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It should be emphasized that all educational departments and centers have now come to understanding the need for uniting the Islamic bodies in order to eliminate rivalry and confrontation between the two supervising centers of Muslim affairs in Bashkortostan.
As to the material support rendered by the government of Russia to the Muslim educational system in Bashkortostan, it covers three educational institutions: the Maryam Sultanova madrasah and the "Galiya" madrasah, as well as the Russian Islamic University under the Central Spiritual Board of Muslims of Russia, which receives government financial aid through the Bashkir State Pedagogical University.
Besides, within the framework of the Russian government project of training skilled specialists in various fields studying the history and culture of Islam, a special subject of legal studies was introduced at the Bashkir State Pedagogical University in 2008. Ten students enrolled in the University through the Spiritual Board of Muslims of the Republic of Bashkortostan for thorough studies of the history and culture of Islam.
"Izucheniye prepodavaniya Islama v Evrazii," Moscow, 2010, pp. 110-115.
Rashid Emirov,
Political analyst
PROSPECTS OF REFORMING THE NATIONAL-TERRITORIAL STRUCTURE OF THE NORTH CAUCASUS
The main problem facing the peoples of the North Caucasus, just as those in the entire post-Soviet area, is the loss of spiritual, ideological and political orientation. The awakening of national self-
consciousness is, above all, a result of profound changes in the world outlook and state of mind of the peoples who need new and more perfect forms of social and economic self-organization, and also a specific reaction to the infringement of their national interests. In this connection we deem it necessary to dwell on a very important matter. All and sundry ethno-national and national-cultural, as well as religious-fundamentalist movements are often depicted as retrograde phenomena engendered by taking the laws of socio-historical development for survivals of old backward epochs, etc., etc. In reality, they are a reaction to modern realities and are their products. As B.J. Stinger justly noted, ethnic identity is not illusory self-consciousness; it is an important connecting force of community, a powerful basic element of identification and personal self-identification of any human being.
This explains the revival of the peoples' striving all over the world for independence or autonomy in any form within the framework of the states they live in. This tendency is characteristic of Europe, too. For example, Belgium has to face time and time again the Flemish and Walloon separatism. The same is true of France, which comes across the national movements of the Bretons and Basques, Britain facing the national movements of Scotsmen and Welshmen, Spain with its Basques and Catalans, etc. The unity of Canada is periodically challenged by French-speaking Quebec claiming independence. This is despite the obvious facts connected with the disintegration of Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia and especially the U.S.S.R. In the modern world the idea of the implementation of the right to create an exclusively mononational state increasingly acquires the character of anachronism. The number of nationally homogeneous states is now few and far between. Most countries are now multinational. Besides, there
are peoples numbering tens of millions who have no statehood of their own.
Therefore it is not accidental that although quite a few international legal documents include special articles envisaging the right to free development of ethnic communities and peoples, they do not encourage separatism and dismemberment of states by the national principle. These documents emphasize the impermissible character of using references to the principle of self-determination for undermining the unity of a state or national unity.
Coercive forms and means of territorial-state refashioning of a multinational state, as a rule, hardly lead to a satisfactory solution of the nationality problem. Solution of problems by non-legal means and methods gives birth to new and more serious problems. Besides, in the modern world with about eight thousand languages, the limit of the planet's division into the growing number of independent national states cannot be endless.
Experience of the past three to four decades has shown that in most cases attempts of any ethnos to create its own mononational state by force have always brought about tragic consequences for that nation. This experience shows that to arrange a harmonious and rational life of peoples it is necessary to use various political, legal, diplomatic and socio-economic means and methods worked out and tested by the world practice, which would give an opportunity to resolve the most controversial problems.
As we have mentioned, Russia is a pluralistic complex society consisting of many ethno-national, linguistic, cultural, confessional and other communities or groups. Each one of these communities or groups has not only interests coinciding with the interests of others, but also interests of its own, contradicting, even conflicting with them. In other words, common interest and common will in Russia as a unified state is
formed from many sources, the main ones being ethno-national communities. The violation of the rights and interests of any one of them, let alone several, can undermine the basis of the common interest and common will, which can become a time bomb placed under the edifice of united Russia. Any ethno-national community subjected to national discrimination will fight for its rights, and a result of this fight will be interethnic discord which will enhance disintegration tendencies.
It is quite natural that the Russian Federation, while regulating the legal status of national minorities and indigenous small peoples, has assumed obligations strictly to follow the principles and standards formulated in international legal documents, which guarantee observance of human rights - personal security, inviolability of property, freedom of speech, etc., which are closely connected with the status of a nation and its life pattern and development way.
