1. The research method has involved a combination of textual analysis of local periodicals and specialist literature, statistics, and interviews with members of the political and religious elite on the issues of Islam, national identity, nationhood, and relations with Moscow.Google Scholar

2. The territory of Tatarstan is 68,000 square kilometers. One fifth of its territory is covered by forest. The population is 3,760,000 (1996). The urban population accounts for 74% of the total. Tatars, who are Turkic people of Islamic cultural background, make up 48% of the Tatarstan population, i.e . only 26% of the total Tatar population of the Russian Federation and the CIS (7,000,000). Russians, who are Slavic people of Russian Orthodox cultural background, make up 44% of the Tatarstan population. Tatarstan is divided into 39 districts and 18 cities. Tatarstan is one of the most economically advanced autonomous republics of the Russian Federation. The major industries are oil and gas refining, chemicals, petrochemicals, aircraft building, machine building, car manufacturing, light industry, and food processing.Google Scholar

3. Yemelianova, Galina, “The National Identity of the Volga Tatars at the Turn of the Nineteenth Century: Tatarism, Turkism and Islam,” Central Asian Survey, Vol. 16, No. 4, 1997, p. 554.Google Scholar

4. Mirfatikh Z. Zakiev, Tatari: Problemi Istorii i Yazika (Kazan: Academy of Sciences of Tatarstan, 1996), p. 102.Google Scholar

5. Stephane A. Dudoignon, “Djadidism, Mirasism, Islamism,” Cahiers du Monde Russe, Vol. 37, Nos 1–2, 1996, p. 17; M. Kempler, “Entre Boukhara et le Moyen-Volga: Abd an-Nasiri al-Qursawi (1776–1812) en conflic avec les oulemas traditionalistes,” Cahiers du Monde Russe, Vol. 37, No.1–2, 1996, p. 42.Google Scholar

6. Jadidism derives from a new a phonetic method (instead of the old syllabic method) of teaching Arabic and later Tatar in the Tatar confessional primary and secondary schools. This method was first introduced by the Crimean Tatar Ismail Gasprinskii in 1884. Later on, Jadidism evolved into Tatar national ideology. See also: D. Iskhakov, “Jadidism kak natsiestroitel'stvo,” Iman Nuri, Vol. 4, 1996, pp. 4, 22; Edward J. Lazzerini, “Ismail Bey Gasprinskii and Muslim Modernism in Russia, 1878–1914,” PhD dissertation, University of Washington, Seattle, 1973; Azade-Ayse Rorlich, The Volga Tatars: A Profile in National Resilience (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1986), p. 49.Google Scholar

7. Yemelianova, “National Identity of the Volga Tatars,” Central Asian Survey, Vol. 16, No. 4, 1997, pp. 543–572.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

8. The Muslim Duma faction consisted mainly of the members of the Party of Ittifaq (Union). It was formed in 1905 and represented the Muslim intellectual and financial elite, who like Russian kadets, favored the enlightened and liberal transformation of the Russian empire into a modern democratic civic nation. See Inorodcheskoe obozrenie, Vol. 2, No. 1, 1915; Musulmanskaya Pechat v Rossii v 1910 Godu (Oxford: Society for Central Asian Studies, 1987).Google Scholar

9. Zaki Validi Togan, Vospominaniya (Ufa: Kitap, 1994); Harriman Review, Vol. 9, No. 4, 1996, p. 6.Google Scholar

10. Pravda, 22 September 1989.Google Scholar

11. President Mintimir Shaimiev, a Tatar, was born in 1937 in the village Anyakovo of the Aktanyshskii district of Tatarstan. In 1959 he graduated from Kazan Agrarian Institute. Since 1962 he has been within the Soviet/party nomenklatura, rising from the position of a district party functionary to the First Secretary of Tatar Obkom.Google Scholar

12. Mukhametshin, Farit, “Tatarstan in the Outside World,” International Affairs, Vol. 43, No. 4, 1997, pp. 197–202; Edward W. Walker, “Nationalism, Regionalism and Federalism in post-Communist Russia,” in Gale Lapidus, ed., The New Russia: Troubled Transformation (Boulder: Westview, 1995), pp. 79–113.Google Scholar

