Abstract

Civil executions in Imperial Russia were punitive ceremonies that were staged before crowds and presaged a sentence of penal labour and lifelong exile in Siberia. Intended to underline the absolute supremacy of the autocracy, they choreographed the public humiliation of the criminal and collective condemnation from the crowds who gathered to witness the stripping away of the rights and entitlements that gave civil life in the autocracy its meaning. Many took place without incident, and followed the ritual of debasement and expulsion endorsed by the state. Yet when at the civil executions of revolutionaries during the reign of Alexander II both convicts and spectators departed from the state’s script of public humiliation and orderly opprobrium, the performance of monarchical power and autocratic justice proved liable to subversion. Russian radicals sometimes succeeded in hijacking the ceremony to denounce despotism and proclaim an alternative vision of activism, solidarity, and revolution. In so doing, they contested the autocrat’s position as the source of status, rights and, ultimately, of sovereignty. Building on studies of law, punishment, performance, and the revolutionary movement, this article demonstrates how radicals and their supporters recast “scenarios of power” as “scenarios of rebellion”.

中文翻译：

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亚历山大二世统治时期的内战，激进抗议和惩罚剧院*

摘要

俄罗斯帝国的民事处决是在人群面前举行的惩罚性仪式，并预示了在西伯利亚的刑罚和终身流放的判决。为了强调专制政体的绝对至高无上，他们精心编排了公众对犯罪和集体谴责的侮辱，他们聚集在一起目睹了剥夺权利和应享权利的情况，这些剥夺了权利和应享权利，赋予了专制政体以公民权。许多事件没有发生，遵循了国家认可的卑鄙和驱逐仪式。然而，当亚历山大二世统治时期在革命者的民事处决中，定罪者和旁观者背离了国家的公开羞辱和有序的亵渎行为，君主专制和独裁正义的表现很可能被颠覆。俄国激进分子有时成功劫持了谴责专制主义的仪式，并宣布了激进主义，团结和革命的另类愿景。在这样做时，他们质疑独裁者的地位，权利和最终主权的来源。本文以对法律，惩罚，绩效和革命运动的研究为基础，展示了激进分子及其支持者如何将“权力场景”重塑为“叛乱场景”。