If the rights of nations and peoples are connected with concrete territorial boundaries, what is to be done with representatives of the title nation of one or another republic living beyond the boundaries of that republic? It should be borne in mind that millions of representatives of ethno-national groups live in Russia, but beyond the boundaries of their national republics. For instance, more than two-thirds of Tatars (even more) live beyond the boundaries of Tatarstan. Two-thirds of Mordovians also live outside their republic. In the Republic of Bashkortostan the Bashkirs hold third place after Russians and Tatars. Big groups of people from the Caucasus have been scattered on the territory of the former U.S.S.R., a greater part of them having settled in the South of Russia.
Under the circumstances it is evident that any attempts to build a state around just one nationality and form statehood on a monoethnic basis have no reasonable foundations. They are not legitimate in our
day when broad processes of people moving from one place to another and a medley of races are taking place.
The specific features of the formation and evolution of Russian statehood requires special understanding of the sovereignty and self-determination of those peoples and republics which have for many generations, even centuries, lived together within the framework of this statehood. The point is that the state has always played the decisive role in Russia in turning the diverse conglomerate of regions and peoples, cultures and religions into a uniform political, administrative, socio-cultural and economic area. This required purposeful administrative regulation, including a wide range of measures, such as reorganization of economic pattern, drawing of all people in the uniform cultural and information area, and a uniform state and socio-cultural organism. This is why it is not always correct to compare the position of national minorities in some European countries, for example Holland, Germany, France and others, on the one hand, and Russia, on the other.
In many European countries it is the problem of migrants, in the main. Whereas in Russia more than 95 percent of its Muslim population are autochthonous, or indigenous. The same can be said about the Finno-Ugrian people, let alone the Paleo-Asiatic peoples. This factor radically changes the essence of the problem and the character of the demands of minorities. For instance, in Germany the Turkish communities settled there cannot raise such question. The situation is completely different in Russia.
By the time of the disintegration of the Soviet Union the social, economic and political structures, and the very way of life and the system of values, and orientations of most inhabitants of Russia, for that matter, had undergone profound changes. Various multiform ties integrally penetrating the economic, socio-cultural, educational, political and other spheres have entrenched themselves in the country's
life. As a result, the situation of all national-territorial state units has changed, just as the very way of life of the people and their mentality. It is natural therefore that the traditional categories and concepts of national sovereignty, etc. should now be regarded in a different context.
Any political entity can be preserved for quite some time either with the help of coercion or by way of unity of interests and will of all its segments to live in peace and accord. This task was successfully achieved during the period of totalitarian power, when social, economic and other problems were resolved by strict orders. This is no longer possible in the present conditions. The North Caucasus is a pluralistic community consisting of many ethno-national groups, cultures confessions, languages, etc. Each one of these communities has not only interests coinciding with those of other segments, but also its own specific interests contradicting to or conflicting with them.
This is why the nationalities question for most republics of the North Caucasus is of key importance and not a single serious economic, political or social problem can be tackled properly without its solution.
Our special literature has time and again written about the lack of prospects in changing the political map of Russia on the basis of the ethno-national principle and attempting to create purely ethnic state units on the basis of politicized ethnicity or ethno-nationalism. A question arises as to what independent sovereign national state can emerge in Daghestan - Lezghin, Avar, Kumyk, Darghin, etc. Similarly in Kabardino-Balkaria - Kabardian, Balkar, Russian?... Or in Karachay-Circassia - Karachay, Circassian, Russian, or another?... And so on, so forth. Evidently, nationalism of each type will inevitably provide an impetus to nationalism among other peoples ad infinitum. There is another important aspect which should not be disregarded. The point is that in forming the state-administrative structure of the U.S.S.R. state borders were often established disregarding ethnoses in
many instances. This is why it is quite clear that any attempt now to establish state borders on the purely national principle can have unpredictable tragic consequences because in the present conditions border lines will have to be drawn disregarding the history, traditions and vital interests of many peoples.
In this connection the preservation of national autonomous units within the boundaries of the Stavropol and Krasnodar territories, namely, Karachay-Cerkessia and Adygea, cannot be assessed positively, because these small republics are now a source of additional problems in the North Caucasus. Numerous projects have come into being, proposing to reform, in one way or another, the federative structure of the republics of the North Caucasus. Moreover, these ideas have become part of the political context of the South of Russia.
