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Ayça Ergun, Zana Çitak, Secularism and National Identity in Post-Soviet Azerbaijan, Journal of Church and State, Volume 62, Issue 3, Summer 2020, Pages 464–485, https://doi.org/10.1093/jcs/csz085
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Most studies relating to the issue of religion in Azerbaijan have been interested in studying religion, politics, and society, as well as the nature of the Islamic revival in post-Soviet Azerbaijan with only scant reference to secularism, its nature, and its role in shaping modern Azerbaijan. This insufficient interest is quite striking, considering that dünyǝvilik (secularism), literally meaning “this-worldliness,” is enshrined in the 1995 Constitution. Moreover, it is common to start any introductory textbook on Azerbaijan by referring to the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic (ADR) (1918–1920) as “the first secular and democratic republic in the Muslim world.”1
This surprising lack of interest in the significance of secularism in post-Soviet Azerbaijan may be related to two factors. First, it seems that the short-lived (23 months) ADR and its secular character have been overshadowed by subsequent longevity of the secular Republic of Turkey, which was established in 1923. Secondly, the important role of secularism in Azerbaijan has been sacrificed to the a priori assumptions of both the post-Soviet transition literature and the challenges against the secularization paradigm in the social sciences. Post-Soviet studies have focused on the meanings attributed to religion and have predominantly discussed the potential for religion to become a) a source of unity in times of transition, war, and turmoil; b) a source of political opposition; or c) the foundation of Islamic fundamentalism and/or radicalism. The main assumption is that Azerbaijani society is predominantly Muslim, therefore Islam would automatically become a major component of national identity. Yet the opposite case has also been considered in some other works, which see national identity in the early years of transition with reference to the rediscovery of ethnic identity (i.e., Turkish identity) rather than religious identity.2 Indeed, the Soviet regime left no room for religion, confining it to the private realm and permitting it to operate as popular Islam, consisting of the veneration of saints and visits to shrines. Both arguments fall short of problematizing the place of religion in national identity in post-Soviet Azerbaijan. Increasing challenges against the secularization paradigm have claimed that religion is not a declining force.3 In fact, it is more present than ever in the post-Cold War world though others such as Casanova and Taylor have drawn our attention to different dimensions of secularization still relevant to our world.4
In contrast, this study argues that components of national identity, including religion, are contingent and need to be problematized as to whether and in what way each plays a role in national identity. As Greenfeld and Brubaker have argued, religion’s relation to national identity is specific to each case.5 Secularism constitutes one of the essential components of Azerbaijani national identity historically and has been preserved in recent interpretations of Azerbaijaniness with reference to multiculturalism and tolerance. Asad has argued that one could not understand secularism independent of religion.6 Thus, notwithstanding the social role of religion both as a source of morality and cultural heritage, it is secularism, and not religion, that comprises the core of national identity in post-Soviet Azerbaijan. This is the outcome of the historical legacy of the ADR and Soviet period along with the preferences of the political and intellectual elite for secularism and emphasis on Turkish identity over religious or sectarian identity. Secularism in that sense has been the motor of Azerbaijani modernization, independence, and survival. It is this wholehearted embracing of the principle that explains the secular character of political elite, both government and opposition, in post-Soviet Azerbaijan. There is a need to understand secularism à la Azerbaijan with its legal and institutional characteristics but also by a scrutiny of its major characteristics, namely the universalism of secularism, the perception of religion as a private matter, an understanding of religion as a social value, the role of secularism as a source of social cohesion, and lastly, a sense of uniqueness and exceptionalism.
This article is based on data collected during fieldwork conducted in Azerbaijan in November and December 2016 where in-depth interviews were held with experts, academics, representatives of non-governmental organizations, government officials, members of parliament, and opposition elite. The first part of the article analyzes the discourses of national identity in post-Soviet Azerbaijan with a particular focus on religion. The second part of the article examines the legal and institutional framework of state-religion relations in Azerbaijan. The third part breaks down Azerbaijani secularism into its constitutive elements.
