SUMMARY:

Mikhail Dolbilov's work analyzes discursive practices of the imperial Russian power in the Western Borderlands in the aftermath of the Polish rebellion of 1863. The author argues that the negative, anti-Polish aspect of these practices were inseparably tied with the positive, assertive aspects that promoted “Russianness” of the highly contested areas. Focusing on the figure of Mikhail Muraviev, the Governor-General of the Northwest Region, Dolbilov argues that Muraviev represented one of the transitional periods when different choices of empire or nation building were available. Muraviev, according to Dolbilov, was still “imperial” administrator, even if his policies sometimes reflected the nationalist tensions. The article dwells on the problem of Russification in the western borderlands, imperial policies to the local gentry and peasantry and the issue of gentry colonization.
Finally, drawing on the methodological insights of Richard Wortman, Dolbilov discusses the transitional role and place of Muraviev's policies between the imperial conception of Nicholas I and the nationalist transformations of the monarchy in the 1880s. The symbolic element of these policies is the empirical ground for the work.