressed only in a disadvantageous way: through restrictions on elections, the removal of bells, and the troops that stand and march there. A Cossack, by instinct, hates the highland horseman who killed his brother less than the soldier who stands with him to defend his stanitsa, but who has smoked his hut with tobacco. […] Fancy dress consists in imitating the Circassian. The best weapons are obtained from the highlanders, the best horses are bought and stolen from them. A fine Cossack flaunts his knowledge of the Tatar language and, when in high spirits, even speaks Tatar with his own brother. Despite this, this Christian people, cast into a corner of the earth, surrounded by half-wild Mohammedan tribes and soldiers, considers itself to be at a high level of development and recognizes only one Cossack as a human being; it looks upon everything else with disdain."

AMIRAN URUSHADZE: In the 19th century, the Terek Cossacks were also governed as a large bureaucratic administrative institution of the Russian Empire. Yes, the Cossacks had certain rights and privileges, they had land rights, they were personally free, but they were obliged to serve the empire. And it's impossible to say that self-government practices were preserved. No, they weren't. The empire was based on the organization of, well, as we might say today, a very rigid vertical power structure.

STUDIO: But the governance system was reformed. And one of these attempts was extremely unsuccessful?

AMIRAN URUSHADZE: Indeed, one such large-scale attempt at large-scale administrative reform in the South Caucasus was the administrative reform developed by Senator Pavel Vasilyevich Gan. It must be said, in general, that the Russian emperors, who made the most important political decisions and determined the trajectory of the various outlying regions within the Russian imperial administrative and legal institutions, had no strategy. That is, the Russian Empire had no overall strategy for annexing and then subsequently integrating the outlying regions into the Russian Empire. Decisions were primarily made reactively and ad hoc; rather, imperial administrators responded to changing circumstances. The Caucasian War raged during the reign of Emperor Nicholas I, and Nicholas I neither started the Caucasian War nor lived to see it end. Although he strove to do so throughout his reign, it was one of his goals, one he was never able to fully realize.  

From Leo Tolstoy's story "Hadji Murat"

“Obviously, the plan drawn up by Your Majesty is beginning to bear fruit,” said Chernyshev.
This praise of his strategic abilities was especially pleasing to Nikolai, because although he was proud of his strategic abilities, deep down he knew they were nonexistent. And now he longed to hear more detailed praise.
“How do you understand?” he asked.
"My understanding is that if we had followed Your Majesty's plan long ago—to gradually, albeit slowly, advance, cutting down forests and depleting reserves—the Caucasus would have been conquered long ago. I attribute Hadji Murat's departure to this very reason. He realized they could no longer hold out."
“It’s true,” said Nikolai.
Despite the fact that the plan of slowly advancing into enemy territory by clearing forests and destroying food supplies was Ermolov and Velyaminov's, completely opposed to Nicholas's plan, which called for capturing Shamil's residence at once and destroying this nest of bandits. Despite this, Nicholas also attributed the plan of slow advance, the gradual clearing of forests and the destruction of food supplies, to himself. […] He made no secret of this and was proud of both the plan of his 45 expedition and the plan of slowly advancing forward, despite the fact that these two plans clearly contradicted each other. The constant, obvious, and utterly obvious flattery of those around him brought him to the point where he no longer saw his own contradictions, no longer conformed his actions and words to reality, logic, or even simple common sense, but was completely certain that all his orders, no matter how senseless, unfair, and inconsistent they were, became meaningful, fair, and consistent with each other only because he carried them out."

Nicholas I was perhaps the first of the Romanovs to declare that the Russian Empire should constitute a single political space. In one of his ministers' reports, he wrote that there could be no kingdom within one kingdom. At a meeting with the chief of the chancery of the first Caucasian viceroy, he declared that his goal was to completely merge the Caucasus with Russia. As popular feuilletons of the mid-19th century wrote, the Caucasus should become Russia itself, but with a slightly rougher surface, alluding to the peculiarities of the Caucasus's topography. It was precisely this principle, formulated by Nicholas I, that formed the basis for the administrative reform of Senator Pavel Vasilyevich Gan. It's difficult to call Pavel Vasilyevich Gan a figure of such note in Russian history. In fact, he was rarely remembered later. If he was remembered, it was as a man who "cast a dark shadow over all branches of government beyond the Caucasus." He headed the commission tasked with transforming the administrative order in Transcaucasia. Hahn decided that the Transcaucasian region was ripe for the introduction of virtually identical administrative and legal institutions to those characteristic of the internal Russian provinces. This meant that Transcaucasia was to be governed in the same way as, for example, Tver Province. And not just at the level of provincial chanceries and provincial governments, but at the court level, and so on. It's not as if Hahn's reform was hasty. In fact, it was in preparation over several years. And if you read the preparatory materials for Hahn's reform, it's quite impressive, even in its vocabulary. It's beautifully written. But he didn't know the Caucasus and believed the main thing was to select the right institutions, and they would function naturally, according to established instructions.

From the Notes on the Current State of the Transcaucasian Region with a Program for Its Improvement by Pavel Gan. 1837

“The various parts of the government that form the whole, diverging from one center, like the rays of the sun, act powerfully only when their properties, dispositions and modifications flow from one source and are directed by one mind.”

The reform was implemented, but it didn't work because the local population was completely disoriented by what had happened and, of course, wasn't prepared for such rapid change. Its reforms culminated in an uprising in western Georgia. A rebellion broke out in Guria in 1841, provoked, on the one hand, by the reforms that had been implemented—that is, the court system had become so slow and confusing for the local population that it sparked discontent. The new tax system caused serious misunderstanding among Gurian peasants. And finally, and this was also very important, it sparked rumors that Georgian residents would now be conscripted into the Russian army. These are rumors about soldierobe. Soldierobe is a terrifying rumor for the Georgian population, as it is for the population of many other regions and subregions of the Caucasus. And of course, the fact that not only the seemingly pacified, but even the Christian population of Georgia, a co-religionist, rose up in rebellion against Russian rule was simply a symbol of a terrible administrative failure. And that was the end of Hahn's career. After this, Nicholas I abruptly changed course, abandoning the introduction of these imperially strict norms and instead pursuing what was essentially military-political autonomy for the Caucasus, which consisted of establishing the office of Viceroy of the Caucasus. And here it must be said that, in general, the Russian elite tended to trust individuals more than institutions, and it's no coincidence that such an influential Russian statesman, publicist, and, I think, an intellectual, as Pobedonostsev, said that institutions don't decide anything—people decide, and there aren't enough people. And indeed, how could institutions decide anything here? If we were to speculate like that, what would the Russian Empire have relied on institutions for? Of course, these should have been institutions of local self-government, first and foremost, meaning that everything should have begun with them. But it wasn't that the Russian Empire didn't trust them, but it was unwilling to allow local government institutions to expand their powers. Consequently, without them, any other institutions imposed from above would have been institutions of police surveillance rather than progressive regional development.

STUDIO: I thank historian Amiran Urushadze, a specialist in the history of the Caucasus in the 18th and 19th centuries and the author of "The Caucasian War: Seven Stories." This was the podcast "We'll Do It Ourselves." Listen to us, comment—your opinions are very important to us.