The Policy of the Russian Empire Towards Refugees During the First World War: Plans and Their Implementation

One of the biggest shocks for Russia in the XX century, undoubtedly, was the First world war, which had a huge impact on the future of the country. At the same time, the war itself was forgotten for many reasons, and only in recent years works devoted to this global conflict have been published. This study is devoted to one of the key issues of the social history of the First world war – to the policy of the Russian Empire towards refugees. While the phenomenon of refugee is studied quite well, the evolution of the state strategy is poorly studied. The work determined the degree of effectiveness of the Russian Empire's policy towards refugees during the First world war. For this purpose, the role of government measures in the mass outflow of population from the border areas of the Russian Empire and Eastern Galicia was established, the process of formation of Russian legislation on refugees was studied, and programs for refugee assistance and their implementation were considered. It was concluded that although some aspects of refugee policy, such as the establishment of full control over the movement of migrants within the Empire, could not be implemented, in general, it was quite effective and allowed in the shortest possible time to provide all the necessary to several million people.