The Union of Unions (

Russian Russian(s) refers to anything related to Russia, including: *Russians (, ''russkiye''), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *Rossiyane (), Russian language term for all citizens and peo ...

: ''Союз союзов'', ''Soyuz soyuzov'') was a wide alliance of various

professional A professional is a member of a profession or any person who works in a specified professional activity. The term also describes the standards of education and training that prepare members of the profession with the particular knowledge and skil ...

unions formed in 1905, active during the revolutionary last years of the

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War. ...

. One of those active in the formation of the Union of Unions was

Pavel Milyukov Pavel Nikolayevich Milyukov ( rus, Па́вел Никола́евич Милюко́в, p=mʲɪlʲʊˈkof; 31 March 1943) was a Russian historian and liberal politician. Milyukov was the founder, leader, and the most prominent member of the Con ...

, who later became the

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in 1917. It was formed in the wake of

Bloody Sunday Bloody Sunday may refer to: Historical events Canada * Bloody Sunday (1923), a day of police violence during a steelworkers' strike for union recognition in Sydney, Cape Breton Island, Nova Scotia * Bloody Sunday (1938), police violence aga ...

, as the professional associations organized themselves at national level, to rally their members behind the liberal cause. The Union of Writers, Lawyers, Professors and Engineers were one of the first of these unions to be formed. They were soon joined by the Women's Union for Equality, despite some opposition from male leaders of the Union of Unions.Semi-professional associations, like the Union of Railway Workers and Employees, Union of Clerks and Book-keepers, and the Union of Pharmaceutical Assistants, became organized as affiliated associations. Their participation gave the

intelligentsia The intelligentsia is a status class composed of the university-educated people of a society who engage in the complex mental labours by which they critique, shape, and lead in the politics, policies, and culture of their society; as such, the in ...

a direct link with the masses, whom they had been distanced from.Figes, p. 181. After the founding of the Bulygin Duma in 1905, the radicals in the Union of Unions, alongside the

Social Democrats Social democracy is a political, social, and economic philosophy within socialism that supports political and economic democracy. As a policy regime, it is described by academics as advocating economic and social interventions to promote so ...

, became more determined than ever to use "mass

civil disobedience Civil disobedience is the active, professed refusal of a citizen to obey certain laws, demands, orders or commands of a government (or any other authority). By some definitions, civil disobedience has to be nonviolent to be called "civil". Hen ...

" as a weapon to pressurize the government to make further

reform Reform ( lat, reformo) means the improvement or amendment of what is wrong, corrupt, unsatisfactory, etc. The use of the word in this way emerges in the late 18th century and is believed to originate from Christopher Wyvill#The Yorkshire Associati ...

s and concessions, even though liberals chose not to boycott the elections to the

Duma A duma (russian: дума) is a Russian assembly with advisory or legislative functions. The term ''boyar duma'' is used to refer to advisory councils in Russia from the 10th to 17th centuries. Starting in the 18th century, city dumas were for ...

.Figes, p. 187. During the general strike in September 1905, after the most educated and wealthy of the working class – the

printers Printer may refer to: Technology * Printer (publishing), a person or a company * Printer (computing), a hardware device * Optical printer for motion picture films People * Nariman Printer ( fl. c. 1940), Indian journalist and activist * Jam ...

– had gone on

strike Strike may refer to: People * Strike (surname) Physical confrontation or removal *Strike (attack), attack with an inanimate object or a part of the human body intended to cause harm *Airstrike, military strike by air forces on either a suspected ...

, the

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workers, and the Union of Railway Employees and Workers, followed suit. The union was affiliated with the Union of Unions, which themselves at the time had been discussing the possibility of a political general strike to aid their campaign for further reform for several months.Figes, p. 189. The political demands of the demonstrators was "remarkably uniform", which was a sign of the co-ordinating role that the Union of Unions played.Figes, p. 190. The Union of Unions served partly as the origin of the Petersburg Soviet, as they first came up with the idea of a workers council established to orchestrate general strikes.

References

Bibliography

* 1905 in the Russian Empire 1905 Russian Revolution National trade union centers of Russia Organizations of the Russian Revolution Unions of the Russian Empire {{Russian-hist-stub