Reform and Repression

Over the period of time, Russia experienced reform as well as repression. Since Russia was ruled based on the totalitarianism, tsars want the absolute power. However, the peasants, or other lower class people, wanted freedom and food. Therefore, the tug of war between “reform” and “repression” occurred a lot in Russia.
Peter the Great modernized Russia. After the journey to the Western Europe, he decided to westernize the Russia. His goal was to strengthen the military, expand Russian borders, and centralize royal power. In order to achieve his goals, he brought all Russian institutions under his control and forced the boyars to serve the state in civilian or military positions. He strengthened serfdom and passed laws ensuring that nobles retained control over their lands, since nobles would serve the state only if their own interests were protected. Moreover, there were changes with symbolic meaning, such as shaving beards, replacing old fashioned robes with western style clothes, and holding grand parties. Anyone who resisted the new order will get tortured and executed. During his reign, I think the reform and repression balanced well. Peter didn’t focus only on reform as well as repression. While he reforming Russia, he repressed or forced people to follow his new orders, however, in some way, like strengthening serfdom, he gave awards or benefits in order to make people to follow his rule, especially to the boyars. Still, it was difficult to make decision between reform and repression, since if he repressed people a lot, people would follow his rule, but it would not be helpful to reform due to their lack of new ideas. Also, if he reformed only, people with freedom would not follow new order if they dislike. Briefly, Peter need to rule Russia in between reformation and repression, which was what Peter did.
The next tsar was Catherine the Great, German wife of PeterⅢ. She is an enlightened ruler. She reorganized the provincial government, codified laws, and...