Social and Economic Factors of Development

Introduction

Since the beginning of the X century, there were significant changes not only in the political, but also in the social system and in the economic life of Russia.

In 882, Novgorod Prince Oleg united all the Eastern Slavic lands into a single state, Russia. Kievan Rus was the largest and most powerful state of medieval Europe. Its territory stretched from the Baltic to the Black Sea, from the Carpathians to the Volga, and covered approximately 800 thousand square kilometers. In fact, it was the empire in which they lived, for various calculations, from 3 to 12 million people. It existed from the 9th to the middle of the 12th century and broke up into 15 separate lands that existed as sovereign states or independent principalities.

The formation of the Kiev state was a factor that accelerated the formation of private land ownership. X-XI centuries. - a period of intensive development, which took place in two directions. First, with the formation of the state, there was a process of conquering the territories of neighboring communities, the formation of the state, represented by the prince, of land ownership. Secondly, the economic differentiation in the society increased.

A number of researchers claim that in the princely period (9th – first half of the 12th centuries) feudalism existed in the guise of the state system. It was characterized by the increased role of princely power, which developed economic relations.

In the first stages of the formation of feudalism, the feudal class as a whole became the supreme owner of the land. At the head of the corporation of feudal lords became the prince, who was, in such images, the supreme feudal owner of the state territory.

The right of land ownership belonged exclusively to the feudal class. The princely, boyar and church land tenure was the estate property, which had a hierarchical and at the same time conditional character. The landowners of the feudal principalities were vassals of the Grand Duke. Large landowners, in turn, had smaller vassals. With the growth of feudal relations, by seizing peasant communal lands, princely, boyar and monastic feudal land tenure was formed. Kievan Rus had property in the form of patrimonial land tenure, where the labor of peasants — serfs and serfs was exploited. Along with the different categories of feudal-dependent peasants in slaves, slave labor was used on a small scale. In the era of early feudalism, there were still many free peasant serfs living on communal land. However, a large patrimony, princely, boyar and monastic, threatened communal land tenure more and more.

At the end of the X-beginning of the XI century, Russia enters into the swath of completion of the disintegration of the tribal system. A new organization based on territorial links is being born. Already in the 9th century, the features of pre-feudal social relations were quite clearly defined. Further relations during the X-XI centuries demanded restructuring and the form of the state. With the active assistance of the superstructure, large land tenure has grown and strengthened on the ground. The political role of landowning nobility has risen greatly. The form of exploitation of the dependent peasantry has changed. New urban centers were clearly indicated. Various political organizations contributed to the strengthening of the economic and political position of the landowning nobility. By the end of the 9th century, one can speak of the existence of the early feudal Old Russian state, which is continuously growing during the 10th and the first half of the 11th centuries.

Simultaneously with the development of social relations, which gave rise to the exploitation of the personally free direct producers in the state by the ruling class, the social and economic system based on the exploitation of the dependent population — the master economy — took shape in the 9th and 11th centuries. In the 9th-11th centuries, the process of the formation of the master's landed property took place, which was the economic basis for the exploitation of the dependent population in the patrimony. In ancient Russia, domination began with small land areas. At this time, the courtyard arises as a complex housing complex, which was one of the factors of the economic stability of the princely and non-princely economy. The operation of the princely and boyar households required additional sources of labor, which turned the master's court into a center not only for economic but also for social and economic activity. The materials relating to the X century, contains data on the complex composition of the princely domain. It consisted of courtyards, villages, cities, unfortified settlements of urban-type “places”. The courtyards were the center of the economy serving and local nobility.