Central Asia: A Space for “Silk Democracy”. Islam and State Almaty 2017 1 Almaty 2017 УДК 327 ББК 66.4 Ц 38 Contributors: Elmira Nogoybayeva, political scientist (editor) Sanat Kushkumbaev, PhD, political sciences Farkhod Tolipov, PhD, political sciences Abdugani Mamadazimov, PhD, political sciences, Tamerlan Ibraimov, PhD in law (Associate Professor) Sardor Salimov, political scientist Tatiana Panchenko – proof reader Ц 38 Central Asia: A Space for “Silk Democracy”: Islam and State / Edited by E. Nogoybayeva. Almaty, 2017. 52 pp. ISBN 978-601-80610-8-0 Almaty Club experts continue their reflections on Central Asia in the socio-political context in this paper, Central Asia: A Space for “Silk Democracy”, the second part of that process, with the authors, this time, considering the issue of the interaction between Islam and the state, and analysing the dynamics of changes in the countries of the region. Three distinct approaches form the basis for this work. The first concerns the nature of changes from 1991 to 2016, shown in infographics; the second covers the outlook and perspectives for individual countries; and the third provides a comparative picture of practices across four countries – Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, giving insights into how these states’ policies have changed regarding Islam and other religions, across the entire period from independence to 2016, as well as providing insights into experience in the institutionalisation of religion. This paper is designed for political scientists, religious scholars and historians, as well as all other readers interested in the development of democratic processes in Central Asia, in general. УДК 327 ББК 66.4 ISBN 978-601-80610-8-0 © Friedrich Ebert Foundation, 2017 2 Contents: Introduction 4 A Changing Picture – Political and Religious Institutions (Infographics) 5 Government in Central Asia: Politics and Islam 13 Uzbekistan – the Islamic Renaissance and the Internal Security Dilemma 14 Islam in Kazakhstan: Between Community and Disassociation 24 Tajikistan: Islam and Politics 34 Kyrgyzstan: Politics and Islam 40 Conclusions 47 Author Biographies 49 3 Introduction What is the role and significance of Islam in the countries of Central Asia – countries which were, until recently, atheist and Soviet? Is it: . a regressive move, back to the source; . a serious risk and threat; . a social choice; . a tool that governments can use to mobilise; or . an illusion? How is this to be viewed, through such prisms and lenses? Many researchers are, today, looking for the answers to these questions. But the rate of change is so great, and the subject itself so multifaceted and delicate, that a full analysis of this process has, thus far, proved difficult. The CAPG “Almaty Club”, involving researchers from four Central Asian countries – Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan – offer their views, from three different perspectives: I. the rate of change, from 1991 through 2016, shown in infographics; II. country-based perspectives; and III. a comparative illustration of practice in all four countries. It is our hope that this approach will provide the impetus for a more in-depth analysis of the process of Islamisation. In what way is Islamisation taking place? How do states endeavour to regulate such processes? In what way does policy in national security impact the state and society’s attitudes to Islam? 4 A Changing Picture - Political and Religious Institutions Laws and regulation governing religion State policy in the religious sphere is, in general, driven by specialist state agencies, with the supervision of activities in the Muslim environment being the responsibility of non- governmental institutions designated in Central Asian countries as the “Spiritual Administration of Muslims” (NB: although in Tajikistan this role falls to the Islamic Council or “Council of Ulema”). 5 Religious affairs are also regulated by various conceptual documents, strategies and concepts. 6 Indicative metrics regarding religious education and development throughout the four countries of Central Asia include: I. the rate of growth in the number of mosques and madrassas. Information on this growth is only available with regard to Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan: . the number of mosques in Kyrgyzstan increased from 1,973 in 2009 to 2,669 in 2015, and . the number of mosques in Kazakhstan increased from 68 in 1991 to 2,516 in 2016. 7 Consequently, the increase in the number of mosques has been accompanied by an increase in the number of imams. The correlation between the number of imams and population size shows that: . Tajikistan has by far the greatest concentration of imams, with one imam for every 2,210 people; and . Uzbekistan has the lowest concentration of imams, with one imam for every 7,824 people. 