Paul Goble
Staunton, June 2 – Army General Anatoly Kulikov has called on the Kremlin to creqate a new body, modelled the National Counter-Terrorism Committee and centered in the military’s general staff, to coordinate the activities of all force structures during emergency situations, natural or man-made.
Kulikov made his proposal at the Military Commanders Club during a conference at the end of May on coordinating force structures during emergency situations. At that time, the general “recommended that the president and government create in the [Army’s] General Staff a permanent organ to coordinate the actions of force structures during emergency situations.”
At present, the Emergency Situations Ministry has primary responsibility for reacting to “technogenic and natural catastrophes, fires, accidents” and similar phenomena, and the Interior Ministry has responsibility for control of any demonstrations or protests. Kulikov’s ideas would give the military a major voice over both (www.ng.ru/politics/2011-05-30/3_kartblansh.html).
The general noted at the meeting that “a certain time ago, the Russian Security Countil had become the coordinating organ among the force structures, but in fact, coordination of actions is being realized only on the basis of decisions taken by the president of the country” rather than in a continuous way.
That is a mistake, Kulikov continued, arguing that “the coordinating organ must be a permanently functioning one like the National Counter-Terrorist Committee.” He added that “the General Staff has already agreed that on its base should be established an operational staff attached to the coordination committee of the Security Council.”
Once those arrangements are made, he said, “the General Staff will fulfill its basic function not only in the sphere of defense but in the sphere of security as well,” something it is “ideally” situated to do by means of the coordination “of the actions of the force structures, including the collection of information, the processing of data, the setting of tasks,” and so on.
As “Nezavisimaya gazeta” notes it its report on Kulikov’s remarks, the general’s formulation, “the General Staff has expressed agreement” is “an interesting way to put the question given that on May 6, President Dmitry Medvedev signed directive 590 which significantly broadened the purview of the Security Council.
That directive specified that the Council “is an independent subdivision of the Presidential Administration with the rights of an administration” and defined its functions as including “the guaranteeing of national security, the organization of the defense of the country, including the construction and development of the Armed Forcdes, other forces, and so on.”
Thus,, that directive means the Security Council “de jure already is playing a coordinating role in ensuring national security and the defense of the country.” What then is Kulikov talking about, especially since he calls for “an operational staff for emergency situations at the coordination committee of the Security Council. But there is no such committee.”
The Security Council has seven inter-agency commissions, “Nezavisimaya” reports, “one of which, for military security is headed by Army General Yury Baluyevsky,” an opponent of the defense ministry. Consequent, “if an operational staff for emergency situations were established” there, it would mean that the Security Council and not the General Staff would “by law play the coordinating role.”
That explains part of Kulikov’s proposal, but it also appears to reflect his rather broader understanding of emergency situations, an understanding that includes not just natural and technogenic disasters but also crimes and protests that threaten to get out of hand, possibly to the point of undermining state power.
If protests like the one in Manezh Square in December were to spread, “Nezavisimaya” continues, “then by themselves neither the interior ministry nor the emergency situations ministry would be able to cope.” But that still leaves open the question as to whether the General Staff could do so more effectively.
It is thus likely that Kulikov’s floating of this idea reflects not only the tensions that have always existed between the Russian military and other force structures but also the concerns of some in the senior officer corps and elsewhere that conditions in the Russian Federation are deteriorating to a point that they may have to play a most unfamiliar role sometime soon.
Thursday, June 2, 2011
Window on Eurasia: Inequality, Poverty Characterize Post-Soviet States, Statistics Show
Paul Goble
Staunton, June 2 – Even though the top ten percent of the population of the post-Soviet states are wealthier than they ever were in the past, three out of every four residents of the Russian Federation are now poor, according to official statistics, with the situation being even worse in Kazakhstan, Ukraine and Azerbaijan and only a little better in Belarus.
In an article in today’s “Nezavisimaya gazeta,” Anastsiya Bashkatova reports on what she describes as “the shocking findings about the inequality of incomes and poverty” in five post-Soviet states, a situation which has made “Russia and its nearest neighbors in the CIS brothers in social unhappiness” (www.ng.ru/economics/2011-06-02/4_antisocial.html).
That is because, Bashkatova continues, “the share of citizens with mid-range incomes in the largest economies of the CIS is several times lower than in socially oriented states,” an outcome that shows that “in essence, on the post-Soviet space have been built anti-social models of the economy.”
The economies of the five countries the experts reported on in “Voprosy statistiki” – Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Belarus and Azerbaijan – share that in common with “the overwhelming majorities” of their populations belong to “the most needy and least secure stratas” and with “the highly paid either forming a minority or being absent statistically.”
Comparing the social pyramids in these countries with those typical of socially oriented countries is truly disturbing, the “Nezavisimaya gazeta” journalist says. In the latter, she points out, there are almost no citizens among the truly poor, those with less than average incomes form “about 20 percent,” those in the middle “about 60 percent,” and those well-paid 20 percent.
“Not one of the CIS countries listed,” she notes, “corresponded to this pattern of developed countries or was even close to it,” according to the analysis published in the Rosstat journal of data from 2008. Instead, they had far more poor and far fewer in the middle as far as income is concerned.
Indeed, “according to the data of sociologists and statisticians, in Russian there really is almost no middle class, because about 96 percent of Russians are poor and are distinguished from one another only by the level of impoverishment.” Only one percent is well-off by income, the investigators found.
The situation in Belarus is marginally better, “but in Kazakhstan, Ukraine and Azerbaijan,” it is worse with “more than 90 percent” of the population part of the needy or low paid segments. In other CIS countries, the situation may be even worse. And the researchers say that all are “very far from the optimal market model of distribution.”