13. The power-sharing arrangements under this treaty were detailed in 12 cooperation agreements. See: Dogovor o razgranichenii polnomochii, preamble, 18 February 1994, Belaya Kniga Tatarstana. Put k Suverenitetu, 1990–1995 (Kazan: Panorama Forum, 1996, No. 5, pp. 86–92; F. Mukhametshin and R. Izmailov, eds, Sovereign Tatarstan (Moscow: Insan, 1997), p. 241.Google Scholar

14. Dagestan's territory is 50,300 square kilometers and its population is 1, 954, 253 (1995). The urban population makes up 43.6% of the total while the rural population is 56.4%. Dagestan is multiethnic; it is populated by over 100 different groups, each of which has its own culture and history and speaks a distinctive language incomprehensible to the rest. Dagestanis belong to three major linguistic families: the Nakh-Dagestani branch of the Caucasian language family, the Turkic group of the Altay language family, and the Indo-European family. Over 90% of Dagestanis are Sunni Muslims of the Shafii madhhab. Over 60% of Dagestani Sunni Muslims belong to the Sufi orders of Naqshbandi, Shazali, and Kadiri. About 5% of Dagestani Muslims are Shiites. Dagestan is divided into 42 districts. One of the least economically developed autonomous republics of the Russian Federation, it is strongly dependent on Federal subsidies (80–95%) and other suppliers. It is a largely agrarian republic, specialising in sheep breeding, fishing, fruit growing, and the related production of wine and brandy.Google Scholar

15. Marie Bennigsen-Broxup, ed., The North Caucasian Barrier (London: Hurst, 1992), pp. 3–4.Google Scholar

16. Until the late 1920s Dagestan's linguae francae were Arabic and Turkic (Kumyk and Azeri) languages, based on Arabic script; afterwards it was Russian, based on Cyrillic script.Google Scholar

17. Statisticheskii sbornik (Makhachkala: Statizdat, 1996).Google Scholar

18. Istoriya Dagestana, Vol. 1, (Makhachkala: AN, 1967).Google Scholar

19. Amri R. Shikhsaidov, Knizhnie Kollektsii Dagestana. Rukopisnaya i Pechatnaya Kniga v Dagestane (Makhachkala: AN, 1991), pp. 8–9.Google Scholar

20. Bennigsen-Broxup, North Caucasian Barrier , p. 34.Google Scholar

21. Daniyalov, Gadzhiali D., Stroitelstvo Sotsializma v Dagestane, 1917–1937 gg ., (Moscow: Politizdat, 1988), pp. 49–64.Google Scholar

22. Migratsiya Naseleniya Respubliki Dagestan, 1996; Statisticheskii Sbornik (Makhachkala: Statizdat, 1997), p. 4.Google Scholar

23. For example, as a result of such consolidation, 13 ethnic groups of the Ando-Tsez linguistic group (Andis, Didys, Godoberins, Bagulals, Chamalins, Tindins, Akhvakhs, Karatins, Botlikhs, and some others) were registered as Avars. Similarly, Kaytaks and Kubachins were registered as Dargins, while a large number of small ethnic groups of the central plateau became Laks; Southern Terkmens turned into Azeris and Northern Terkmens into Kumyks. See Traditsionnoe i Novoe v Sovremennoi Kulture i Bite Dagestanskikh Pereselentsev (Moscow: Yupiter, 1988), pp. 22–23, 32.Google Scholar

24. Osnovnie Natsionalnosti Respubliki Dagestan. Statisticheskii Sbornik (Makhachkala: Statizdat, 1995), pp. 1–2.Google Scholar

25. Narodi Rossii: Entsiklopediya (Moscow: Entsiklopediya, 1994), p. 434.Google Scholar

26. I investigated the cities of Kazan and Naberezhnie Chelny and the districts of Arskii/Pestrechinskii, Drozhanovskii, Elabuzhskii, Laishevskii, Menzelinskii, and Sarmanovskii in Tartarstan. In Dagestan I investigated the cities of Makhachkala and Derbend and the districts of Buynakskii, Kaytagskii, Karabudakhkentskii, Kizilyurtovskii, Kizlyarskii, and Rutulskii.Google Scholar

27. By 1996, 106 mosques and only seven churches had been built, while 148 mosques and 34 churches were under construction. Religia v Sovremennom Obshestve: Istoria, Problemiu, Tendentsii, 5–6 (Kazan: Magarif, 1994), p. 265.Google Scholar

28. Some participants at the Congress who were interviewed admitted that over half of the people there were undercover policemen.Google Scholar