In this connection mention should be made of absurd projects of reunification of kindred peoples living in different national republics by their unification within new mono-ethnic republics. For example, some people suggest to unite the artificially divided peoples and territories "for their ethnical rebirth and more successful development of Russian federalism." For this purpose it will be necessary, first, to form the "Adygea Republic" with several autonomous districts. Secondly, the Karachay-Balkarian Republic with several autonomous districts. It would be possible to form other national-state units, just like the ethnic reunification of the Vainakh people (Chechens and Ingush), Ossetians, Lezghins, Nogais, and others.
However, these projects are objectively unfounded, inasmuch as there are no serious territorial, economic and other ties between the parts of the country suggested for unification. Besides, the implementation of such projects would lead to increasing the drawbacks of the national-state construction of the Soviet period. One cannot but agree with Academician V. Tishkov who says that "the
attempts to restore historical justice lead to new injustice with regard to the present population. Such problems should be resolved along the road of mutual cooperation, free travel and settlement, the development of economic and humanitarian ties, and respect of the individual and collective rights of citizens."
Quite often a whole number of small nationalities, such as Tsakhurs, Aguls, Andiis, and others are faced with the more pressing problems than their representation at regional and federal bodies of state power, namely, those of material well-being, which should be tackled together with their neighbors.
It should be admitted that the formation of national autonomous units as independent parts of the state-territorial structure of the U.S.S.R. indeed played a definite positive role for their economic, social and cultural development. However, by the end of the Soviet period it became evident that the administrative-territorial division of the country and individual regions lagged behind the main trends of the socio-economic and political development of the country as a whole and the rest of the world. In the present conditions the principle of administrative-territorial division, which came into being many decades ago, has become outdated and worked only due to historical tradition, or to be more exact, inertia. Moreover, it became one of the factors preventing the complete overcoming of conflicts in the region and the establishment of unity, stability and security of the state. This is why it is necessary to search for new forms and ways of transferring from national-territorial to territorial-administrative federation.
As world experience shows, poly-ethnicity does not always envisage the national-territorial principle of state structure. The United States and some other countries are a case in point, for they have been built, either exclusively or predominantly, on the administrative-territorial principle. As shown by the U.S.S.R., the national-territorial
federation is connected with the emergence of the phenomenon of the title ethnos or title people, which is nonsensical in relation to the North Caucasus with its virtually Babylonian medley of races. This phenomenon prevents the actual legitimation of regional political elites on the ethnical basis. And this leads, at least in an actual form, to the hierarchical status of the peoples of the region, their division into "equal" and "more equal."
At present the North Caucasian republics present an example of communities in which different segments in the form of ethno-national communities partly coincide and intersect, in other words, we have a combination of territorial and extra-territorial segments. From this point of view, one of the specific features of the North Caucasus is that it is a mixture of peoples, districts, teams and families. This has led to the emergence of a whole range of new problems, and it is practically impossible to examine and solve the problem of one nationality outside its connection with other peoples, all the more so at the expense of other peoples.
Besides, this principle does not resolve the nationalities problem, but only pushes it to the background, and in many cases even complicates the problem of ensuring unity and territorial integrity of the federative state. Moreover, contradictions connected with it breed conflicts. This was confirmed by the disintegration of the U.S.S.R. Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia. One of the latest examples is provided by Belgium which has turned from a unitary state into federation during the past decades, and an acute political struggle has been going on there for the past years between the Flemish and Walloon people, with the former coming out for turning the country into confederation or even for complete secession and creation of an independent state, and the latter advocating the preservation of the federation.
Evidently, federation based on the administrative-territorial principle suggests a simpler and more optimal system of territorial structure based on due account of resource, economic, production, geographical, demographic and other factors. There is no doubt that federalism tinted with ethnic shades inherited by the Russian Federation considerably weakens the country's unity. As shown by historical experience, nationalism can come out as a factor mobilizing peoples for the fight for their independence and a source of creative passion. But in many cases it is a sort of an original cover for other interests and motives, for instance, the striving for taking part in dividing material resources, winning power and prestige, overcoming psychological and ideological barriers, etc.
It should be noted that the right of each people to self-determination contradicts the principle of the territorial integrity of a state. This aspect is of major importance for a multinational country, inasmuch as the effectiveness of measures to block possible separatist tendencies aimed against integration largely depends on it. As to Russia, it is a constitutional federation, which excludes the possibility of any part of it to withdraw from the federation.
Without denying the right to self-determination as the expression of the sovereignty of a nation, international law, nevertheless, limits its realization by the requirement to preserve the territorial integrity of a state.
