Public Interactions between Orthodox Christian and Muslim Organisations at the Federal Level in Russia Today

Abstract

When we discuss Orthodox–Muslim relations in Russia we need to be clear which particular partners we are talking about. My article is about relationships among the religious leaderships at the federal level. These relationships are essentially asymmetrical, and this is the result not only of differences in the number of believers, but also of differences in political weight and ideological loyalty to the regime. One important factor is that Orthodoxy is part of the basis of Russian ethnic self-identification, whereas Islam has not become a unifying factor for many varied ethnic groups in the country. Orthodox and Muslims have asymmetrical relations as far as tolerance is concerned. At all levels – ordinary citizens, the mass media, the actions of leaders – this is heavily dependent on the dominant political mythology. The Russian Orthodox Church has privileged relations with the federal power, and Muslim leaders simply have to accept this as a fact. Some of the latter are preoccupied with their own ethnic issues; some follow the ideological lead of the Orthodox Church; others invoke Islamic unity; yet others see themselves as defending minority rights. Relations between Orthodox and Muslim leaderships are intimately involved with discourse about identity, and in the context of the ever-increasing significance of this discourse in Russia their relations are becoming ever more strained. Meanwhile the federal authorities do not seem to be paying serious attention to this phenomenon.

Notes

1 Even more ‘preliminary’, regarding the Russian Federation, was the relevant chapter in Mitrokhin (2004, pp. 443–60).

2 A conflict around a historical monument in Karachayevo-Cherkessia may be considered an exception (see Karachayevo-Cherkesiya, 2004).

3 The authorities or Orthodox Christian activists are not always responsible for hindering the construction of a mosque. The religious researcher Roman Silantyev points out, for example, that in a number of cases funds allocated for the construction of mosques were misappropriated (Silant'yev, 2006, pp. 462–63).

4 A similar resource is Yuri Maksimov's website Orthodoxy and Islam, www.pravoslavie-islam.ru (last accessed 3 August 2008).

5 See Appendix 2 in Xenophobia (2008), which consolidates statistics on racist and neo-Nazi attacks from 2004 to 2007 by category.

6 This is a consultative body founded at the beginning of 2006. It comprises public figures (‘predstaviteli obshchestvennosti’) chosen directly or indirectly by the president.

7 For details of this change in the ethno-nationalist vector, see Pain (2004).

8 This declaration should not be interpreted as a radical change of public rhetoric. Since then, the same Metropolitan Kirill has repeatedly described Russia as a ‘multiethnic and multireligious country’.

9 By the time this article was finalised Putin was no longer president, but his significance in political life so far remains unchanged.