Moreover, they argue, according to the “Nezavisimaya gazeta” report, that the situation is even worse than that because their figures were based on income requirements set by the governments of these countries, requirements that are “much lower than in developed countries” and thus allow the regimes involved to claim more progress than they have in fact made.
“If one applies to the CIS countries western measures of minimum wages,” Bashkatova writes, “then Russia along with its nearest neighbors falls more clearly in the group of the poor nations of the third world,” an indictment of their governments and a likely source of growing social tensions.
Staunton, June 2 – Even though the top ten percent of the population of the post-Soviet states are wealthier than they ever were in the past, three out of every four residents of the Russian Federation are now poor, according to official statistics, with the situation being even worse in Kazakhstan, Ukraine and Azerbaijan and only a little better in Belarus.
In an article in today’s “Nezavisimaya gazeta,” Anastsiya Bashkatova reports on what she describes as “the shocking findings about the inequality of incomes and poverty” in five post-Soviet states, a situation which has made “Russia and its nearest neighbors in the CIS brothers in social unhappiness” (www.ng.ru/economics/2011-06-02/4_antisocial.html).
That is because, Bashkatova continues, “the share of citizens with mid-range incomes in the largest economies of the CIS is several times lower than in socially oriented states,” an outcome that shows that “in essence, on the post-Soviet space have been built anti-social models of the economy.”
The economies of the five countries the experts reported on in “Voprosy statistiki” – Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Belarus and Azerbaijan – share that in common with “the overwhelming majorities” of their populations belong to “the most needy and least secure stratas” and with “the highly paid either forming a minority or being absent statistically.”
Comparing the social pyramids in these countries with those typical of socially oriented countries is truly disturbing, the “Nezavisimaya gazeta” journalist says. In the latter, she points out, there are almost no citizens among the truly poor, those with less than average incomes form “about 20 percent,” those in the middle “about 60 percent,” and those well-paid 20 percent.
“Not one of the CIS countries listed,” she notes, “corresponded to this pattern of developed countries or was even close to it,” according to the analysis published in the Rosstat journal of data from 2008. Instead, they had far more poor and far fewer in the middle as far as income is concerned.
Indeed, “according to the data of sociologists and statisticians, in Russian there really is almost no middle class, because about 96 percent of Russians are poor and are distinguished from one another only by the level of impoverishment.” Only one percent is well-off by income, the investigators found.
The situation in Belarus is marginally better, “but in Kazakhstan, Ukraine and Azerbaijan,” it is worse with “more than 90 percent” of the population part of the needy or low paid segments. In other CIS countries, the situation may be even worse. And the researchers say that all are “very far from the optimal market model of distribution.”
Moreover, they argue, according to the “Nezavisimaya gazeta” report, that the situation is even worse than that because their figures were based on income requirements set by the governments of these countries, requirements that are “much lower than in developed countries” and thus allow the regimes involved to claim more progress than they have in fact made.
“If one applies to the CIS countries western measures of minimum wages,” Bashkatova writes, “then Russia along with its nearest neighbors falls more clearly in the group of the poor nations of the third world,” an indictment of their governments and a likely source of growing social tensions.
Window on Eurasia: Tajik Officials Have Closed 1500 Mosques Since Start of 2011
Paul Goble
Staunton, June 2 – In the latest of a series of moves that recall the Soviet approach to Islam in Central Asia, Tajikistan has closed some 1500 mosques, in many cases at least nominally because their leaderships have failed to secure registration, health and tax documents that Dushanbe has been reluctant to give even when imams have applied for them.
The Islamsng.com portal reported yesterday that the Tajik government “continues to interfere in the religious life” of a republic where Islam and politics are not only thoroughly intermixed but one where the clashes in neighboring Afghanistan are continuing to shake the foundations of the state (islamsng.com/tjk/news/1994).
According to the report, Dushanbe has closed 1500 mosques this year, citing their owners for failing to have the necessary tax documents, permissions from the fire and health services, and official permission from district administrations – even though one imam, Inomjon Saidov, said that he had been trying to get such documents for two years.
Over the last two decades and largely because of the weakness of government institutions, the portal continued, mosques have appeared “on every large street” in Dushanbe and other Tajik cities. Most never registered with the authorities, and consequently, even more mosques are likely to be closed in the coming months.
Expert observers say, the news service continues, that “religious oppression [in Tajikistan] began seven years ago.” At first, women were banned from visiting mosques, then mosques were blocked from calling people to pray via loudspeakers, and children were prevented from wearing the hijab.
Then, last year, Dushanbe began insisting that all Tajiks studying at Islamic institutions in foreign countries return home and be checked to ensure that they were not importing radical ideas. And earlier this year, the Tajik government set up a special commission to ensure that imams have good morals, “rich religious knowledge,” and observe the laws.
Moreover, and perhaps most seriously, the government commission insisted that the imams be “laconic” and not preach more than 15 minutes at mosque ceremonies. In some cases, it appears, the imams have even been asked to clear their sermons in advance with government officials.
These restrictions recall the Soviet approach to mosques, an approach that undermined itself by driving many believers into what came to be known as “underground” or “parallel” Islam. And according to Islamsng.ru, experts believe that the current approach of the Tajikistan government may have the same effect and threaten “the security of the state.”
That is all the more likely because these actions are probably going to escape criticism from other governments who are inclined to look with favor or at least not to oppose any action that can be presented however implausibly as a move against Islamist radicalism and who view Tajikistan as a potential bulwark against the spread of Taliban-style violence northward.
