Russia under the Old regime

FOREWORD TO THE SECOND EDITION

Space limitations preclude my dealing with specific criticisms directed at Russia Under the Old Regime. Of these, the most weighty challenged my contention that the Muscovite variant of absolutism differed fundamentally from the absolutism of early modern Europe. I found that the analogies drawn by some scholars between the two types of monarchial rule rested on a formalistic interpretation of juridical documents, with minimal attention to living reality-the reality which so struck and shocked Western visitors to Moscovy. If a future historian were to apply such formalistic methodology to Stalin's regime, he might well conclude that it did not significantly differ from those of the contemporary West since it too had a constitution, a parliament, and guarantees of human rights.

Russia Under the Old Regime is soon to be published in translation in Moscow. The author hopes that it will encourage Russian historians, recently freed from the fetters of censorship and ideological control, to abandon their traditional self-restraint and examine their country's past in a bolder, more comparative, more philosophical manner. For the purpose of true history is not only to learn what happened but also to understand why. Richard Pipes March 1992 xx