Railroad Development and Market Integration: The Case of Tsarist Russia

Up until the mid-nineteenth century Russia had an enserfed peasantry, a mere 1,000 or so miles of railways, and a small, almost insignificant market sector. When serfdom was abolished (1861) and the expansion of railroads started to occupy a prominent place in development policy toward the end of the nineteenth century, Russia was launched on a transformation from a state of preindustrial and pre-capitalistic backwardness into a path of modernization and industrialization.