Staunton, June 2 – In the latest of a series of moves that recall the Soviet approach to Islam in Central Asia, Tajikistan has closed some 1500 mosques, in many cases at least nominally because their leaderships have failed to secure registration, health and tax documents that Dushanbe has been reluctant to give even when imams have applied for them.
The Islamsng.com portal reported yesterday that the Tajik government “continues to interfere in the religious life” of a republic where Islam and politics are not only thoroughly intermixed but one where the clashes in neighboring Afghanistan are continuing to shake the foundations of the state (islamsng.com/tjk/news/1994).
According to the report, Dushanbe has closed 1500 mosques this year, citing their owners for failing to have the necessary tax documents, permissions from the fire and health services, and official permission from district administrations – even though one imam, Inomjon Saidov, said that he had been trying to get such documents for two years.
Over the last two decades and largely because of the weakness of government institutions, the portal continued, mosques have appeared “on every large street” in Dushanbe and other Tajik cities. Most never registered with the authorities, and consequently, even more mosques are likely to be closed in the coming months.
Expert observers say, the news service continues, that “religious oppression [in Tajikistan] began seven years ago.” At first, women were banned from visiting mosques, then mosques were blocked from calling people to pray via loudspeakers, and children were prevented from wearing the hijab.
Then, last year, Dushanbe began insisting that all Tajiks studying at Islamic institutions in foreign countries return home and be checked to ensure that they were not importing radical ideas. And earlier this year, the Tajik government set up a special commission to ensure that imams have good morals, “rich religious knowledge,” and observe the laws.
Moreover, and perhaps most seriously, the government commission insisted that the imams be “laconic” and not preach more than 15 minutes at mosque ceremonies. In some cases, it appears, the imams have even been asked to clear their sermons in advance with government officials.
These restrictions recall the Soviet approach to mosques, an approach that undermined itself by driving many believers into what came to be known as “underground” or “parallel” Islam. And according to Islamsng.ru, experts believe that the current approach of the Tajikistan government may have the same effect and threaten “the security of the state.”
That is all the more likely because these actions are probably going to escape criticism from other governments who are inclined to look with favor or at least not to oppose any action that can be presented however implausibly as a move against Islamist radicalism and who view Tajikistan as a potential bulwark against the spread of Taliban-style violence northward.
Wednesday, June 1, 2011
Window on Eurasia: Moscow Plans Re-Adaptation Program for Up to 10,000 North Caucasians Who’ve Studied in Muslim Countries
Paul Goble
Staunton, June 1 – “Up to 10,000” young people from the North Caucasus are studying or have studied Islam abroad where they have received “doubtful ideological positions,” the Russian presidential plenipotentiary for the region says, and officials are working on a program to re-adapt them to life inside the Russian Federation.
In an interview in today’s “Vedomosti,” Aleksandr Khloponin says that Moscow “cannot prevent” people from travelling abroad given that “Russia has a visa-free regime with many countries.” But officials must make sure that they do not bring back and spread harmful ideas (www.vedomosti.ru/newspaper/article/261264/programma_po_vosstanovleniyu_chechni_vypolnena_aleksandr).
“According to our estimates,” Khloponin adds, there are “from 1000 to 10,000 of our youth studying or who have studied on the territories of countries” where they “can receive” potentially harmful ideas. Among these countries, “in particular” he continues, are Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Turkey.
“In this connection, we now are developing a program of adaptation of young men who are returning from there. This task has been given to the Ministry of Regional Affairs, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Federal Migration Service.” And before the end of the year, there is to be created “a data base” on who had studied what and where.
According to Khloponin, “it is natural that an individual who spends five years in a country where the the laws of shariat operate has an absolutely different understanding of life. We will help this individual. He should not give up his convictions, but he must understand that it is necessary to live according to the rules of the country to which he has returned.”
If the returnee does not change his views, Khloponin continues, “we will think about how to control his further activity. This individual must not work in the educational sector with children or conduct enlightenment activity in mosques. We will work with the Muslim spiritual administrations: they must exercise control within the limits of their competence.”
Asked whether such actions do not violate human rights, Khloponin responded that those who suggest that should consider the problems he faces and recognize that “there is nothing illegal in our actions, we are only proposing a program of adaptation. Ifg you want to work in a private company, fine, no one will interfere.”
Most of Khloponin’s interview was devoted to other issues, to his insistence that the basic task of restoring the Chechen Republic has been “in practice” achieved and that his current challenge is “to develop the economy of this and all other Caucasus republics” in order to find jobs for 400,000 unemployed young men.
Most of his remarks on those issues repeat what he has said before. But Khloponin makes four other comments that deserve attention. First, he downplayed the role of foreigners in financing the militants, saying “why should anyone seek money from Western foundations when it is possible to force local entrepreneuers to pay tribute and obtain a great deal more money?”
Second, he insists, it is now time to end the assignment of positions on the basis of ethnicity. “In order to preserve or not destroy” a shaky peace, he said, Russian officials, including himself, have been willing to “close our eyes” to this practice, one htat “all healthy thinking people” understand is “a survival of the past.” It must be ended gradually.
Third, Khloponin says, he faces a serious challenge to ensure that “in the formation of [party] lists for the upcoming elections, there are not included people who are close to the criminal structures or band formations.” As far as United Russia is concerned, he suggests, the Peoples Front will play a key role in that.
And fourth, he concludes, his being both a plenipotentiary representative of the president and a vice prime minister helps him do his work more effectively. Consequently, Khloponin suggests that in his opinion, it would be well to think about arranging things in the same way in other federal districts.
