Samokhin K.V. First World War and Spiritual Modernisation of Russia (using the materials on Tambov peasantry)

Abstract: The article is devoted to the study of the military factor as a mechanism of Russian modernisation in 1914-1940. The author's main goal is to conduct an analysis of the impact of the First World War on the transition of the Russian state from the agrarian society to the industrial one in terms of spirituality. The article defines the major mental attitudes of Russian peasantry, such as paternalism, piety, monarchism, social collectivism, equalitarian land utilisation, and their transformations in the course of the Russian modernisation during the First World War and interbellum period. The article put special emphasis on the need for organic modernisation processes in Russia as a prerequisite for their successful implementation, because the transition of the Russian Empire from agrarian to industrial society was not of organic nature, which was expressed in asynchronous of economic, political, social and spiritual transformations. The academic novelty of the paper is the interpretation of war as a kind of a "challenge" for the Russian (Slavic) civilisation, and the "response" was the modernisation of Russia in that time. The main conclusion is the assumption that the Great war (1914-1918) was the strongest "accelerator" for the Russian modernisation processes, compared to previous military conflicts involving the Russian Empire. This justified the formation of the deviant model of Russian modernisation, which was expressed in the Soviet variant of the Russian society in terms of spirituality.  

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