СОЦИАЛЬНО-ЭКОНОМИЧЕСКИЕ ХАРАКТЕРИСТИКИ БАЛКАР-СКОГО ОБЩЕСТВА ВТОРОЙ ПОЛОВИНЫ XIX – НАЧАЛА XX В. (НА ОСНОВЕ ПОСЕМЕЙНЫХ СПИСКОВ 1886 И 1905 ГГ.)

Abstract

The essay focuses on the demographic and socioeconomic structure of Balkarian rural societies during the epoch of Russian capitalist modernization in the late XIXth and early XXth centuries. The evidence from the 1886 Household Census was used to compile the database. The information was processed with the use of various methods of statistical and correlation analysis. This made it possible to present a cross-section of the Balkar society of that period, its demographic structure, economic differentiation, and social stratification. Systematic comparison of the data from the 1886 Census with that from the governmental inspection of 1905 was indispensable for the meas-uring of the social change the local ethno-social community had underwent in twenty years time span. All the influences of the modernizing environment notwithstanding, Balkarian society re-tained its traditional characteristics. None meaningful changes in socio-economic structure lead-ing toward “agrarian capitalism” are discernible. So, the Balkarian highlander’s society remained at the onset of the XXth century, relatively isolated from the modernizing environment of the greater Russian society. The methods applied and findings achieved in this research bear an essen-tial novelty in relation to interpretations prevalent in literature on the topic. The article partially contains the conclusions of the author’s dissertation research [Муратова (Muratova) 2006] and has been prepared for publishing in order to make them public and increase readership.