Book two is devoted to the era of the 1850s-1870s, which received the name of the Era of Great Reforms from historians. The result of the thirty-year reign of Nicholas I (1825-1855) was the creation of a rigid administrative vertical, a total clamp of critical thought and social activity. But the illusion of stability turned into an omnipotence of bureaucracy, monstrous corruption and, as a result, the complete collapse of the public administration system.