Russian periodical press in the post-reform period of the second half of the 19th century in the context of the interaction problem between government and society

Abstract

Background. An attempt is made to understand what was the role of the press, the degree of its influence on the residents, the understanding of the authorities and con-temporaries of the role and place of periodicals in the information field of the Russian Em-pire during the period of systemic reforms of the second half of the 19th century, in the tran-sitional period of Russian history. The purpose of the work is to study the role of the perio-dical press as the main channel for broadcasting official information in the provinces of the Russian Empire in the 1860s–1880s on the basis of the analysis of the materials of the offi-cial document circulation, periodicals and correspondence of contemporaries. Materials and methods. The study was conducted on the basis of archives, official document mana-gement, materials of the periodical press of late Imperial Russia. The formal-logical method and comparative-historical methods of scientific research are used. The method of content analysis of the press made it possible to identify the topics of publications of the official and unofficial sections of periodicals. Results. In the course of writing the article, the main task was solved – to investigate the role of the periodical press in the context of interaction and mutual influence of power and society in the model of the Russian state of the second half of the 19th century. Conclusions. The periodical press of the capital and province of the Russian Empire in the 1860s and 1880s was the main official mass source of information for the population of the empire. The policy of the tsarist government in the capitals and in large university cities with respect to printed publications differed somewhat from the poli-cy pursued by the provincial administration with respect to time-based publications. In the hinterland, methods of direct prohibitions and imposition of administrative penalties were used more widely. While in the capital cities, government officials made greater use of the opportunities to censor publications and issue warnings.

Keywords

• periodical press
• censorship
• official part of the publication
• government official