If in Europe the idea of nation, closely associated with the principle of popular representation, challenged political autocracy, in Russia it was supposed to support the traditional tsarist regime. Uvarov did not seek to justify the tsar’s autocratic rule by claiming that it was based on divine right, as was customary at the time in the imperial capital; nor did he look to the church to legitimize it. Instead he linked autocracy with nationality, claiming that “one and the other flow from the same source and are conjoined on every page of the history of the Russian people.” He stopped short,
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