Notes on the Data Set: Known Problems with the Data

1. Codes for gubernatorial terms listed in Deck I include governorships in all St. Petersburg and Moscow posts PLUS all terms inother regions. The code is for ALL governorships regardless of area. Separate codes for Moscow and St. Petersburg governors (distinguished by type of governship, e.g., civil or military) are listed on Deck III. These two codings are not mutually exclusive. Therefore, one cannot merely "add up" governorships from Deck I and those of Deck II.
2. Codes for "geographical area posts" (Decks II and III) should include all known posts in areas outside Moscow and St.Petersburg, regardless of type of post. However, a large number of omissions have been noted in earlier analyses, namely gubernatorial roles were omitted in many cases from the geopgraphical area codes. Moreover, only up to two posts were recorded as "geographical roles," whereas up to four governorships were punched.

   Recommended solution to determine years of service in governorships outside Moscow and St. Petersburg: subtract Moscow and St. Peersburg governorships (N.B. not all recorded Moscow and St. Petersburg roles are governorships) from total governorships. Result is governorships in territorial posts.

   Recommended solution to determin total service in area (territorial) roles, including governorships (some of which were unfortunately omitted from geographical role codes):

   1. If a person had any non-Moscow, St. Petersburg gubernatorial roles coded (as determined by item 1, see above), these roles should be included in territorial role totals.
   2. If a person had any geopgraphical area post information coded EITHER (a)this this information should be ingnored for all persons who also had territorial governorships (i.e., this avoids double counting of governorships) OR (b) this information shold be included in total territorial service terms if no territorial gubernatorial service information was recorded.
3. Minister codes are incomplete, especially for certain periods, i.e., the nine categories coded were exhaustive for certain years in the nineteenth century, but not exhaustive for the eighteenth century. This is partly due to the fact that certain posts at various times were of ministerial rank and at other periods were not. It is also partly due to the fact that some roles, while formally not ministerships, in fact, involved ministerial functions.
4. Roles for State Councils, i.e., Government Council, Military Council and Admiralty Council, sometimes overlapped with one another (i.e., some bureaucrats held more than one role at one time) sometimes, the overlapping was partial and sometimes complete. These council terms also frequently overlapped with other posts coded. Estimated total number of bureaucrats with such overlaps (either among councillorships or between councillorships and other posts) is approximately 215.
5. There is no code designating the region in which gubernatorial terms outside Moscow and St. Petersburg were served. Up to four gubernatorial terms were recorded. Each gubernatorial term is coded regardless of whether more than one term was served in a given region.
6. Specific questions concerning coding procedures or form of the data should be addressed to Brian Silver, Department of Political Science, University of Wisconsin.

August, 1970

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Email: disc@mailplus.wisc.edu