THE PUBLIC, GLASNOST’ AND THE LIMITS OF THE “PERMISSIBLE” ON THE EVE OF THE OPENING OF THE RUSSIAN REFORMED COURTS IN 1866

The article discusses the impact of the perceptions of the public on the implementation of the 1864 Judicial Reform. The focus is on previously unexamined archival materials from the Ministry of Justice that demonstrate that the reformers viewed an uneducated and underdeveloped public as a signifi threat to the independence of the judiciary. The article relies on archival records on the development of court etiquette guidelines and materials on publishing court decisions and media coverage of these decisions. These records are compared to the public position expressed by the Ministry of Justice in its journal. The author demonstrates that contrary to the rhetoric of collaboration between government and society as presented in official media, the analysis of archival sources reveals that before the opening of the new courts, the reformers sought to control public behavior in court to the greatest extent possible, turning “outsiders” into passive observers of events. The Ministry of Justice attempted to impose strict restrictions on press coverage of the new judicial system. The perception that there was a lack of development in the public sphere led to policies of restrictions, tight control, and avoidance of misinterpretations. These attempts to control the public sphere and guide the actions of new institutions in the “correct” direction raised questions about the policy of trust between the government and society. Additionally, the fairness of the new court system, which openly positioned itself above the “underdeveloped” public, was questioned. The article contributes to ongoing historiographical debates about the role of modernist discourses of backwardness in the development of the public sphere and the significance of public discourse in Russia.