29. Interview with R. Khakimov. Kazan, 2 September 1997.Google Scholar

30. Interview with B. Terentiev, teacher of history and Russian at comprehensive school No. 87, Kazan, 13 September, 1998; G. M. Davletshin, F. Sh. Khuzin, and I. L. Izmailov, Rasskazi po Istorii Tatarstana, 5–6 (Kazan: Magarif, 1994), p. 265.Google Scholar

31. Yemelianova, “National Identity of the Volga Tatars,” Central Asian Survey, Vol. 16, No. 4, 1997, pp. 557–559.Google Scholar

32. Deputy Fanavil Shaimardanov provided the copies of parliamentary hearings. Kazan, September 1998.Google Scholar

33. The religiosity of the population varies considerably in different parts of Dagestan and among various ethnic groups. The general perception is that the Avars and Dargins are the most religious, the Kumyks and Laks are less religious, and the Lezgins are the least religious. In many rural areas Islamic norms prevail over secular regulations. Village Imams still play a central role in the everyday life of many rural communities. They have the final say in land, property, and family disputes. The function of the village administration is often limited to the rubber-stamping of the decisions reached by the local Imams. However, even within the same ethnic community the scale of religiosity differs greatly among local communities.Google Scholar

34. In 1997 the Chechen Republic officially proclaimed itself an Islamic state observing Sharia law.Google Scholar

35. Like Chechnya, Dagestan has been overwhelmed by a wave of kidnapping and political assassination. Among the recent victims have been the vice-premier of Dagestan, Gamid Gamidov; the leader of the Kumyk national council, Bashir Alzhanbekov; and the Dagestan Mufti Abubakarov. The mayor of Makhachkala, Said Amirov, has survived ten assassination attempts.Google Scholar

36. Wahhabism is a religious and political movement within the Hanbali madhhab of Sunni Islam. It originated in the mid eighteenth century in Arabia. Its founder was Muhammad ben Abd al-Wahhabi who advocated strict monotheism (tawhid). He renounced the worshipping of saints and sacred places and called for the purging from Islam of its later accretions. Wahhabism is the state ideology of Saudi Arabia.Google Scholar

37. From an interview with Magomed Kurbanov, the Deputy Minister of Nationalities of Dagestan, Makhachkala, 20 June 1998.Google Scholar

38. On 20–21 May 1998, a group of armed people, under the command of the leaders of the Lak popular movement, the All-Russian Union of Muslims, the Avar popular movement, and the chair of the Makhachkala city council, occupied the Parliament building for 12 hours. Novoe Delo , No. 22, 29 May 1998.Google Scholar

39. SBMD, based in Makhachkala, emerged in 1992 as a result of the disintegration of the Spiritual Board of Muslims in the North Caucasus.Google Scholar

40. Proekt Kontseptsii Gosudarstvennoi Natsional'noi Politiki Rossiyskoi Federatsii na Severnom Kavkaze , 12 January 1998, p. 10.Google Scholar

41. The Wahhabi center Kavkaz in Makhachkala was demolished and its chairman, Muhammad Dzhangishev, arrested. Interview with a Wahhabi called Rashid, Makhachkala, 17 June 1998.Google Scholar

42. In 1997 Dagestan's Visa and Registration Office stopped issuing invitations for foreign nationals to visit Dagestan.Google Scholar

43. The Khachilaev clan, which monopolized the smuggling of caviar, has headed the Lak mafia. The oldest brother, Magomed, is the leader of the Lak national movement Kazi-Kumukh, while the younger brother Nadirshakh chose to play the Islamic card on an all-Russian scale. He is the leader of the All-Russian Union of Muslims and a Deputy of the Russian State Duma, representing Dagestan.Google Scholar

44. Interview with Nizami Kaziev, the Dagestani Minister of Education, Makhachkala, 14 July 1997.Google Scholar

45. Abuev, Guseyn, the representative of the Russian President in Dagestan, and Magomed Tolboev, the former Security Council secretary of Dagestan, have also spoken in favor of wider incorporation of Islamic norms into Dagestani society. Novoe Delo , No. 25, 1998.Google Scholar

46. Interview with Magomed Kurbanov, Makhachkala, 20 June 1998.Google Scholar

47. The Tatar nationalists have rejected the Bilateral Treaty between Presidents Yeltsin and Shaimiev as a betrayal of the national interests of the Tatars. Altyn Urba , Nos 8–9, March 1997, p. 1.Google Scholar

