Paul Goble
Staunton, February 22 – Encouraged by “the ethnicization of political rhetoric” in the wake of the Manezh clashes, the leadership of the Russian Orthodox Church has been pushing the idea of “ethnic Orthodox,” a term that conflates nationality and religion, to bolster its claim to be able to speak for the Russian people, according to a Moscow analyst.
In a lengthy article posted on Chaskor.ru yesterday, Nikolay Vinnik, the leader of the Demagogiya.ru portal, traces the way in which this hsift in rhetoric by Dmitry Medvedev and others over the last two months has been accompanied by greater “public acitivity” by the Moscow Patriarchate (www.chaskor.ru/article/russkij_vopros_i_pravoslavnyj_otvet_22320).
Medvedev appeared to give approval to the former by his statement on January 17 that “we must devote attention to our multi-national culture but beyond any doubt particular attention must be devoted to Russian culture,” despite his partial “disavowal” of that idea on February 11 when he spoke in defense of multi-culturalism.
But the genie was out of the bottle, Vinnik argues, and many analysts agreed. Maksim Kononenko of “Gazeta,” for example, noted that “in Russia a national revolution has taken place,” adding that nationalist ideas are “extremely popular” and that this shift in Moscow’s position is “more serious than the decision to introduce tanks into South Osetia.”
In this upsurge of commentary, the Russian Orthodox Church sought to demonstrate its “’Russophile’ and more generally ethnocentric content.” In one document, it specified that “the subjects of social relations are not so much citizens and their voluntary organizations as ethnoses” (demagogy.ru/news/2011-01-31/rpts-khochet-stat-politicheskim-predstavitelem-russkogo-naroda).
And that because that is so, the document continued, the Russian Orthodox Church has every right to present itself as “one of the most legitimate representatives of the Russian people in international and inter-ethnic dialogue,” conversations that must replect “adequately the number and role” of the Russian nation.
To that end, the Patriarchate proposed creating a special group in the Inter-Religious Council of Russia to consider the possibility of creating “a Council of Peoples of Russia, ‘on the basis of the criteria” that would reflect “the objective relationship in Russia of peoples and religious groups.”
Following that, the Patriarchate released another document in which it declared its readiness “to lobby on behalf of legislative measures ‘which will increase the defense of religious symbols, holy names and terms’” and also block slander and attacks against “collective religious and also national and racial feelings of the human worth of social groups” (demagogy.ru/vinnik/blog/2011-02-08/arkhiereiskii-sobor-nastaivaet-na-neobkhodimosti-nakazyvat-grazhdan-za-bogokh).
What is particularly noteworthy, Vinnik says, is that the Church has positioned itself as a defender of groups rather than individuals, placing the rights of the nation as higher than those of the individual, an idea that Kirill, now the patriarch, has been pushing since at least 2006 (old.demagogy.ru/index.php?module=comment&uid=442).
On this basis, one that reduces the importance of individual rights relative to collective ones, Vinnik says, Patriarch Kirill is pushing for the prohibition of free abortions not so much on moral grounds as part of a defense of the nation and a means of overcoming the country’s demographic problems.
“For the first time,” the Moscow analyst continues, “anti-abortion initiatives of an all-Russian scale are not reduced to propaganda but immediately directed at the worsening of the legal status of citizens.” Moreover, “for the first time, in the name of the Church, is diretly sounded the thesis about the necessity of national-proportional representation.”
And “for the first time, the Church has directly declared itself as the plenipotentiary representative of the Russian people, something it had early asserted indirectly but did not proclaim or propose as the basis for organizational measures.” What is taking place, Vinnik says, is “the ethnicization of Orthodoxy,” something “politically profitable” to the Patriarchate.
Kirill first used the term in December 2005 in a letter to Ravil Gainutdin of the Union of Muftis of Russia (SMR) who has often spoken of “ethnic Muslims” (www.interfax-religion.ru/dialog/?act=documents&div=288). But now that Kirill has become patriarch and that Russian political discourse has shifted, he is in a position to make use of this term more broadly.
The term “ethnic Orthodox,” Vinnik says, “is not only theologically absurd but also sets Orthodoxy apart from other confessions which are ready topresent themselves as having a super-ethnic or catholic status.” But it is politically useful because it allows the Patriarchate to advance a claim to speak on behalf of “the entire Russian people” and not just its own faithful.
