Contenu du sommaire

Matei Cazacu, Sources of Russian autocracy. Rumanian and Hungarian influences. Fifteenth-sixteenth centuries. The traditional sources of Muscovite autocracy in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries have been submitted to various research works that underlined the contributions of the political thought of Byzantium, of the Golden Horde and even of the Ottoman Empire to the structure of the ideological equipment of the great princes and then of the Russian tsars. In the present article we propose to study two other eventual sources of Russian ideology: the Hungarian political theory elaborated at the Court of Mathias Corvin (1458-1490) on the one hand, and on the other hand, the traditions of princely courts of Valachia and Moldavia in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. We have chosen three Russian representatives of this period and have analyzed their works in order to determine the Hungarian and Rumanian contributions. They are: Fedor Kuricyn, the anonymous author of The tale of the princes of Vladimir, and Ivan Peresvetov.

Jean-Claude Marcade, Studies on Leskov. The unfortunate editorial in Severnaia pchela of May 30, 1862. The ill-fated editorial of Leskov on the tragic fires that at the time had devastated St. Petersburg is still viewed in much the same way as when it first appeared. Leskov was outlawed by the literary world and classified among the "antinihilist" writers. Even critics favourable to the author of Soboriane blamed him severely for this article. This is not a hagiographic study but an essay meant to replace Leskov's editorial into its socio-political context. For the first time, extensive extracts from the terrorist proclamation "Young Russia" are translated into French, with the view of illustrating the climate of insecurity which at the time allowed the circulation of the most fanciful gossip. On the other hand, we are endeavoring to find an explanation for the disproportionate and lasting animosity which surrounded Leskov as a result of this publication. It is due to the fact that the author of Nekuda had flirted at the beginning of his career with leftist circles, which he abandoned later on and against which he aimed his satire. It can also be explained by the intolerance of Russian "public opinion", as noted by Gorki in his introduction to the first volume of Leskov's Works published in Berlin in 1923. This article is a contribution to a particular case: the problem of the way articles from the past are now received.

Isabelle Stal, "De Profundis" or criticism of revolutionary reason. We present herewith to the French readers a comment of "De profundis" (Iz glubiny) published in Moscow in 1921. This miscellany develops a criticism of the October revolution, from the metaphysical and moral standpoint. For our part, we endeavoured to stress the original character of this view and its current interest for the modern reader informed of the problems of socialism. We lay no claim to a work of erudition. We have preferred to present a thematic comment which sets better out the obvious convergence and coherence of the various analyses that are proposed.

Michael Confino, Peter Kropotkin and the agents of the Okhrana. A study and thirteen unpublished letters of P. Kropotkin to M. Goldsmith and to a Russian anarchist group. This article deals with two sets of closely interrelated subjects. The first includes the attitudes and activities of the Okhrana towards Russian anarchist groups abroad in general, and P. Kropotkin in particular. In this portion of the study are examined the techniques of shadowing ("external surveillance"), letters' interception (perliustraciia) , the reports of the secret agents infiltrated in the anarchist groups ("internal surveillance"), as well as the collaboration between the Okhrana and the police organizations of other European states, whether within the framework of the "Anti-anarchist International," or outside of it. One of the conclusions that emerges from this analysis is the remarkably wide scope of the Okhrana1 s activity in this area, and the impressive amount of information which it was capable to collect on P. Kropotkin and on the anarchist groups. The second part of the article is a discussion of P. Kropotkin's attitude, on the one hand, towards this activity of the Political Police and its use of secret agents ("agents provocateurs") in the revolutionary movement, and, on the other hand, towards the infiltration of informants into the Okhrana by revolutionary organizations. In this context are examined several historical types of events such as degaevščina , azefščina, and bogrovščina, as well as the less notorious cases of N. Kletočnikov, N. Pauli and A. Petrov. Kropotkin had been following directly (as a member of "courts of honor") and indirectly (through his contacts with Vladimir Burcev) these occurrences which were shakening time and again the Russian revolutionary movement. His views on these tactics and techniques give an opportunity for a reassessment of several important aspects of the movement's action, such as political efficiency, revolutionary ethics, and the perennial dilemma of "ends and means." The article is followed by thirteen unpublished letters of P. Kropotkin, which focus on most of the topics discussed.

Nurit Schleifmann, The Internal Agency: linchpin of the political police in Russia. The purpose of this article is to outline several of the characteristic features of police infiltration into the revolutionary movement by means of the secret agent. These features stem largely from the underlying conception of the Police Department which viewed its cardinal objective as "liquidation": the surveillance of revolutionary groups with the aim of eliminating them at an appropriate moment. Thus the Internal Agency - as the secret agents were collectively dubbed by the Police - had pride of place in the activity of each Okhrana section; the data gathered by the agents were given top priority in appraising the situation and since this information was tendentious, this led to incongruities between the revolutionary tide and the deployment of the police to combat it. Moreover, the underlying conception dictated police concentration on the individual revolutionary act and brought about the erroneous assumption that the larger the revolutionary organization, the greater its menace. Police comprehension of reality determined also their attitude towards the various components of the revolutionary camp. However, the scope of infiltration into a given movement was affected by a combination of three factors: the degree of interest evinced by the police in the movement's activity, the movement's size and the nature of its organization.