UC Berkeley GAIA Research Series Title Minorities, Mullahs and Modernity: Reshaping Community in the Former Soviet Union Permalink https://escholarship.org/uc/item/785560v1 Journal Research Series, uciaspubs/research/95 Authors Saroyan, Mark Walker, Edward W. Publication Date 1997 Peer reviewed eScholarship.org Powered by the California Digital Library University of California Minorities, Mullahs and Modernity: Reshaping Community in the Former Soviet Union Mark Saroyan Edited by Edward W. Walker Description: With the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Caucasus and Central Asia suddenly became significant actors on the world stage. Yet outside knowledge of this vast region has been limited and superficial. This collection of essays and lectures by the late Mark Saroyan (1960-1995, UCB Ph.D. 1990) is a major contribution to understanding the interaction among the region's religious traditions, cultures, and politics. Saroyan's command of five regional languages and extensive fieldwork both before and after the Soviet collapse yielded numerous original insights into the identity politics of the region. The volume will be of great interest to political scientists, anthropologists, historians, and students of religion — as well as to specialists on Central Asia and the Caucasus. RESEARCH SERIES / NUMBER 94 Minorities, Mullahs, and Modernity: Reshaping Community in the Late Soviet Union Mark Saroyan Edward W. Walker, Editor With an introduction by Gail W. Lapidus and Ronald G. Suny UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA AT BERKELEY Some of the articles in this collection originally appeared in other publications. We are grateful to the following publishers for granting us permission to include them here: “The Armenian Protests: Is It Passion or Politics?” Deadline (New York) 3, 4 (July/August 1988). “Beyond the Nation-State: Culture and Ethnic Politics in Soviet Transcaucasia.” Soviet Union/Union Sovietique 15, 2–3 (1988). “‘The Karabakh Syndrome’ and Azerbaijani Politics.” Problems of Communism, September–October 1990. Majority-Minority Relations in the Soviet Republics." In Soviet Nationalities Problems, ed. Ian A. Bremmer and Norman M. Nai- mark. Stanford: Center for Russian and East European Studies. “Rethinking Islam in the Soviet Union.” In Beyond Sovietology: Essays in Politics and History, ed. Susan Gross Solomon. Armonk, N.Y.: M. E. Sharpe, 1993. “Trouble in the Transcaucasus.” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 45, 2 (March 1989). The remaining articles are from the estate of Mark Saroyan, and we thank his family for allowing us to include them. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Saroyan, Mark. Minorities, mullahs, and modernity : reshaping community in the former Soviet Union / Mark Saroyan ; edited by Edward W. Walker. p. cm. — (Research series ; no. 95) Includes bibliographical references. ISBN 0-87725-195-9 (pbk.) 1. Transcaucasia—Ethnic relations. 2. Asia, Central—Ethnic rela- tions. 3. Islam—Asia, Central. 4. Islam—Transcaucasia. 5. Transcau- casia—Politics and government. 6. Asia, Central—Politics and government—1991– I. Walker, Edward W. II. Title. III. Series: Research series (University of California, Berkeley. Institute of Inter- national Studies) ; no. 95. DK509.S26 1997 305.8’00958—dc21 97-19310 CIP ©1997 by the Regents of the University of California Printed in the United States of America CON TENTS Preface vii Introduction 1 Rethinking Islam in the Soviet Union 8 The Islamic Clergy and Community in the Soviet Union 43 The Reinterpretation and Adaptation of Soviet Islam 58 The Restructuring of Soviet Islam in the Gorbachev Era: Interethnic Fragmentation and Thematic Continuity 88 Ambivalence, Authority, and the Problem of Popular Islam 104 Majority-Minority Relations in the Soviet Republics 125 Beyond the Nation-State: Culture and Ethnic Politics in Soviet Transcaucasia 135 Trouble in the Transcaucasus 167 The “Karabakh Syndrome” and Azerbaijani Politics 175 The Armenian Protests: Is It Passion or Politics? 