That the Church might want to do so is understable, but this idea has more serious consequences: “An ethnocentric picture of the world correspondents to a legal consciousness in the framework of which collective subjecthood, collective responsibility and collective rights dominate over individual subjectivenss, individual responsibility and individual rights.”
Thus it matters, especially in Russia. By its exploitation of “the ethnicization of public rhetoric,” Vinnik says, the Russian Orthodox Church is obtaining “political dividends” but it is also settting the stage for making even broader claims that will both “legitimate” such ethnicization and lead to a further “archaization of legal consciousness.”
That may help the leadership of the Russian Orthodox Church to win benefits greater than other groups will, but those benefits will come, Vinnik says, only at the cost of “the erosion of civil accord and the worsening of the legal position of citizens,” something Orthodox and non-Orthodox alike should be concerned about.
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
Window on Eurasia: Unrecognized States More like the Flu than like Cancer, Malashenko Says
Paul Goble
Staunton, February 22 – Unrecognized states reflect the continuing tension between the principles of self-determination and of the territorial integrity of existing states, but their appearance is “more like ‘the flu’ than like ‘cancer’” and will not lead to “global consequences,” according to one of Moscow’s leading experts on ethnic relations.
In a discussion with Yevgeny Shestakov published yesterday in yesterday’s “Rossiiskaya gazeta,” Aleksey Malashenko of the Moscow Carnegie Center, points out that “all unrecognized states are quite small with a population of each generally not exceeding a half million and sometimes only a few thousand” (www.rg.ru/2011/02/21/malashenko-site.html).
And while their appearance is often very much a matter of contention, they do not and will not have the widespread impact on the international system that some have suggested, he argues, suggesting that the rise of such states in recent times is more like a passing illness than a fatal disease.
Consequently, Malashenko says, dealing with them requires “flexibility” and a willingness to live with a “de facto” situation, all the more so when “everyone clearly understand that there can be no going back.” Abkhazia, for example, “will never return to being part of Georgia, and Nagorno-Karabakh will not become part of Azerbaijan.”
The conflict between the principles of the right of nations to self-determination and the right of the territorial integrity of states, both recognized by the United Nations, is “eternal,” Malashenko suggests. But he points out that “the world is step by step beginning to relate to this quite calmly.”
“Look at the example of Cyprus, which is divided into two parts, recognized and unrecognized. Then there is Karabakh, there is the very specific problem of Abkhazia and South Osetia. There are also the Kurds, by the way, an enormous people which does not have its own state,” not to speak of Africa, Malashenko says.
Given this complexity, there is “no single model” for overcoming this conflict. Doing that, he suggests, is “simply impossible.”
Malashenko’s observations about unrecognized states come within a broader discussion of the problems countries face in dealing with populations consisting of more than one nationality, problems that can under certain continues threaten the continued existence of a unified country.
Disintegration of states is “almost always connected with ethnic problems,” Malashenko continues, with “the sharpness of inter-ethnic relations and the desire of the minority to separate.” Clearly, he suggests, for them, “to live in a mono-national state is much more peaceful somehow, more favorable than in complex multi-national countries.”
“In general,” the Moscow scholar argues, errors in the nationality policy of the state are to blame for this, but there are also cases, he suggests, “when the cultures [involved] are too different and when it is very difficult to combine them.” That is clearly the case of Northern and Southern Sudan.
Asked about the decision of some European countries to move away from the policy of multi-culturalism, Malashenko says that this step by itself will not lead to the disintegration of these states because the people involved are immigrants and the state has the right to insist that they adapt themselves at least to the point of knowing the national language.
Sometimes, the centralization of the state can help, Malashenko says, but sometimes that will have just the opposite effect, especially if, “as was the case in the Soviet Union where there existed an absolutely wild and idiotic centralization,” this policy “goes beyond the limits of what is wise.” No one correct model exists.
Like many Russians, Malashenko argues that the policies of pre-1914 Russian Prime Minister Pyotr Stolypin represent a useful point of departure. Tragically, he notes, he was followed by war and revolution, and the Soviet Union which emerged “could not survive. To reform it was impossible.”
