Stolypin was a monarchist and hoped to strengthen the throne by modernizing the backward Russian rural economy. Modernity and efficiency were his goals, not democracy. He argued that the land question could only be resolved, and revolution averted, when the peasants communal system was abolished and a stable landowning class of peasants created – the kulaks – who would have a stake in the status quo. His successes and failures have been subject of heated controversies among scholars. They agree he was one of the last major statesmen of Imperial Russia with clearly defined public policies and with the determination to undertake major reforms.