Tkachev S.V., Tkacheva N.N. (2023) Opium Prevalence in the Primorsky Region of the Russian Empire Through the Lens of One Particular Case. Vostok (Oriens). No. 6. Pp. 104–117.

Abstract

Looking through the documents in the State Archive of the Russian Federation (GARF), we largely by accident (the name of the file did not accurately reflect the content of the materials) found a folder of documents of the Police Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs from 1915 named “On the eviction of Chinese tenants of the Cossack lands from the Ussuriysk Army”. Actually, the materials referred primarily to a single episode, related to the spread of opium poppy culture in the southern Primorsky Region in the early 20th century. The fact of the wide spread of poppy culture among the Chinese in this area has long been known. This problem has been discussed both by contemporaries of this phenomenon and by present researchers. However, the case under consideration, in our opinion, allows us to look somewhat differently at relationships with the Chinese population in the region, and, in general, the socio-political situation in the country during World War I. In the authors’ opinion, ignoring such a widespread activity of the local population as opium cultivation, particularly considering it was illegal, can significantly distort the understanding of both political and economic processes that took place in the south of the Russian Far East in the early 20th century. We hope that introduction of materials from this archival case to the academic discourse will contribute to a deeper historical understanding of the socio-political processes in the region.

Content (in russ)