Новые каналы коммуникации просителей и монарха в России на рубеже XVIII‒XIX веков

Новая и новейшая история. 2022. Т. 66. № 4. С. 55–71.

Е.Ю. Моряков

In this article the author focuses on the practice of using new communication channels
between subjects and the sovereign in Russia. During the reign of Catherine II, the people of Russia
made extensive use of the post office to send petitions to the monarch; under Paul I, the petition box
and newspapers were used for the same purpose. In the historiography of modern Russia, there are
no special studies of the communication channels between petitioners and the monarch. This article
attempts to reconstruct the institutional and socio-cultural history of the new communication tools
in order to understand how their use transformed communication between government and society
in Russia. The main sources for the paper are records and periodicals, as well as contemporaries’
notes describing the new means of communication. The author concludes that the development of
remote communication relieved petitioners of the need to visit administrative offices in person. When
petitioners used the post office, both the postmasters and state secretaries acted as communication
intermediaries. The petition box allowed petitioners to address the monarch without intermediaries. By
publishing responses to petitions in the Vedomosti, the government changed the communication with
petitioners and promoted legal education. The new channels of communication, however, contributed
to maintaining the old tradition of the personal administration of justice by the monarch.

Keywords: обращения граждан, коммуникация, communication, Russian Empire, Российская империя, Екатерина II, Павел I, complaints, жалобы, press, пресса, state and society, государство и общество, почта, Catherine II, государство и личность, Paul I, post, petition box, ящик для прошений

Publication based on the results of: Regional Status in Russia in 18th – 20th centuries: Dynamics and Social Reflection (2022)