Staunton, June 1 – “Up to 10,000” young people from the North Caucasus are studying or have studied Islam abroad where they have received “doubtful ideological positions,” the Russian presidential plenipotentiary for the region says, and officials are working on a program to re-adapt them to life inside the Russian Federation.
In an interview in today’s “Vedomosti,” Aleksandr Khloponin says that Moscow “cannot prevent” people from travelling abroad given that “Russia has a visa-free regime with many countries.” But officials must make sure that they do not bring back and spread harmful ideas (www.vedomosti.ru/newspaper/article/261264/programma_po_vosstanovleniyu_chechni_vypolnena_aleksandr).
“According to our estimates,” Khloponin adds, there are “from 1000 to 10,000 of our youth studying or who have studied on the territories of countries” where they “can receive” potentially harmful ideas. Among these countries, “in particular” he continues, are Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Turkey.
“In this connection, we now are developing a program of adaptation of young men who are returning from there. This task has been given to the Ministry of Regional Affairs, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the Federal Migration Service.” And before the end of the year, there is to be created “a data base” on who had studied what and where.
According to Khloponin, “it is natural that an individual who spends five years in a country where the the laws of shariat operate has an absolutely different understanding of life. We will help this individual. He should not give up his convictions, but he must understand that it is necessary to live according to the rules of the country to which he has returned.”
If the returnee does not change his views, Khloponin continues, “we will think about how to control his further activity. This individual must not work in the educational sector with children or conduct enlightenment activity in mosques. We will work with the Muslim spiritual administrations: they must exercise control within the limits of their competence.”
Asked whether such actions do not violate human rights, Khloponin responded that those who suggest that should consider the problems he faces and recognize that “there is nothing illegal in our actions, we are only proposing a program of adaptation. Ifg you want to work in a private company, fine, no one will interfere.”
Most of Khloponin’s interview was devoted to other issues, to his insistence that the basic task of restoring the Chechen Republic has been “in practice” achieved and that his current challenge is “to develop the economy of this and all other Caucasus republics” in order to find jobs for 400,000 unemployed young men.
Most of his remarks on those issues repeat what he has said before. But Khloponin makes four other comments that deserve attention. First, he downplayed the role of foreigners in financing the militants, saying “why should anyone seek money from Western foundations when it is possible to force local entrepreneuers to pay tribute and obtain a great deal more money?”
Second, he insists, it is now time to end the assignment of positions on the basis of ethnicity. “In order to preserve or not destroy” a shaky peace, he said, Russian officials, including himself, have been willing to “close our eyes” to this practice, one htat “all healthy thinking people” understand is “a survival of the past.” It must be ended gradually.
Third, Khloponin says, he faces a serious challenge to ensure that “in the formation of [party] lists for the upcoming elections, there are not included people who are close to the criminal structures or band formations.” As far as United Russia is concerned, he suggests, the Peoples Front will play a key role in that.
And fourth, he concludes, his being both a plenipotentiary representative of the president and a vice prime minister helps him do his work more effectively. Consequently, Khloponin suggests that in his opinion, it would be well to think about arranging things in the same way in other federal districts.
Window on Eurasia: Kirill Seeks to Tighten Control over Church by Dividing Up Existing Bishoprics
Paul Goble
Staunton, June 1 – Patriarch Kirill is continuing to divide up the existing bishoprics within the Russian Orthodox Church in order to strengthen his control of local parishes, some of whom have gone their own way in the much larger sees inherited from the Soviet past, according to a leading Moscow specialist on religious affairs.
In a comment reported by “Kommersant,” Roman Lunkin, the director of the Moscow Institute of Religion and Law, says that Patriarch Kirill’s decision to form new eparchates, in the North Caucasus earlier this year and across the former Soviet space this week is intended to “strengthen” the patriarchate’s powers in localities (www.kommersant.ru/doc/1650916).
In the larger sees which have now been divided, Lunkin continues, “the parishes often live on their own because the ruling hierarch cannot physically follow what is taking place in all of them.” Consequently, the formation of the new bishoprics will increase the powers of the bishops over parishes and of the patriarch over the Russian Orthodox Church as a whole.
Moreover, because all the new bishops are “people devoted to [Kirill],” Lunkin suggests, this increase in their number will reduce the chance for the formation of any serious opposition group within the church and mean that Kirill will have a power vertical within the church equivalent to the one Vladimir Putin built in the Russian political system.
As Pavel Korobov of “Kommersant” ponts out, “the restructuring of the territorial-administrative structure of the Russian Orthodox Church began … in March … when the Synod took a decision to create several new bishoprics in the North Caucasus” in place of the two – centered in Stavropol and Baku – that had supervised parishes in that region.
This week, Kirill and the Synod took the following additional steps in this direction. First, they divided the Russian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate in Estonia into two parts, creating a new bishop for Narva and environs and removing this heavily ethnic Russian region from the control of Metropolitan Kornilii of Tallinn and All Estonia.
Second, the patriarch and his advisors divided what had been the Mordovian and Saransk bishopric into two new “church-territorial units, the Krasnoslobodskaya and Ardatskaya bishoprics.” Third, they reorganized the Tobolsk-Tyiumen bishopric, removing from its supervision the territory of Khanty-Mansiisk AO and the Yamarlo-Nenets AO, and forming two new bishoprics, the Khanty-Mansiisk and Sugurtskaya and the Salekhard and Novo-Urengoy.
And fourth, Kirill and the Synod restructured the Krasnoyarskaya and Yeniseyskaya bishopric, forming in its place a Yenisey and Norilsk bishopric and a Krasnoyarsk and Achinsk bishopric. As a result of these changes, the ROC of the Moscow Patriarchate now has 164 bishoprics to supervise some 30,000 parishes, many beyond the borders of Russia itself.