48. For instance, the former leader of VTOTS, Rafael Khakimov, was elevated to the post of presidential advisor and director of the Institute of History. Another VTOTS activist, Fandas Safiullin, was “elected” to the Parliament, while Farid Urazaez got a position as the head of the Federal department of the pro-government All-Tatar National World Congress.Google Scholar

49. Among recent victims of official persecution have been the newspapers Kazanskii Telegraph, Suverenitet, Kris , and Altyn Urda, which have been closed under a variety of pretexts. The closure in particular of Altyn Urda in 1998 had a devastating impact on the whole Tatar national movement, since it played a crucial consolidating role within it.Google Scholar

50. For example, the authorities appropriated nationalist policies in areas such as language and education (the creation of Tatar gymnasia, higher schools, the Academy of Sciences of Tatarstan, and of a Tatar University), religion (the restoration of old mosques and the building of new ones, the opening of an Islamic University and Islamic colleges and secondary schools, the formation of Tatar national cultural autonomy, and other goals of the VTOTS. The Program of VTOTS (Kazan, 1993), p. 3.Google Scholar

51. The Ittifaq branch of Naberezhnie Chelny split into two factions, headed respectively by Damir Galeev and Rafail Khaplekhamitov. Similar divisions have occurred in other Ittifaq branches. The VTOTS, which still maintained some influence in Naberezhnie Chelny, Nizhekamsk, Al'metievsk, and Aznakay, has also fragmented into a division between centrists and hardliners.Google Scholar

52. Ittifaq Khalyk Partiyasi , Chally, 1993.Google Scholar

53. Omet intends to propose a joint candidate for the 1999 elections to the Russian State Duma and Tatarstan presidential elections in 2000.Google Scholar

54. Altyn Urda , Naberezhnie Chelny, 1994–1998.Google Scholar

55. Leader, 28 June 1996.Google Scholar

56. The attitudes of officials and ordinary Muslims towards these organizations have differed substantially. While various representatives of Islamic officialdom were aggressively intolerant towards them and considered its leaders and their followers as schizophrenic, some Tatar intellectuals spoke positively about Faizrahmanists and members of Tabligh and stressed their spirituality and aloofness from corrupted politics. Interviews with Velliulla-hazret, deputy Mufti of Tatarstan, and a number of Tatar intellectuals, who asked not to be named, Kazan, 17 September 1998.Google Scholar

57. Yemelianova, “Ethnic Nationalism, Islam and Russian Politics in the North Caucasus,” in Ch. Williams and Th. Sfikas, eds, Ethnic Nationalism in Russia, the CIS and the Baltic States (Aldershot, U.K.: Ashgate Publishing Ltd, 1999), pp. 120–148.Google Scholar

58. Put Islama , No. 2, 1994, p. 1; Znama Islama, No 2, 1996, p. 1. The leaders of the Dagestani Lezegin nationalists have continued to press for the formation of the Lezgin state. However, this idea has not found an enthusiastic response among the Azerbaijan Lezgins, whose living standards have been considerably higher than among the Dagestani Lezgins. Interview with Abdul Gamid Aliev, the deputy head of the Dagestan Scientific Center of the RAS (Russian Academy of Sciences), Makhachkala, 17 June 1998.Google Scholar

59. Interview with Magomed Kurbanov, Makhachkala, 20 June 1998.Google Scholar

60. Put Islama, No. 2, 1994, p. 1; Znamya lslama, Vol. 2, No. 4, 1996, p. 1.Google Scholar

61. Among the most active in both republics have been the University of Imam Muhammad ben Saud, the Islamic charities of Taiba and Ibraghim al-Ibraghim in Saudi Arabia, the UAE Islamic charity organization Al-Khairia, the Organization of Islamic Conference (OIC), the World Islamic League, the World Association of Islamic Youth, and the fund of Ibraghim Hayri. About 400 Young Tatars and Dagestanis annually receive scholarships to study at various Islamic institutions in Turkey, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria, Libya, Kuwait, the UAE, Egypt, and Malaysia.Google Scholar

