History of Russia (1894–1917)

Under Tsar Nicholas II (reigned 1894–1917), the Russian Empire slowly industrialized while repressing opposition from the center and the far-left. During the 1890s Russia's industrial development led to a large increase in the size of the urban middle class and of the working class, which gave rise to a more dynamic political atmosphere. Because the state and foreigners owned much of Russia's industry, the Russian working class was comparatively stronger and the Russian bourgeoisie comparatively weaker than in the West.

During the 1890s and early 1900s, bad living- and working-conditions, high taxes, and land hunger gave rise to more frequent strikes and agrarian disorders. By 1914, 40% of Russian workers were employed in factories of 1,000 workers or more (32% in 1901). 42% worked in businesses of 100 to 1,000 workers and 18% in businesses of 100 workers or fewer (in 1914, the United States had equivalent figures of 18%, 47% and 35%, respectively).

Politically, anti-establishment forces organized into competing parties, although political parties were not legalized until the October Manifesto was issued in 1905. The liberal elements among the industrial capitalists and nobility, who believed in peaceful social reform and a constitutional monarch, founded the Constitutional Democratic party or Kadets in 1905. The socialist parties included the Socialist Revolutionaries (SRs, founded in 1900) and the Russian Social Democratic Workers Party (RSDRP, founded in 1898). The workers in major cities revolted in 1905 with widespread strikes and mutinies.