In announcing these changes, Vladimir Vigilyansky, press spokesman for Patriarch Kirill, noted that “in Greece, there is a bishop in every city, but we have a structure inherited from Soviet times when one city of a bishopric was separated from another by a thousand kilometers and when parishioners did not who was their ruling hierarch.”
“The reduction in the size of the bishoprics,” he continued, “will improve administration.” Moreover, by increasing the number of bishoprics and bringing their borders into closer correspondence with those of the state, the ROC may be in an even better position to influence politics.
But such explanation may not be the whole story or even the most important part of it. On the one hand, Lidiya Orlova writes in today’s “NG-Religii,” the church has no shortage of bishops but also no shortage of ambitious priests, many of whom “carry a marshal’s baton” in their cassocks (religion.ng.ru/events/2011-06-01/3_arhierei.html).
And on the other, as Kirill himself a most experienced church apparatchik certainly knows from his own life in Soviet times, there are few better ways to make the power of Moscow beyond challenge than by dividing up larger units on the Russian periphery that might at some point constitute a challenge and staffing the new smaller units with loyalist.
Staunton, June 1 – Patriarch Kirill is continuing to divide up the existing bishoprics within the Russian Orthodox Church in order to strengthen his control of local parishes, some of whom have gone their own way in the much larger sees inherited from the Soviet past, according to a leading Moscow specialist on religious affairs.
In a comment reported by “Kommersant,” Roman Lunkin, the director of the Moscow Institute of Religion and Law, says that Patriarch Kirill’s decision to form new eparchates, in the North Caucasus earlier this year and across the former Soviet space this week is intended to “strengthen” the patriarchate’s powers in localities (www.kommersant.ru/doc/1650916).
In the larger sees which have now been divided, Lunkin continues, “the parishes often live on their own because the ruling hierarch cannot physically follow what is taking place in all of them.” Consequently, the formation of the new bishoprics will increase the powers of the bishops over parishes and of the patriarch over the Russian Orthodox Church as a whole.
Moreover, because all the new bishops are “people devoted to [Kirill],” Lunkin suggests, this increase in their number will reduce the chance for the formation of any serious opposition group within the church and mean that Kirill will have a power vertical within the church equivalent to the one Vladimir Putin built in the Russian political system.
As Pavel Korobov of “Kommersant” ponts out, “the restructuring of the territorial-administrative structure of the Russian Orthodox Church began … in March … when the Synod took a decision to create several new bishoprics in the North Caucasus” in place of the two – centered in Stavropol and Baku – that had supervised parishes in that region.
This week, Kirill and the Synod took the following additional steps in this direction. First, they divided the Russian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate in Estonia into two parts, creating a new bishop for Narva and environs and removing this heavily ethnic Russian region from the control of Metropolitan Kornilii of Tallinn and All Estonia.
Second, the patriarch and his advisors divided what had been the Mordovian and Saransk bishopric into two new “church-territorial units, the Krasnoslobodskaya and Ardatskaya bishoprics.” Third, they reorganized the Tobolsk-Tyiumen bishopric, removing from its supervision the territory of Khanty-Mansiisk AO and the Yamarlo-Nenets AO, and forming two new bishoprics, the Khanty-Mansiisk and Sugurtskaya and the Salekhard and Novo-Urengoy.
And fourth, Kirill and the Synod restructured the Krasnoyarskaya and Yeniseyskaya bishopric, forming in its place a Yenisey and Norilsk bishopric and a Krasnoyarsk and Achinsk bishopric. As a result of these changes, the ROC of the Moscow Patriarchate now has 164 bishoprics to supervise some 30,000 parishes, many beyond the borders of Russia itself.
In announcing these changes, Vladimir Vigilyansky, press spokesman for Patriarch Kirill, noted that “in Greece, there is a bishop in every city, but we have a structure inherited from Soviet times when one city of a bishopric was separated from another by a thousand kilometers and when parishioners did not who was their ruling hierarch.”
“The reduction in the size of the bishoprics,” he continued, “will improve administration.” Moreover, by increasing the number of bishoprics and bringing their borders into closer correspondence with those of the state, the ROC may be in an even better position to influence politics.
But such explanation may not be the whole story or even the most important part of it. On the one hand, Lidiya Orlova writes in today’s “NG-Religii,” the church has no shortage of bishops but also no shortage of ambitious priests, many of whom “carry a marshal’s baton” in their cassocks (religion.ng.ru/events/2011-06-01/3_arhierei.html).
And on the other, as Kirill himself a most experienced church apparatchik certainly knows from his own life in Soviet times, there are few better ways to make the power of Moscow beyond challenge than by dividing up larger units on the Russian periphery that might at some point constitute a challenge and staffing the new smaller units with loyalist.
Window on Eurasia: 21st Century to be ‘Century of the Majority,’ Tishkov Says
Paul Goble
Staunton, June 1 – “If the 20th century was the century of minorities,” the director of the Moscow Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology says, “the 21st century will be the century of the majority in the sense of recognizing its interests, demands and rights,” a view likely to please Russian nationalists even as it frightens national minorities in that country.
In a comment posted on the “Russky zhurnal” portal, Valery Tishkov, often the object of attack by Russian nationalists, argues that this is the case because “either at the level of the state or at the level of particular regions within countries, minorities turn out to be in a situation of the ruling majority” (www.russ.ru/Mirovaya-povestka/XXI-vek-priznaet-prava-bol-shinstva).
