to live on the lowest wages in Europe. Industrial workers could not earn a living wage with these exploitive restrictions. As a result of the industrial depression of 1900-1903, the worker’s dissatisfaction turned to desperation. They had no legal means by which to protest their treatment, or to seek improvement: the “protective” laws prohibited the organization of unions and forbade strikes of any kind. This situation of frustration allowed the radical ideas to gain a sympathetic ear within the labour community. Because of this influx of radical ideas, some were daring to defy constituted authority through illegal strikes. Initially the government reaction was typical arrests and more paternalistic legislation. However, in 1900 Sergei Zubatov introduced a new method for the reassurance of the Russian industrial worker. His method was so disasterous that at the end of 1903 he was dismissed as head of the Moscow security department.“Worker’s societies” were to be formed for the expressed purpose of “providing healthful, fraternal activities and opportunities for cooperative self-help together with “protection” from influences that might have an inimical effect on loyalty to job or country Trial groups were established in Moscow, Odessa, Kiev, Nikolaiev, and Kharkov. These societies attracted a large number of members. These members found the societies to be an ideal forum to plan and organize strikes, rather than a deterrent against striking. As a result of this organized environment, strikes became far more frequent. In the summer of 1903 – 225,000 various industries of southern Russia and Transcaucasia were on strike. Labour groups were beginning to show their real power in 1903, yet the tsar and his government made few concessions, preferring to suppress illegal strikes and arrest their organizers. The oppression of the labour class by employers and the governm...
