Church-State Relations in Right-Bank Ukraine in the 1860s–1880s: the Kurenevka Precedent
Abstract
This article analyzes the Russian government’s repressive policies against the monastic community and clergy of the Kurenevka Old Believer monasteries in the 1860s–1880s. Based on documents from the offices of the Podolsk governor, the Kyev governor-general, and the Ministry of Internal Affairs, now available for scholarly circulation for the first time, the methods of state oversight and strategies for adapting the Old Believer community in the village of Kurenevka are reconstructed. The author examines the evolution of imperial policy from the period of the Great Reforms of Alexander II to the era of counter-reforms under Alexander III. Contrary to the established historiographic thesis of a total reaction in the 1880s, it is proven that in Right-Bank Ukraine, government policy during this period was more moderate than in other regions of the country. This regional specificity is explained by a geopolitical factor: in the context of the “Polish question” and the border status of the Podolsk province, the imperial administration sought to utilize the Great Russian Old Believer population as a reliable ethnopolitical support for the autocracy on the southwestern border. This article explores the complex behind-the-scenes struggle within the highest echelons of power in the Russian Empire, which was tied to the continued existence of the monasteries. It establishes that, unlike the Synod, the highest regional and ministerial authorities were fully prepared to legalize the Kurenyovo monasteries, recognizing the Old Believers’ public and economic contributions. As a result, the monasteries received a state guarantee of immunity, agreeing in exchange for transparency in their internal affairs. The use of historical-comparative and microhistorical approaches allowed the author to uncover the mechanisms of interaction between central and local authorities, as well as the specifics of governing the empire’s border territories.