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Review: Prince Michael Vorontsov: Viceroy to the Tsar.

The American Historical Review, Vol. 96, No.4. (Oct., 1991), pp. 1243-1244.

ANTHONYL. H. RHINELANDER. Prince Michael Vorontsov: Viceroy to the Tsar. Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press. 1990. Pp. viii, 279. $34.95.

Biographies of Russian statesmen and administrators are rare, and biographies of those who devoted themselves to governing the empire's vast hinterlands are rarer still. Therefore, Anthony L. H. Rhinelander's study of Michael S. Vorontsov is doubly welcome. Between 1823 and 1855, Vorontsov ruled the enormous area known as New Russia, those territories along the northern shore of the Black Sea that had been acquired, for the most part, during the reign of Catherine II. From 1844 until his retirement, he also served as the tsar's viceroy in the Caucasus. Thus, a work on Vorontsov promises much: the life story of a fascinating individual, insights into the problems of Russia's bureaucracy at the local level, and an understanding of the processes of empire building and imperial administration. To a large extent, Rhinelander's well-researched and readable book fulfills its promise.

The author does a fine job of tracing Vorontsov's public and private career. He portrays Vorontsov as a builder and a modernizer who attached the greatest importance to stimulating the economic and cultural development of the regions entrusted to his care. Although Rhinelander gives considerable attention to his subject's administration of New Russia, he is at his best when he recounts Vorontsov's struggle to put Russian rule in the Caucasus on a firm footing. The problems there were especially daunting. The region was distant and backward, and its population had long been fragmented along ethnic, religious, and administrative lines. The ancient civilizations and cultures of the region could not be easily russified. More serious still, the tsar's rule was threatened by Muslim guerrillas who, under the leadership of the legendary Shamil, were waging a protracted struggle for freedom.

Rhinelander credits Vorontsov with considerable success in coping with these difficulties. Unable to suppress Shamil and his followers by means of a military campaign, Vorontsov quarantined the rebellion and fatally weakened it. In addition, the viceroy reorganized local administrative units to take better account of ethnic distinctions and historic divisions. He paid great attention to indigenous traditions, fostering the growth of education, literature, and journalism in the native languages. Simultaneously, Vorontsov drew Caucasian elites into the tsar's service, providing avenues for training and advancement. Yet Rhinelander shows that Vorontsov's achievements had paradoxical consequences. Initially, they strengthened Russian control, but, by helping revive Georgian, Armenian, and Azerbaijani culture, Vorontsov's measures ultimately fostered the local nationalisms that were to threaten both imperial and Soviet rule.

Rhinelander focuses. considerable attention on Vorontsov's administrative style. He shows how Vorontsov, as governor-general and viceroy, built up a strong cadre of energetic, competent officials who enjoyed his respect and solicitude. Vorontsov drove his subordinates hard but did not spare himself, for he was always actively engaged in many of the details of governance. He also used his close ties to the emperor in order to cut through red tape and avoid many of the constricting regulations that emanated from the St. Petersburg bureaucracy. Although Rhinelander provides an excellent picture of Vorontsov practicing the arts. of government, he might have strengthened this aspect of his work by placing his subject more firmly in the political and administrative context of his age, showing clearly how Vorontosv's style differed from that of other leading provincial officials in the reigns of Alexander I and Nicholas I. But perhaps this is too much to ask of a biography. We should, instead, be grateful to Rhinelander for this lucid account of Vorontsov's life and for the insights he gives us about the problems and character of imperial rule in the first half of the nineteenth century.

RICHARD G. ROBBINS, JR. University of New Mexico

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