Ivan Nikolaevich Durnovo was a politician of the late Russian Empire who was born on 1 or 13 March 1834 in the noble family of Durnovo in the Chernihiv province.
Growing up, Ivan Durnovo studied at the Prince Michael Artillery Academy in St. Petersburg, and after graduation went to serve in the army for a short time, then returned to civilian life.
Shortly thereafter, Ivan Dur Nunovo was elected by the nobility of his county as a marshal of nobility, and then successively served as governor of Chernihiv and governor of Yekaterinoslav.
In 1882, Dur Nuovo managed to please the then Tsar Alexander III and Empress Maria Fyodorovna, and on the recommendation of the latter, Ivan Dunovo was able to come to St. Petersburg as Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs.
He was not a capable politician, but a good communicator was able to win the trust of his superiors through a few conversations, which, combined with his aristocratic status, led him to mingle well in officialdom.
Later, the well-known reformer of the Russian Empire, the first Prime Minister Sergei Witte, described Every Dunovo in his memoirs as a pleasant aristocratic marshal, a pleasant governor, and a pleasant deputy minister of the interior. But not a literate or intelligent person; He is rather limited in his abilities and is a hospitable, polite, amiable, but at the same time very cunning person.
In 1886, also on the recommendation of the Empress, Dur Nuovo was appointed Chairman of the Fourth Department of His Majesty's Chancellery, which was responsible for charities and health care.
In 1889, Minister of the Interior Dmitry Tolstoy died, and Dur Nuovo was ordered to replace him as the new Minister of the Interior.
After Dur Novo took office, what stood out was that he would only blindly follow the policy made by the previous interior minister, and would not flexibly innovate on this.
It is precisely because of this that Ivan Dunovo, as Minister of Internal Affairs, worked significantly less than his predecessor, Dmitry Tolstoy.
Durnovo's fish-catching attitude and poor work ability often caused him to be complained about by subordinates or staff.
From 1891 to 1892, a massive famine occurred in Russia, spreading from the banks of the Volga River to the Urals and the Black Sea, resulting in the deaths of as many as 375,000-400,000 civilians.
In the face of this famine, Dur Novo still carried out the attitude of fishing to the end, and did not take enough effective measures to deal with the famine.
It is precisely because of this that many ordinary people have serious dissatisfaction with the tsarist government, which in turn has awakened Marxism and populism in Russia.
In 1895, Tsar Nicholas II promoted Dunovo to chairman of the Council of Ministers (equivalent to the post of chancellor), the pinnacle of the Russian Imperial bureaucracy at the time.
Even so, however, Durnovo continued to fish, and in the face of the symptoms of the Russian Empire at that time, he did not have any ideas for reform. The policy left over from the predecessor is maintained, and there is not much change.
Durnovo did not enjoy authority and trust in the bureaucracy, and he himself had not done enough to perform politics before, but he remained unharmed in the highest-ranking position of chairman of the Council of Ministers until the end of his life.
Durnovo himself eventually died at work on May 29, 1903.