Taxes, Liberty, and Anxiety: Russia and the World from the Eighteenth Century to the Twentieth

The lecture considers the evolution of Russian, European, and North American tax systems in the context of the formation of a modern polity. It argues that all states moved toward a system of revenue that was at once respectful of certain immunities and rights, and more intrusive and inquisitive about the individual citizen and enterprise. Tax systems embody the duality of modern citizenship: the person has the right to be left alone, and the person is more transparent and vulnerable than ever before.

Yanni Kotsonis is professor of history at New York University. He is founding director of the Jordan Center for the Advanced Study of Russia. His recent book, States of Obligation: Taxes and Citizenship in the Russian Empire and Early Soviet Republic(2014) was awarded the Wallace K. Ferguson Prize of the Canadian Historical Association. He has fathered three tax exemptions.