8 Religious – in this instance, Islamic – education is also showing a tendency towards growth, particularly in Kyrgyzstan, which has one Islamic university, nine institutes, and 102 madrassas (of which 88 are currently active). 9 10 Religion and Everyday Life: Religious Festivals Kurban-Hayit (or Eid-al-Adha – the “Feast of Sacrifice”) is officially celebrated in all four countries. Three countries (with the exception of Kazakhstan) celebrate Ramadan (Ramzan). The Orthodox Christmas is celebrated in two countries. Religious parties are officially banned throughout the countries of Central Asia. The Islamic Renaissance (Revival) Party of Turkestan (IRPT), however, has operated in Tajikistan at different times, before being banned in September 2015. 11 In all four countries (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan), state policy on religion is managed in the context of the objectives and interests of national security. 12 Government in Central Today’s re-Islamisation, however, almost a century after the beginning of “successful” Asia: Politics and Islam atheism, reflects the fact that Islam has always remained an ether permeating Over the course of three centuries (the social relations and people’s worldview. XVIII–XX centuries), Islam in Central The contrast between the post-Soviet Asia has experienced a whole series of process of headlong re-Islamisation (de- challenges – the most significant being the atheisation) and the Soviet period of anti-religious policy of the Soviet era. ongoing de-Islamisation (atheisation) is Huge resources invested in grandiose interesting here. The historical turning Soviet modernisation projects (attitudes point between these two realities thereto notwithstanding) envisaged, among undoubtedly being Gorbachev's other things, the secularisation of religious perestroika, which, among other things, consciousness: which meant large-scale freed up religious identity for all the projects in education, in the promotion of peoples of the former Soviet Union. Soviet ideals of “national cultures”, in the film industry, in the emancipation of The striking contrast between the Soviet women, and so on. Whole institutions offensive against Islam and its post-Soviet revival has revealed a rather contradictory were created to support these projects, which could not help but leave their mark socio-political situation and spiritual on consciousness, and on the lifestyles of atmosphere in Uzbekistan. On the one the indigenous population – part of which, hand, the local population embraces Islam incidentally, was not only the object, but as practiced locally, while, on the other, also the subject (that is, an active initiator) the country has become part of the global of grandiose changes. It was expected that Islamic world, with the particular serious political changes and challenges inherent to such practices. industrialisation would force local Which has meant, on the one hand, the revival of Islam as a faith, value, culture, residents “to throw religion into the dustbin of history.” 1 and so on, and, on the other – its protection and containment from excessive euphoria and external influences. 1 Sukhareva O.A. and Bikdzhanova M.A., (1955), Past and Present in the Village of Aikyran (Experience in Ethnographic Research into the “Stalin” Collective Farm in the Chartak District, Namangan Oblast), Publishing House of the Academy of Sciences of the Uzbek SSR. 13 Uzbekistan – the Islamic revealed their faces. This was considered a Renaissance and the progressive achievement by the new Internal Security Dilemma Soviet authority in the traditional and backward Turkestan. In the first years of national independence in Uzbekistan there Uzbekistan is clearly distinguished from was indeed a certain liberalisation in the other Central Asian countries by its religion and governmental–religious large Muslim population, a far greater relations. Thus, the country’s Muslims had concentration of religious institutions and more opportunities for making pilgrimages historical monuments, and by its more (the Hajj and Umrah) to Mecca and deep-rooted religious traditions in terms of Medina.2 Even before gaining local forms of Islamic practice. On which independence, in June 1991, Uzbekistan basis, it can be stated that the post-Soviet adopted the law on “Freedom of religious renaissance in independent Conscience and Religious Organisations”, Uzbekistan has largely been expressed albeit this law was subsequently subject to through the continuity of pre-existing and amendments and modifications. persistent practices, through its world view, and through the interrelationships The religious revival in Uzbekistan was between Islam and the state. accompanied, as it were, by the legalisation