“All contemporary states,” Tishkov points out, “have a complex ethnic, religious and racial composition,” and consequently, “all contemporary nations display a cultural complexity.” Of course, “that was the case earlier but it wasn’t recognized” because it was assumed that all members of such nations were the same.
“Only with the development of democracy and with the acquisition of a voice of the so-called silent groups of minorities” did it turn out, Tishkov said, that various “territorial, cultural and historical identities” existed within the nation. And this sense of variety was exacerbated by the arrival of immigrant groups.
The experience of various European countries shows that “a particular challenge became not eethnic migration but migration connected with a different religious culture.” Indeed, Tishkov says, “it was more difficult to adapt or integrate not so much people different by language, tradition, phenotype or skin color as by membership in a different religion.”
This religious “barrier,” the Russian ethnographer argues, “is much more different to overcome” because “people almost never shift from one religion to another, and Islam in general harshly punishes and does not accept the possibility of departure let alone a transfer to another religion.”
This difficulty, Tishkov argues, has generated a certain “panic” with many commentators even suggesting that “the policy of multiculturalism is to blame, that it was a mistake and so on,” a view that has contributed to “the activation of conservative, ultra-right forces and political parties.”
The countries where this has happened most clearly are “the countries of Euro-Atlantic civilization, inclusing Eastern Europe and the territory of the former USSR in certain parts of which democracy has existed already for a long time.” But it is particularly obvious where democracy is in the process of development.
As there become “greater possibilities to insist on their rights in the frameworks of various international conventions, declarations, and chargers about the rights of minorities or about the rights of citizens which belong to ethnic, racial or religious minorities,” members of these groups will not surprisingly make use of them.
This pattern of development, Tishkov says, is “connected not only with political democratization but also with economic development,” especially since economic development has attracted immigration flows. “Countries which do not accept migrants have not been characterized by particular success in their development.”
At the same time, of course, immigration brings with it certain “political, social or emotional-ideological risks,” all the more so because “it is rarely acknowledged by politicians that [most countries, including Russia] have benefited more from immigration than they have lost.”
Integrating immigrants is a challenge, Tishkov says. “The formula, e pluribus unum, is used in many countries,” and “many democracies are constructed on the formula of unity in multiplicity, but sometimes doubt is cast on this formula and in opposition to it appears the idea that it is necessary to make all the same even to the point of forming a mono-culture.”
“But this is unreal,” he continues, and suggests that “democracy must be build on the recognition of diversity, of the rights, demands and interests of people and citizens which are connected with their culture and with their ethnic or religion origin” even as “a common civic solidarity must be affirmed.”
In the case of the Russian Federation, Tishkov says, “one is speaking in this case about a [non-ethnic] Russia identity, about an all-Russian patriotism. Here the formula is not ‘ether-or’ (either you are an [ethnic] Russian or a [non-ethnic] Russian; or you are a Chechen or you are a [non-ethnic] Russian, but ‘both-and.’”
“And this must be reflected not only in administrative-government arrangements but also in questions of access to power,” Tishkov says. “It must not be the case that one group, the bears of one nationality declare themselves a state-forming ethnos or people and usurp in their favor all power.”
Officialdom must reflect “the composition of the population of the country,” albeit “there must not be quotas,” the ethnographer says. And he suggests that this century will be a century of majorities because “either at the level of the state or in particular regions,” minorities will be majorities and thus will be interested in defending majoritarian principles.
Moreover, Tishkov says, “minorities [at the present time] have international protection, they are able to organize themselves, to advance themselves and to make demands up to the level of international Strasbourg Courts” and thus it is no longer the case that majorities always “outvote” minorities.
If Tishkov is correct and the 21st century will be “the century of the majority,” that could present even more threats to existing states that “the century of minorities” did because many minorities will want to make sure that they are majorities and thus seek the formation of their own states rather than integration into existing ones.
Staunton, June 1 – “If the 20th century was the century of minorities,” the director of the Moscow Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology says, “the 21st century will be the century of the majority in the sense of recognizing its interests, demands and rights,” a view likely to please Russian nationalists even as it frightens national minorities in that country.
In a comment posted on the “Russky zhurnal” portal, Valery Tishkov, often the object of attack by Russian nationalists, argues that this is the case because “either at the level of the state or at the level of particular regions within countries, minorities turn out to be in a situation of the ruling majority” (www.russ.ru/Mirovaya-povestka/XXI-vek-priznaet-prava-bol-shinstva).
“All contemporary states,” Tishkov points out, “have a complex ethnic, religious and racial composition,” and consequently, “all contemporary nations display a cultural complexity.” Of course, “that was the case earlier but it wasn’t recognized” because it was assumed that all members of such nations were the same.
“Only with the development of democracy and with the acquisition of a voice of the so-called silent groups of minorities” did it turn out, Tishkov said, that various “territorial, cultural and historical identities” existed within the nation. And this sense of variety was exacerbated by the arrival of immigrant groups.
The experience of various European countries shows that “a particular challenge became not eethnic migration but migration connected with a different religious culture.” Indeed, Tishkov says, “it was more difficult to adapt or integrate not so much people different by language, tradition, phenotype or skin color as by membership in a different religion.”
This religious “barrier,” the Russian ethnographer argues, “is much more different to overcome” because “people almost never shift from one religion to another, and Islam in general harshly punishes and does not accept the possibility of departure let alone a transfer to another religion.”
This difficulty, Tishkov argues, has generated a certain “panic” with many commentators even suggesting that “the policy of multiculturalism is to blame, that it was a mistake and so on,” a view that has contributed to “the activation of conservative, ultra-right forces and political parties.”
