ECONOMIC ASPECTS OF THE CREATING AND FUNCTIONING OF REGIONAL RAILWAYS IN BUKOVYNA IN THE SECOND HALF OF THE 19th – EARLY 20th CENTURIES

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to study the objective economic aspects and prerequisites for the creating and functioning of regional railways in Bukovyna in the second half of the 19th – early 20th centuries. The deployment of railway construction on the lands of Bukovyna in the second half of the 19th century was associated with the processes of the capitalist structure formation in the economies of the countries that included these lands – Austria-Hungary and the Russian Empire. The successful activities of the large railway companies in Bukovyna were facilitated by their strong ties with banks and close mutually beneficial cooperation with various parts of the state apparatus of Austria-Hungary and the Russian Empire. There was certain dependence between railway companies and States that, on the one hand, companies could not do without financial assistance from the State. On the other hand, the State did not possess sufficient funds at the end of the 19th century to independently expand the railway network and it was forced to entrust the construction of railway lines to private companies. Banks willingly acted as founders of new private railway companies in Austria-Hungary, which intensively stimulated the development of railway construction in Bukovyna. The high degree of the capital concentration in comparison with the other branches of private capitalist production was one of the characteristic features of the railway companies of Bukovyna.