The Liberal Doctrine of Civil Rights in Late Imperial Russia

Abstract

The author describes the doctrine of civil rights developed by the “revived” (vozrozhdennoe) school of natural law in late Imperial Russia. This doctrine was not only of theoretical but of considerable practical value as well. It became the basis for the rule‑of‑law theory developed by Russian liberal legal philosophers at the beginning of the twentieth century, caused a virtual revolution in the Russian intellectual elite’s consciousness, and influenced the liberation movement. The paper draws from a wide range of sources, including academic and journalistic works of liberal‑minded Russian legal philosophers, e.g., Pavel Novgorodtsev, Vladimir Solov´ev, Evgenii Trubetskoi, Bogdan Kistiakovskii, Vladimir Gessen, and others. The paper should be of interest to social and political historians, historians of intellectual thought and law.