204 Representation as a Realm of Conflict: Two Examples from Soviet Armenian Literature 211 Azerbaijan Looks “West”: New Trends in Foreign Relations with Iran and Turkey 221 About the Author 231 ❖ Pref ace Mark Saroyan was one of the first as so ci ated grad u ate stu dents of what was then called the Berke ley-Stanford Pro gram in So viet In ter na- tional Behav ior (now the Berke ley Pro gram in So viet and Post-Soviet Studies). Mark ar rived at Berke ley in 1986 and grad u ated with a Ph.D. in polit i cal science in Decem ber 1990, at which point he took up a po si- tion as an as sis tant pro fes sor of polit i cal sci ence at Har vard. Tragically, Mark was di agnosed with a fatal ill ness shortly be fore his ar rival at Har vard. As Mark ’s illness wors ened, it be came in creas- ingly dif fi cult for him to meet his teaching ob liga tions, so in 1993 he re turned to Berke ley, where, at the urg ing of his for mer dis ser ta tion ad viser, Gail Lapidus, he be gan to col lect his pub lished and unpub lished pa pers, and to com - plete var ious works-in-progress, in cluding a co-authored pa per with a Berke - ley grad u ate student, Maranatha Ivanova. His hope was that he would be able to pub lish the col lec tion as a book. But Mark ’s health dete ri o rated rap idly, and he was un able to com plete the pro ject be fore his death on 21 July 1994 at the age of 34. Mark ’s death was a terri ble loss for his fam ily, friends, and col - leagues; it was also a great mis for tune for his profes sion. Mark was a brilliant scholar. Un like many of his contem po rar ies in polit i cal sci - ence, he had both the abil ity and the de sire to study not only “pol i - tics,” but also culture, and the in terac tion be tween them. Mark traveled ex tensively throughout the former Soviet Union at a time when most of his colleagues would visit the USSR only rarely, usu - ally confin ing their visits to Mos cow. He was a talented linguist who was fluent in Russian, Ar me nian, Azeri, and Turkish. As the pa pers in this vol ume attest, he used his prodi gious linguis tics abili ties and pow ers of empa thy to great ef fect in his study of Islam in the forme r So viet Union; So viet nation al ity policy; and poli tics, soci et y, and cul - ture in the Cauca sus and Central Asia. Although I had heard of Mark and had ad mired his schol ar ship, I met him for the first time in 1993 af ter his return to Berke ley. He struck me as a truly decent human being who cared deeply about the peoples and cultures he was studying and who at the same time re - fused to ac cept conven tional wisdoms about his objects of study. I vii viii Pref ace was therefore hon ored to be asked to pick up where he had left off prior to his death and put together a col lection of his works for pub li - cation. This volume is the result of those efforts, and it is dedi cated to his memory . This was, I con fess, a dif fi cult book to edit, and I apol o gize to Mark for any in jus tice I have done to his ideas. His un pub lished pa pers were clearly not in tended for im me di ate pub li ca tion, and there was a con sid- erable de gree of du pli cation in them, which I have at tempted to min i- mize. Also, his pa per with Maranatha Ivanova was still in prog ress at the time of his death, and I thank her for her con sid er able ef forts to com - plete the pa per in accor dance with Mark ’s instruc tions. Many people made this vol ume possi ble. Thanks go first and foremost to Mark ’s fam ily for giv ing us per mis sion to proceed with the volume; to Ron Suny and Gail Lapidus for their excel lent in tro- duction; to Timo thy Colton and Susan Pharr for estab lish ing a Mark Saroyan Fund at Harvard that helped make the vol ume possi ble; to Bojana Ristich for her careful and profes sional copy edit ing; to Ste - phen Pitcher for the excel lent layout and design of the vol ume; to Nayereh Tohidi for check ing the Azeri spell ings; and to In ter na tional and Area Studies at Berkeley for agreeing to publish the vol ume. Finally, I would like to ac knowledge the gen er ous con tri bu tions of the fol low ing in divid u als to Mark Saroyan Funds at Berkeley and Har vard: Michele Albanese · Robert Bates · Pe ter Berkowitz · Mark Bousian · Liliana Botcheva · Houchang Chehabi · Timo thy Colton · Thomas Cushman · Jorge Dominguez · Gordon Furth · John Gershman · Al bert Grote · Mi chael Hagen · Henry Hale · Elaine Haw thorne · Joel Hellman · Ar thur Hoff · Stan ley Hoffmann · Rob - ert and Yasuko Ikeda · Iain Johnston · Fu Jun · Robert Keohane · Ruth Lewis · Roderick MacFarquhar · Judith Mehrmann · Mary E. Merschen · An drew Moravcsik · David Nalle · Jean Oi · Mark Pe ter- son · Susan Pharr · Dan iel Posner · Paul Quinlan · Lou ise Rich ard- son · Pe ter Rutl and · Caro lyn Sheaff · Ken neth Shepsle · James Tracy · Ronald and Dor othy Ty ler · Janet Vaillant · Celeste Wallander · Robert Weiner · Perdita Welch · Deborah Yashar. Edward W. Walker June 1997 INTRODUCTION Gail W.