Crime, Gender, and Justice in Imperial Russia Positive law vs. customary law

Tsar Alexander II “Tsar- Liberator” Presided over Great Reforms prompted by Russia’s defeat in Crimean war Emancipation of serfs, 1864 reform of judicial system, introduction of zemstvos, military reform, reform of education and censorship Peasant uprisings and intellectual discontent over limits of reforms: the emergence of radicalism

A Divided Russia “Europeanized Russians thus approached their own native culture, to which the majority of the population belonged, as anthropologists confront an alien society” Engelstein, 97 Peter I westernized nobility: great divide between educated society and the “dark mass of common folk” Professionals (psychiatrists, lawyers) Western educated, adopt European lens when viewing their own country Great divide between Westernizers and Slavophiles (conservatives) emerges in 1840s “Europeanized Russians thus approached their own native culture, to which the majority of the population belonged, as anthropologists confront an alien society” Engelstein, 97 Peter I westernized nobility: great divide between educated society and the “dark mass of common folk” Professionals (psychiatrists, lawyers) Western educated, adopt European lens when viewing their own country Great divide between Westernizers and Slavophiles (conservatives) emerges in 1840s

Impact of Legal and Local Government Reforms, 1864 Zemstvo allowed local self- government at district level, control over schools, communications, health and sanitation Each estate (nobility, clergy, townspeople, peasants) elected representatives, although election laws favored nobility Created class of educated professionals (previously missing in Russia) who lived amongst, provided aid and studied peasantry

Impact of Legal Reforms, 1864 Introduced independent judiciary, public trial by jury, adversarial proceedings and importance of lawyers, public testimony and open proceedings Created volost’ courts for peasantry: not governed by statute or procedural norms, but “accommodated variety and specificity of cultural practices” No right of appeal

The “Woman Question” Women’s subjugation questioned John Stuart Mill and Harriet Taylor: Essays on Sex Equality Prominent Russian liberals and radicals championed women’s cause “Nihilists” questioned all established authority, cultural tradition: subjected everything to empiricist inquiry; sought to abolish institutions which restricted human freedom: family, church, autocracy

Klikushi: hysteria or somnambulism? Hysteria: catch-all term originating with Hippocrates to explain women’s pathology as originating in uterus and sexual organs: diagnosis popularized in nineteenth century by Jean Martin Charcot and Sigmund Freud. Hysteria thought to result from women’s sexual frustration and relieved by marriage. Freud believed that unconscious conflicts manifested themselves in physical symptoms

Klikushi: Hysteria or Somnambulism? N.V. Krainskii: Russian psychiatrist influenced by Jean Martin Charcot and Pierre Janet, argued that although klikushestvo had sexual causes (etiology), the actual fit was a form of somnambulism: thus, the klikushi were not hysterics and thus not fakers (malingerers) Vladimir Bekhterev: klikushestvo hysterical neurosis, because symptoms resemble hysteria and women predominate among afflicted; however, they are not fakers

Discussion questions How did psychiatrists, jurists and other experts assess women’scapacity and proclivity for crime? What types of crime were women most likely to commit? How did experts explain this, and what were the contradictions or paradoxes of their arguments? How were psychiatrists and jurists inclined to view infanticide among Russian peasant women? What were the advantages and disadvantages of deference to customary over positive law in the township courts? Who was in favor of maintaining parallel justice systems for the peasants and the rest of society, and why? How did psychiatrists, jurists and other experts assess women’scapacity and proclivity for crime? What types of crime were women most likely to commit? How did experts explain this, and what were the contradictions or paradoxes of their arguments? How were psychiatrists and jurists inclined to view infanticide among Russian peasant women? What were the advantages and disadvantages of deference to customary over positive law in the township courts? Who was in favor of maintaining parallel justice systems for the peasants and the rest of society, and why?