Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin - Integrative Research Institute Law & Society (LSI)

Stefan Kirmse: The Lawful Empire. Legal Change and Cultural Diversity in Late Tsarist Russia (Cambridge University Press).

This book combines an analysis of law and legal practice with a discussion of autocratic rule over a multicultural empire. It is as much about new legal institutions and their implications for an emerging rule of law in late tsarist Russia as it is about equality and cultural diversity. It examines the introduction and local use of the court system created by the Judicial Reform of 1864, its gradual expansion across the Eurasian landmass over the following three decades, and its importance for Russian imperial rule. Focusing on two regions that stood out for their ethnic and religious diversity, it follows the spread of the new legal institutions into the open steppe of southern Russia, especially Crimea, and into the fields and forests of the Middle Volga region around the ancient Tatar capital of Kazan. As these former frontier zones were home to large Tatar populations, this book is also about the integration of Muslims.

The book on CUP's webpage.

With comments by

Tatiana Borisova, Higher School of Economics, St Petersburg, editor of 'Russia's Legal Trajectories', in: Kritika: Explorations in Russian and Eurasian History 19, no. 3 (2018), pp. 469-508.

Nancy Kollmann, Stanford University, author of 'Crime and Punishment in Early Modern Russia' (Cambridge 2013)

The event will be conducted via Zoom. Registration via registration(at)zmo.de.