62. Catherine the Great created this Muftiyat in Ufa in 1789.Google Scholar

63. Interview with Galiulla-hazret, Kazan, 10 April 1997.Google Scholar

64. Among other members of the Council of the Muftis of Russia are the new Muftis of Dagestan, Chuvashiya, Siberia and the Far East, Penza, the Volga region, Bashkorstan, Kabardino-Balkaria, Orenbourg, and Ulyanovsk.Google Scholar

65. Interview with Muftis Gusman-hazret, Kazan, September 1998; and with Talgat Tadjuddin, London, 12 March 1999.Google Scholar

66. In 1996 there were 1,670 mosques, 25 Islamic schools, and 9 Islamic Institutes functioning in Dagestan. Interview with Magomed Kurbanov, Makhachkala, 17 July 1997.Google Scholar

67. Interview with the members of the Muftiyat establishment, Makhachkala, 18 July 1997.Google Scholar

68. Interview with Imam Ali Abdullaev of Karlabko village, Levashinskii district, 16 June 1998.Google Scholar

69. Interview with Ali Magomedov, the head of the Religious Department of the Dagestani government. Makhachkala, 16 June 1998.Google Scholar

70. It is believed that Sufism of the Naqshbandi tariqa played an important role among Tatar and Bashkir Muslims before the October revolution. Many Tatar Muftis were members of the Naqshbandi tariqa. (Interview with Tatar Ishan Abul-hakk, Kazan, 16 September 1998).Google Scholar

71. According to the Muftiyat, the first Dagestani Wahhabi was Ali Kayaev, who turned to Wahhabism during his studies in Egypt. He returned to Dagestan in 1913 and began the dissemination of Wahhabism. The Wahhabis themselves reject this version.Google Scholar

72. For example, in May 1998, 12,700 Dagestanis conducted the pilgrimmage. In addition about 6,000 Dagestanis went on the small pilgrimmage.Google Scholar

73. For example, in May 1998, in the village of Kirovaul in the Kizilyurtovskii region, tariqatists and Wahhabis formed joint Sharia courts to combat crime, alcohol and drug abuse, theft, and moral laxity. Interview with a Wahhabi called Gadzhi, Kizilyrt, 29 June 1998.Google Scholar

74. “Ispoved Wahhabita,” Dialogue, No. 7, April 1998.Google Scholar

75. During the only joint press conference that was organized by the authorities in 1997, Wahhabis outplayed tariqatists.Google Scholar

76. Interviews with Rashid Gulyamov, Indus Tagirov, Rafail Khaplekhamitov, Rashad Saphin, Tolgat Boreev, Tufan Minullin, and Aydar Halim; Kazan, Naberezhnie Chelny, 1997–1998.Google Scholar

77. Interviews with Fazu Alieva, Abdurashid Saidov, Vladlen Gadzhiev, Amri Shikhsaidov, and Ali Aliev; Makhachkala, Moscow, 1997–1998.Google Scholar

78. Interviews with Alexander Salagaev, Vladimir Belyev, Andrei Maltsev, Gennadii Mukhanov, Boris Terentiev, Alexei Litvin, Liya Sagitova, and Georgii Milovanov; Kazan, Makhachkala, 1997–1998.Google Scholar

79. Guzel Sabirova and Elena Omelchenko, “The Renaissance of Islam in Tatarstan and Dagestan: Popular Perceptions,” BASEES Conference, Cambridge, U.K., 27–29 March 1999.Google Scholar

80. In 1990, there was only one Tatar school in Kazan; in 1997, there were already 124 Tatar gymnasiums and 1,112 schools out of a total of 2,439 had the Tatar language as the language of instruction. They have probably produced their first graduates in 1999. The elite schools are Turkish–Tatar lycées that are based on the Turkish curriculum and use Turkish and English as languages of instruction. In 1997, there were two such lycées in Kazan out of eight in the whole republic. Interview with Radik Zaripov, head of the Department of National Education of the Ministry of Education of the Republic of Tatarstan, Kazan, 10 April, 1997.Google Scholar

81. Interview with Georgii Milovanov, Makhachkala, 17 July 1997.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

82. Many Russian voters in Tatarstan have expressed their pessimism about any control of Izbirkoms (electoral committees) in the future. This fear has been fuelled by the negative experience of the parliamentary elections in 1995, when seven out of 21 candidates from Soglasie were badly beaten. One was killed and some others were sacked from their jobs.Google Scholar

83. Interview with Georgii Milovanov, Makhachkala, 17 July 1997.CrossRefGoogle Scholar