Vekhi

Vekhi (Russian: Вехи; "Milestones", "Landmarks" or "Signposts"), is a collection of seven essays published in Russia in 1909. It was distributed in five editions and elicited over two hundred published rejoinders in two years. The volume reappraising the Russian intelligentsia was a brainchild of the literary historian Mikhail Gershenzon, who edited it and wrote the introduction.

Pyotr Struve selected the contributors, five of whom had previously contributed to a 1902 volume, Problems of Idealism, and he had attended the 1903 Schaffhausen Conference that laid the foundation for the Union of Liberation. A founder of the Constitutional Democratic Party in 1905, Struve had served in the Second Duma in 1907, then went on to edit the journal Russian Thought. In his essay, he argued that the intelligentsia owed its identity to standing apart from the government because it had coalesced in the 1840s under the impact of atheistic socialism. Thus, when the government agreed to restructure along constitutional lines in 1905, the intelligentsia proved incapable of acting constructively toward the masses, within the new framework.

Bogdan Kistyakovsky discussed the intelligentsia's failure to develop a legal consciousness. Their insufficient respect for law as an ordering force kept courts of law from attaining the respect required in a modern society. Reflecting on the distressing character of revolutionary processes in Russia, he laid the blame on both the Slavophiles and the Westernizers for representatives of both currents displayed negligence with regard to law and even found certain merits in the weakness of the lawful state in Russia. Kistyakovsky pointed out that Alexander Herzen, the key-figure of the early Westernizer movement, saw in that a way to a quicker and easier overthrow of the regime in power, but Konstantin Aksakov considered it to be another manifestation of Russia’s uniqueness: abstaining from law, the Russian people chose the path of “inner truth". Ideas of justice were drawn in the country from fiction, not from legal treatises. In contrast, it was law, according to Kistyakovsky, that could provide an individual with both personal freedom and social discipline. The constitutional state emerges and develops to reflect people’s solidary interests. It unites people and promotes mutual solidarity, thus contributing to individuals’ personal growth. Kistyakovsky saw the ultimate embodiment of the lawful state in the socialist state, which would realize all the lawful principles declared. All citizens’ rights would be fulfilled, people would govern the country and solidarity would reach its summit.

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