Zakharchenko P. Land Property Right in Ukraine: institutionalization, legal groundwork, particularities of implementation (mid. ХІХ - first quarter of ХХ)

The thesis consists of introductory part, four chapters, summary and a list of used sources. It deals with the law of land property evolution from the mid ХІХth to the first quarter of ХХth century with regard to its legal groundwork and implementation in certain regions of the Russian Empire populated mostly by Ukrainians. First chapter focuses on the current scientific researches conducted in this field, provides information regarding the theoretical grounds, sources, defines the notion "Land Property Right" as a part of the Russian Empire legislation. Other chapters shed the light on the essence of the subject studied. The defender of the thesis rests on the premises that the land reform of 19 February 1861 was induced by the public opinion and legal practices in the Russian Empire of that time. It was pushed by the Alexander's II Rescript of 20 November 1857 and addressed to all imperial governors suggesting to establish the local legislation aimed to improve life conditions of the praedial serfs. It is the Rescript that served as a pre-requisite to the legal groundwork for the following serfage liquidation vesting the serfs land property rights. The author guards his opinion arguing that the land property law transformation was more public, open and transparent than the soviet historiography states, proving his claims by numerous documents and other legal instruments. He deflates the statements of his predecessors who claimed that regardless implementation of the Regulations of 19 February 1861 the land remained to be owned by the landlords as well as he insists on the appearance of a new subject of the land property right in certain regions of Ukraine - the household or family and a houseowner - representatives of the common property interests. The author also shows the organization, course and particularities of the arrangement of the land owned by certain classes of peasants in Ukrainian guberniyas. The counter-reformation measures taken by the government in 1880-1890 also embraced the field of the land relations. Exploring this issue the dissertator analyzes a number of anti-market legislative acts, in particular the Law of 14 December 1893, disabling the peasants to manage their own land plots. The author associates ideological substantiation of a further bourgeois oriented land reform at the beginning of ХХth century with the name of the Minister of Finance then the Prime Minister S. Vitte. The disclosed archive records testify that it was him who in 1903 initiated the new transformations that were further fulfilled by the government headed by P. Stolypin.