Shestakov points out that at present several Russian experts are arguing that “to exclude even the potential disintegration of the state is possible by doing away with any national-territores,” by creating “a state of regions not connected with specific nationalities or ethnic groups.”
Malashenko replies that “it is possible this would be a suitable variant, but it is purely theoretical.” It does “look good on paper,” and one can come up with maps of all kinds. “But now consider the reaction of the national regions. Of course, under normal inter-ethnic relations this is not the most important but tensions all the same will arise.”
Staunton, February 22 – Unrecognized states reflect the continuing tension between the principles of self-determination and of the territorial integrity of existing states, but their appearance is “more like ‘the flu’ than like ‘cancer’” and will not lead to “global consequences,” according to one of Moscow’s leading experts on ethnic relations.
In a discussion with Yevgeny Shestakov published yesterday in yesterday’s “Rossiiskaya gazeta,” Aleksey Malashenko of the Moscow Carnegie Center, points out that “all unrecognized states are quite small with a population of each generally not exceeding a half million and sometimes only a few thousand” (www.rg.ru/2011/02/21/malashenko-site.html).
And while their appearance is often very much a matter of contention, they do not and will not have the widespread impact on the international system that some have suggested, he argues, suggesting that the rise of such states in recent times is more like a passing illness than a fatal disease.
Consequently, Malashenko says, dealing with them requires “flexibility” and a willingness to live with a “de facto” situation, all the more so when “everyone clearly understand that there can be no going back.” Abkhazia, for example, “will never return to being part of Georgia, and Nagorno-Karabakh will not become part of Azerbaijan.”
The conflict between the principles of the right of nations to self-determination and the right of the territorial integrity of states, both recognized by the United Nations, is “eternal,” Malashenko suggests. But he points out that “the world is step by step beginning to relate to this quite calmly.”
“Look at the example of Cyprus, which is divided into two parts, recognized and unrecognized. Then there is Karabakh, there is the very specific problem of Abkhazia and South Osetia. There are also the Kurds, by the way, an enormous people which does not have its own state,” not to speak of Africa, Malashenko says.
Given this complexity, there is “no single model” for overcoming this conflict. Doing that, he suggests, is “simply impossible.”
Malashenko’s observations about unrecognized states come within a broader discussion of the problems countries face in dealing with populations consisting of more than one nationality, problems that can under certain continues threaten the continued existence of a unified country.
Disintegration of states is “almost always connected with ethnic problems,” Malashenko continues, with “the sharpness of inter-ethnic relations and the desire of the minority to separate.” Clearly, he suggests, for them, “to live in a mono-national state is much more peaceful somehow, more favorable than in complex multi-national countries.”
“In general,” the Moscow scholar argues, errors in the nationality policy of the state are to blame for this, but there are also cases, he suggests, “when the cultures [involved] are too different and when it is very difficult to combine them.” That is clearly the case of Northern and Southern Sudan.
Asked about the decision of some European countries to move away from the policy of multi-culturalism, Malashenko says that this step by itself will not lead to the disintegration of these states because the people involved are immigrants and the state has the right to insist that they adapt themselves at least to the point of knowing the national language.
Sometimes, the centralization of the state can help, Malashenko says, but sometimes that will have just the opposite effect, especially if, “as was the case in the Soviet Union where there existed an absolutely wild and idiotic centralization,” this policy “goes beyond the limits of what is wise.” No one correct model exists.
Like many Russians, Malashenko argues that the policies of pre-1914 Russian Prime Minister Pyotr Stolypin represent a useful point of departure. Tragically, he notes, he was followed by war and revolution, and the Soviet Union which emerged “could not survive. To reform it was impossible.”
Shestakov points out that at present several Russian experts are arguing that “to exclude even the potential disintegration of the state is possible by doing away with any national-territores,” by creating “a state of regions not connected with specific nationalities or ethnic groups.”
Malashenko replies that “it is possible this would be a suitable variant, but it is purely theoretical.” It does “look good on paper,” and one can come up with maps of all kinds. “But now consider the reaction of the national regions. Of course, under normal inter-ethnic relations this is not the most important but tensions all the same will arise.”
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