Bankrupts and Usurers of Imperial Russia: Debt, Property, and the Law in the Age of Dostoevsky and Tolstoy. By Sergei Antonov

Middleman Minorities and Ethnic Violence: Anti-Jewish Pogroms in the Russian Empire

“…The economic relationship between Jewish middlemen and the majority was based on repeated interactions: on a regular basis, creditors lent to peasants and grain traders extended credit both to peasants in rural areas and to urban buyers of grain. 5 As we discuss below, historians point out that in periods of bad economic shocks, it was common for creditors to forgive debt completely or to roll it over for the next period (Antonov, 2016). The reason why creditors were ready to forgive debt was the value of continuation of their relationship with debtors.…”

“…6. Note that credit contracts were relatively well enforced in the Russian Empire before the collapse of the state in 1917 (Antonov, 2016).…”

“…Historians agree that credit contracts were relatively well enforced in the Russian Empire. 44 However, both the complete forgiveness of debt and rolling it over until the debtor was expected to gain sufficient income to repay were very common (Antonov, 2016). Both professional moneylenders and grain traders extended credit.…”

“…In addition, the coefficients on the quadruple interaction terms of the shares of Jews in middleman occupations 44. A creditor's complaint of nonpayment with presentation of a promissory note, which was the most common form of credit contract, led the authorities to send a policeman who was supposed to seize valuable items (if any) in favour of the creditor or, in case of the absence of valuable property, to arrest the debtor (provided that the creditor paid a fee) (Jezierski and Leszczynska, 2003;Antonov, 2016).…”

Prosperity and Precarity in Imperial Russia's Long Nineteenth Century

“…70 Because tsarist Russia had a regime of separate marital property, husbands and wives could choose who would be a legal property owner or who would take on a debt; considerations of debt may well have been behind the decision for Anastasiia to be the legal owner of the factory at this point. 71 The Chikins seem to have been doing very well at the time they entered the Gatchina merchant society. Their daughter, Elizaveta, was born around the time they became legal owners of the factory.…”