History

Q. To what extent were the reforms of Witte and Stolpin successful?

Both Sergei Witte and Stolpin were like minded men who identified the problems in Russia and
worked to fix them. At the time of their influence, Russia had a lot of problems ranging from
economic to agricultural. While Witte focused mainly on economic and industrial reform, so that
Russia could catch up to the other more industrialised economies, Stolpin recognised the agricultural
aspect of Russia’s problems and introduced several reforms in an attempt to solve them.

Sergei Witte believed that Russia’s economic problems lay in foreign loans and foreign exports.
Russia was undoubtedly rich in raw materials and agriculture, but didn’t have the necessary
infrastructure in place to export it. Examples of this infrastructure includes factories and railways.
The problem was building these would require huge sums of money which the country wasn’t willing
to give, as rich statesmen and nobles thought of industrialisation as undignified.

The first thing he did was bring in economists and managers from the West to advise the
government on economic reform. To fund these reforms, taxes were raised and foreign investors
were incentivised to invest in Russia after increasing interest rates. In order to protect the Russian
currency, tariffs on imports were imposed. This would protect Russia’s economy from foreign, more
efficiently producing industries. The rouble, Russia’s currency, was also made more stable as it was
linked to the Gold standard.
During Witte’s government, the length of the railways on Russia almost doubles in size. This opened
up other inaccessible parts of the country to trade. The biggest one was the Trans-Siberian railway,
linking one end of Russia with the other.
The successes of his policy included increases in industrial growth and coal production in Russia
trebling. Russia proceeded to become the world’s fourth largest producer or steel and the second
largest producer of petrol.

Stolypin’s policies included ‘Stolypin’s necktie’. This consisted of his strict policy against rebels, in
which they would be hanged. He believed that to restore order, a policy of social and economic
reform should take place.
The first thing he did was encourage the growth of Kulaks (the wealthy peasant class). This would
mean they now have a stake in the current system and would be less likely to support revolutions.