Social portrait of the local elite of the Union of October 17 in early 20th century Russia

The paper aims to form the social image of the Octobrist local political elite at the all-Russian level comparing it with the social composition of the Central Committee and the party as a whole. The criteria of elitism were participation in the Union regional department leadership, representation and participation in the State Duma elections of various convocations as well as in the State Council except metropolitan figures participating in the Central Committee. The prosoprographic electronic database Party and Political Elite of Provincial Russia (1890s-1920s) was used as a source providing the data on characteristics of the elite, their social origin etc. The analysis of the accumulated information allowed drawing up a general portrait of the Union local political elite, to identify its preferential parameters (nobility, civil service, mature age, higher education, belonging to the Great Russians). The originality of the research lies in the first attempt to create a social portrait of the provincial elite of the Union of October 17 at the all-Russian level in comparison with the social composition of the Central Committee and the party as a whole, using a prosopographic database as a source.