Ekaterina Pravilova

This project studies the development of property in Russia on the eve of its revolutions. It is also a study of the modernization of the Russian state, law, and culture, using the idea of property as a lens for the analysis of institutional and cultural transformation, revealing shifts and changes that might otherwise go unnoticed. Among these “unnoticed” shifts are such important developments as the transformation of the methods of political competition; the formation of the sphere of “public things” and new mechanisms governing public resources; and the strengthening of the power of professional organizations, in particular, their ability to exert control over private owners. It also analyzes the transition from the pre-revolutionary model of property to the Bolshevik nationalization and discusses to what extent Bolshevik nationalization constituted a rupture in the development of the concept and models that governed resources.