The countries where this has happened most clearly are “the countries of Euro-Atlantic civilization, inclusing Eastern Europe and the territory of the former USSR in certain parts of which democracy has existed already for a long time.” But it is particularly obvious where democracy is in the process of development.
As there become “greater possibilities to insist on their rights in the frameworks of various international conventions, declarations, and chargers about the rights of minorities or about the rights of citizens which belong to ethnic, racial or religious minorities,” members of these groups will not surprisingly make use of them.
This pattern of development, Tishkov says, is “connected not only with political democratization but also with economic development,” especially since economic development has attracted immigration flows. “Countries which do not accept migrants have not been characterized by particular success in their development.”
At the same time, of course, immigration brings with it certain “political, social or emotional-ideological risks,” all the more so because “it is rarely acknowledged by politicians that [most countries, including Russia] have benefited more from immigration than they have lost.”
Integrating immigrants is a challenge, Tishkov says. “The formula, e pluribus unum, is used in many countries,” and “many democracies are constructed on the formula of unity in multiplicity, but sometimes doubt is cast on this formula and in opposition to it appears the idea that it is necessary to make all the same even to the point of forming a mono-culture.”
“But this is unreal,” he continues, and suggests that “democracy must be build on the recognition of diversity, of the rights, demands and interests of people and citizens which are connected with their culture and with their ethnic or religion origin” even as “a common civic solidarity must be affirmed.”
In the case of the Russian Federation, Tishkov says, “one is speaking in this case about a [non-ethnic] Russia identity, about an all-Russian patriotism. Here the formula is not ‘ether-or’ (either you are an [ethnic] Russian or a [non-ethnic] Russian; or you are a Chechen or you are a [non-ethnic] Russian, but ‘both-and.’”
“And this must be reflected not only in administrative-government arrangements but also in questions of access to power,” Tishkov says. “It must not be the case that one group, the bears of one nationality declare themselves a state-forming ethnos or people and usurp in their favor all power.”
Officialdom must reflect “the composition of the population of the country,” albeit “there must not be quotas,” the ethnographer says. And he suggests that this century will be a century of majorities because “either at the level of the state or in particular regions,” minorities will be majorities and thus will be interested in defending majoritarian principles.
Moreover, Tishkov says, “minorities [at the present time] have international protection, they are able to organize themselves, to advance themselves and to make demands up to the level of international Strasbourg Courts” and thus it is no longer the case that majorities always “outvote” minorities.
If Tishkov is correct and the 21st century will be “the century of the majority,” that could present even more threats to existing states that “the century of minorities” did because many minorities will want to make sure that they are majorities and thus seek the formation of their own states rather than integration into existing ones.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Window on Eurasia: Russians See Themselves as Both ‘the Greatest and the Most Oppressed of Nations,’ Moscow Commentator Says
Paul Goble
Staunton, May 31 – Russians “at one and the same time feel themselves to be the greatest and the most oppressed nation on earth,” a situation that a Moscow commentator says reflects their “uncritical approach to themselves, the powers, and state propaganda” and that is the continuing source of many of their country’s most intractable problems.
In an essay in today’s “Gazeta,” Boris Tumanov explores the origins and the consequences of these “two unchanged and mutually exclusive leitmotifs” of Russian thought and suggests that even “the dialectic” will not help most people to understand why Russians feel the way they do (www.gazeta.ru/comments/2011/05/31_a_3633993.shtml).
“On the one hand,” he begins, the situation in which Russians find themselves in post-Soviet Russia, a country in which they form the overwhelming majority of the population and find themselves subordinate to “Russian state traditions including the mania for geopolitical greatness” allows them to view themselves “without irony” as the “state forming” nation.
And consequently, “when Russians are told in this situation that ‘Russia has risen from its knees,’ Russians for completely understandable reasons conceive this as being exclusively their due.” They ascribe “in a natural way” to “the current powers and to Vladimir Putin personally” the fact that they have begun “to live better and more happily.”
Any effort to cast doubt on this “idyl” or to point up “existing shortcomings” which any objective individual would have to acknowledge Russia, like any other country, has, Tumanov suggests, is considered by Russians to be the work of “born Russophobe who are working in the service of the enemies of Russia.”
But this belief that Russians are “the greatest of nations, the Moscow commentator says, “organically coexists with equally categorical assertions” by the Russians themselves that “Russians are the most oppressed nation in Russia, that Russians are dying out with their birthrate falling and morality growing, with Russians becoming impoverished” and so on.
Unfortunately, while believing these things to be true, most Russians do not have any understanding of whom they should address complaints about these things and “who is the guilty party of all these misfortunes,” even though they should recognize that such responsibility falls “above all on those people who administer” Russia.
That is not something Russians want to do because of their feeling that they are the greatest of nations and that their leaders are the best, and it is not something that intermediate leaders want to do because they recognize that there is little they can do about most of these problems.
But periodically, one or another politician, especially in the run up to elections, suggests that the issue should be addressed. Now that has happened again, Tumanov says, pointing to the proposal from Communist Duma deputy Vladimir Fedotkin to hold a parliamentary discussioin on “the conditions of life and fate of the Russian people.”
Such hearings, of course, Tumanov argues, “will become in fact a recognition of the fact that ten years of ‘stability, flowering, and getting up from one’s knees’ have led the Russian people to such a condition that it is time to reflect about its further fate and immediately improve the conditions of its life.”
The absurdity of this situation will be obvious because “our deputies will be forced to acknowledge the impoverished situation in which Russians, that is in essence, the overwhelming majority of the population are situated,” but they will find it almost impossible to take any real steps.
