Czar Alexander II took steps to reform and modernize the Russian Empire, including abolishing the practice of serfdom in 1861. What effect did this have on industrial growth in Russia?
A. Russia had food shortages due to a lack of farm labor.
B. Freed serfs left the farms and found work in factories.
C. The factory owners refused to hire serfs for new industrial jobs.
D. Workers' wages went up, which slowed industrial growth.

Answer:

Explanation:

It is arguable that the main beneficiary of the reform was not the peasant and certainly not the landowner but the state. A new apparatus of government was established to replace the authority of the serf owner. From the is pravnik, the chief official of the district, who in 1862 ceased to be elected by the nobility and became an appointed official of the Ministry of the Interior, the official hierarchy now stretched down to the village notary, the most powerful person at this level, who was assisted by an elder elected by an assembly of householders. The lowest effective center of power was the village commune (obshchina), an institution of uncertain origin but great antiquity, which had long had the power to redistribute land for the use of its members and to determine the crop cycle, but which now also became responsible for collecting taxes on behalf of the government