The term itself derives from the Russian expression "Going to the people" (Хождение в народ).

The crisis in the system of autocracy and serfdom hastened bourgeois democratic reforms in Russia.

The antagonistic social contradictions of bourgeois society emerged in the capitalist relations of the advanced countries of Europe.

The bourgeois democratic revolutions in these countries disappointed Russia’s progressive intelligentsia

who began to seek “special paths” for the country’s social reconstruction.