That is because “the people’s representatives and above all the United Russia party leaders even under torture will not agree to recognize their direct responsibility for the current misfortunes of the Russians and will always be looking for someone else on whom they can place all the blame.”
What is thus likely to happen? Tumanov suggests that there will be declarations about the Russians “as the state forming people” and possibly other “privileges for Russians,” although these too will remain “on paper” lest they spark a new “inter-ethnic catastrophe” among the country’s various ethnic groups.
Even the discussion promises to worsen ethnic relations, Tumanov says, even though the Russians themselves “will remain satisfied for the next two or three years” and then all this “will begin again,” with no end in sight all the more so because many Russians will be all too inclined to see the non-Russians as their oppressors, just as they did in Soviet times.
One of Russia’s greatest problems remains excessive drinking which in turn reduces life expectancy, Tumanov says, “It is necessary to drink less. But this assertion can be true only for those people who recognize their responsibility at a minimum for their own fate and still better for the fate of their society.”
“In other words, for those Russians who do not await from the powers that be instruction about how to love it, what to think and how to conduct onself and which are not seeking the causes of their own lack of well-being in the machinations of mythical ‘internal and external enemies,’” including “the non-Russians.”
Russia’s tragedy, Tumanov suggests, will continue “as long as the unnatural symbiosis between the insane deification of the powers” and the acceptance of existing conditions as beyond anyone’s control” exists among the majority of Russians. That time, unfortunately, is not yet, the commentator concludes.
Staunton, May 31 – Russians “at one and the same time feel themselves to be the greatest and the most oppressed nation on earth,” a situation that a Moscow commentator says reflects their “uncritical approach to themselves, the powers, and state propaganda” and that is the continuing source of many of their country’s most intractable problems.
In an essay in today’s “Gazeta,” Boris Tumanov explores the origins and the consequences of these “two unchanged and mutually exclusive leitmotifs” of Russian thought and suggests that even “the dialectic” will not help most people to understand why Russians feel the way they do (www.gazeta.ru/comments/2011/05/31_a_3633993.shtml).
“On the one hand,” he begins, the situation in which Russians find themselves in post-Soviet Russia, a country in which they form the overwhelming majority of the population and find themselves subordinate to “Russian state traditions including the mania for geopolitical greatness” allows them to view themselves “without irony” as the “state forming” nation.
And consequently, “when Russians are told in this situation that ‘Russia has risen from its knees,’ Russians for completely understandable reasons conceive this as being exclusively their due.” They ascribe “in a natural way” to “the current powers and to Vladimir Putin personally” the fact that they have begun “to live better and more happily.”
Any effort to cast doubt on this “idyl” or to point up “existing shortcomings” which any objective individual would have to acknowledge Russia, like any other country, has, Tumanov suggests, is considered by Russians to be the work of “born Russophobe who are working in the service of the enemies of Russia.”
But this belief that Russians are “the greatest of nations, the Moscow commentator says, “organically coexists with equally categorical assertions” by the Russians themselves that “Russians are the most oppressed nation in Russia, that Russians are dying out with their birthrate falling and morality growing, with Russians becoming impoverished” and so on.
Unfortunately, while believing these things to be true, most Russians do not have any understanding of whom they should address complaints about these things and “who is the guilty party of all these misfortunes,” even though they should recognize that such responsibility falls “above all on those people who administer” Russia.
That is not something Russians want to do because of their feeling that they are the greatest of nations and that their leaders are the best, and it is not something that intermediate leaders want to do because they recognize that there is little they can do about most of these problems.
But periodically, one or another politician, especially in the run up to elections, suggests that the issue should be addressed. Now that has happened again, Tumanov says, pointing to the proposal from Communist Duma deputy Vladimir Fedotkin to hold a parliamentary discussioin on “the conditions of life and fate of the Russian people.”
Such hearings, of course, Tumanov argues, “will become in fact a recognition of the fact that ten years of ‘stability, flowering, and getting up from one’s knees’ have led the Russian people to such a condition that it is time to reflect about its further fate and immediately improve the conditions of its life.”
The absurdity of this situation will be obvious because “our deputies will be forced to acknowledge the impoverished situation in which Russians, that is in essence, the overwhelming majority of the population are situated,” but they will find it almost impossible to take any real steps.
That is because “the people’s representatives and above all the United Russia party leaders even under torture will not agree to recognize their direct responsibility for the current misfortunes of the Russians and will always be looking for someone else on whom they can place all the blame.”
What is thus likely to happen? Tumanov suggests that there will be declarations about the Russians “as the state forming people” and possibly other “privileges for Russians,” although these too will remain “on paper” lest they spark a new “inter-ethnic catastrophe” among the country’s various ethnic groups.
Even the discussion promises to worsen ethnic relations, Tumanov says, even though the Russians themselves “will remain satisfied for the next two or three years” and then all this “will begin again,” with no end in sight all the more so because many Russians will be all too inclined to see the non-Russians as their oppressors, just as they did in Soviet times.
One of Russia’s greatest problems remains excessive drinking which in turn reduces life expectancy, Tumanov says, “It is necessary to drink less. But this assertion can be true only for those people who recognize their responsibility at a minimum for their own fate and still better for the fate of their society.”
“In other words, for those Russians who do not await from the powers that be instruction about how to love it, what to think and how to conduct onself and which are not seeking the causes of their own lack of well-being in the machinations of mythical ‘internal and external enemies,’” including “the non-Russians.”
Russia’s tragedy, Tumanov suggests, will continue “as long as the unnatural symbiosis between the insane deification of the powers” and the acceptance of existing conditions as beyond anyone’s control” exists among the majority of Russians. That time, unfortunately, is not yet, the commentator concludes.
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