Mir (social)

Obshchina (Russian: общи́на; IPA: [ɐpˈɕːinə], literally: "commune") or Mir (Russian: мир, literally: "society" (one of the meanings)) or Selskoye obshestvo (Russian: Cельское общество ("Rural community", official term in the 19th and 20th century) were peasant village communities, as opposed to individual farmsteads, or khutors, in Imperial Russia. The term derives from the word о́бщий, obshchiy (common).

The vast majority of Russian peasants held their land in communal ownership within a mir community, which acted as a village government and a cooperative. Arable land was divided in sections based on soil quality and distance from the village. Each household had the right to claim one or more strips from each section depending on the number of adults in the household. The purpose of this allocation was not so much social (to each according to his needs) as it was practical (that each person pay his taxes). Strips were periodically re-allocated on the basis of a census, to ensure equitable share of the land. This was enforced by the state, which had an interest in the ability of households to pay their taxes.

A detailed statistical description of the Russian village commune was provided by Alexander Ivanovich Chuprov. Communal land ownership of the Mir predated serfdom, surviving emancipation and even the Russian Revolution (1917). Until the abolition of serfdom in 1861, the mir could either contain serfs or free peasants. In the first case lands reserved for serf use were assigned to the mir for allocation by the proprietor.

Even after the emancipation of the serfs in 1861, a peasant in his everyday work normally had little independence from obshchina, governed at the village level (mir) by the full assembly of the community (skhod). Among its duties were control and redistribution of the common land and forest (if such existed), levying recruits for military service, and imposing punishments for minor crimes. Obshchina was also held responsible for taxes underpaid by members. This type of shared responsibility was known as krugovaya poruka, although the exact meaning of this expression has changed over time and now in Russian it has a negative meaning of mutual cover-up.

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