In this connection the decree of the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation No 10-P of July 31, 1995, is of special importance, inasmuch as it emphasizes that the aim of preserving the integrity of the Russian state is in accord with the generally recognized international principles of the people's right to self-determination. This is why the constitutional principle of "self-determination of peoples" in the
Russian conditions means that it can only be realized within the bounds of the Russian state.
One of the most negative consequences of the disintegration of the U.S.S.R. was the outburst of centrifugal tendencies and processes aimed against integration over the entire post-Soviet area, which led to disunity and separatism of the peoples living on its territory. The Caucasus became the arena of bitter interethnic and inter-confessional armed conflicts.
The example of several former Soviet Union republics is quite indicative in this respect. Having become independent, they are now ruled by ethnocratic regimes based on disregard of the interests of non-title nations. The idea of sovereignty, "having gripped the minds of the popular masses," has virtually become a means of ascending to the peak of supreme power for certain political figures. However, the genuine national ideas have not been realized and were sacrificed to political interests.
All this goes to show that it is necessary to discard foggy and simplified interpretations of the idea of national sovereignty and self-determination of peoples and bring them in line with modern realities.
There is no doubt that contradictions between the ethno-national and territorial models of a state will persist for a long time to come in the Russian Federation as a whole and in its national republics particularly, they will be felt in their policy in the economic and social spheres and also in the sphere of interethnic relations.
It is evident that the North Caucasian peoples will have to pass through a long transition period, when the national and territorial models will have to adjust to each other and evolve new forms of the inner organization of the Russian state. This means that asymmetrical character of the Russian Federation will be preserved during this period, and the territories and regions will begin to become equal in
their status to national republics gradually. The slow transition to the territorial-administrative principle is possible by leveling the economic, social and political rights of all part of the Russian Federation, which should be combined with ensuring the almost equal living standards throughout the entire territory of the country.
It can be asserted that the main conflicts in the North Caucasus have emerged and are developing mainly due to interethnic contradictions. In addition, other conflict-generating factors emerge: the economic interests of the conflicting parties and third countries, struggle around the problem of sovereignization of the self-proclaimed state formations and their relations with the outer world, etc. The successful regulation of problems in the sphere of ethno-national relations influences the investment climate, the proper use of natural and other resources of the North Caucasus, and also the migration processes and the socio-psychological atmosphere in the region. It goes without saying that the disruption and collapse of the economic and political infrastructure and social ties are concomitants of prolonged ethnic and confessional conflicts.
In order to resolve the problem of the optimal state and political organization of the North Caucasus it is necessary to work out and implement such nationalities policy which would be based on the dual strategy of ensuring and observing the rights of all peoples and providing all-round assistance to factors and trends ensuring their solidarity and unity within the bounds of the Russian Federation. This policy will only become effective if it is based on recognition of the existence of many peoples historically developed and now living in the North Caucasus with their national languages, cultures, traditions and specific interests. It is also necessary to recognize the importance of preserving the unity of the country as a complex multinational community with a view to reforming and democratizing the economy,
the social and political spheres and interethnic relations. The conservation and enlargement of the old structures and the system of dividing power and its benefits between different clans, which regarded state power as their inalienable property, will be a path fraught with negative consequences for the prospects and viability of the country.
"Prioritety natsionalnoi bezopasnosti Rossiiskoi Federatsii na Severnom Kavkaze,"Moscow, 2011, pp. 167-183.
A. Klimenko,
Cand. Sc. (Military) (IOS of RUS) CENTRAL-ASIAN REPUBLICS: DESTABILIZING FACTORS IN RELATIONS AMONG THEM AND THEIR INFLUENCE ON THE SITUATION IN THE REGION
The situation in Central Asia remains rather complicated in terms of ensuring regional stability and security. As the president of Kazakhstan N. Nazarbayev admitted, Central Asia is one of the regions with potential conflicts. In the perspective, conflicts may arise both in the region and in adjacent territories relating to water and rich national resources. The territorial and other related inter-state contradictions emerged after disintegration of the USSR. Although the leadership of new sovereign states in the sphere of territorial demarcation took decisions according to the boundaries determined in time of the Soviet Union, the old inter-communal tensions relating to the belonging of some or other territories reminded of themselves.
The relations between Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan as the biggest regional states did not avoid the territorial contradictions, which demanded the delimitation of boundaries between them. At present, the issue as a whole has been settled, which decreased tension in their mutual relations. However, the actual absence of border protection of