Religion, Secularism, and National Identity in Azerbaijan
In the post-independence period, Azerbaijan has endured numerous problems characteristic of many post-Soviet Eurasian states on its new path of social and political transformation.7 The early independence period was marked by the inter-ethnic conflict in the Nagorno-Karabagh region, trials of state and nation-building, attempts at democratization, and the need to secure domestic stability. National identity was to be redefined and reinterpreted. The period was marked by an attempt to challenge the Soviet description of Azerbaijani people as Azerbaijani and to reassert the understanding of the first Republic’s heritage. The Azerbaijan Democratic Republic constituted a source of ideological inspiration for the pro-independence elite of the late Soviet period and has been a source of historical pride for the existing ruling elite. The ideological discourse of the republican elite was formulated by Ahmet Agaoglu, Ali Bey Huseyinzade, Uzeyir and Ceyhun Hacıbeyli, Ali Mardan Topçubaşı, and Mehmet Emin Resulzade. According to Lemercier-Quelquejay, “this group of brilliant intellectuals was the ‘nursery’ of all Azeri political parties” and promoted “a certain anticlerical (though not anti-religious) modernism.”8 This ideology, Musavatism, took its name from the ruling party of the ADR, the Musavat Party, and defined the nation with a very strong emphasis on Turkish identity. Altstadt characterizes this ideology as “neither pan-Islamist nor pan-Turkist” but “grounded more solidly in ethnic consciousness.”9 For Swietochowski, “nationalism still meant broadly, Turkism with a growing component of Azerbaijani identity” and the essence of Musavatism was “secular Turkic nationalism.”10 While underlining the Muslim identity of the Azerbaijanis, this nationalism was significantly secular in its emphasis on establishing an independent nation-state in harmony with civilized and democratic nations.11 For the nationalist intelligentsia, science, and not religion, was the main mechanism for independence and survival.
Despite republican elite’s ambitions about the preservation and consolidation of independence, this could only be achieved with the collapse of the Soviet Union. The Nagorno-Karabagh conflict and Black January (January 20, 1990) constituted a historical turning point for the Azerbaijani political and national revival, with Azerbaijanis discovering the otherness of the Soviets in general and the Russians in particular.12 Yunusov argues that Black January led to increasing adherence to Islamic values, rituals, and practices.13 However, while extreme violence and a considerable number of deaths and casualties resulted in mass grief and suffering, they rather accelerated the formation of a pro-independence and nationalist mass movement. The Popular Front Movement of Azerbaijan (PFA) promoted a dichotomy of Turks, rather than Muslims, against Russians and Armenians, and hence it portrayed the conflict as ethnic rather than religious. Thus, both the Nagorno-Karabagh conflict and Black January provided a major impetus for relocating Turkishness into the core of Azerbaijani identity.
The PFA, which was led by Ebulfez Elchibey and strongly inspired by the ADR’s heritage (i.e., Turkism, modernization, secularism, and anti-clericalism), purposefully picked up the idea of Turkishness as the central component of national identity. In fact, it would have been much easier for the PFA to foster religious identity in the population, which had traditionally described itself as Muslim, than to initiate a discourse based on ethnic identity, which had been to a large extent forgotten under Soviet rule.14 The early experience with statehood provided them with an enthusiasm to build an independent state. According to one of the politicians of the PFA, “We looked back and remembered the ADR, Mehmet Emin Resulzade and his friends and what they did and what they fought for . . . We thought we did it once, [so] we can do it again.”15 Although there was not an explicit focus on secularism, the policies initiated by the Elchibey government (1992–1993)—such as defining Azerbaijani identity and language as Turkish, changing surnames from Russian -ov/-ova to Turkish names, maintaining extremely friendly relations with Turkey, developing a vision for the unification of all Turks and the establishment of a Turkish Union, and, last but not least, propagating the idea of a Unified Azerbaijan denoting the unification of Southern and Northern Azerbaijan—demonstrated an unequivocal emphasis on ethnic identity. For Elchibey, Turkishness constituted the very essence of national identity whereas religion “[was] in the spirit of the people.”16 While he acknowledged the value attributed to religion in society, Elchibey did not consider Islam to be a political force and did not anticipate a turn to fundamentalism due to the lack of a tradition of theology and clerics in Azerbaijan:
Shiism is not so strict and cruel like it is in Iran. The original religious system does not exist. It is neither widespread nor is it is a system. For fundamentalism the system has to be shaped like a pyramid. For example, there has to be a sheikh and around him there has to be 30 other sheikhs. Above them there has to be 500 big ruhani, axund, and then ten thousand mollas. Fundamentalism can only be established if there is an established pyramid.17
Moreover, Elchibey had also an anti-clerical tone:
Who is going to present Islam to Azerbaijan with modern thought (tǝfǝkkür)? I do not see anybody … [since] there is no propagation of Islam. There are only ignorant mollas or little mollas (mollacık) benefiting from religion to secure their own livelihoods. People need religion; one has a funeral, the other has a wedding. Eventually they go to a molla and this molla is ignorant.18
Altstadt similarly argues that the mullahs were “available for burials, weddings, or circumcisions, and were well-paid for these essential life-passage ceremonies.”19
After Heydar Aliyev came to power, the notion of Azerbaijani identity was preserved and secured by the 1995 Constitution, which called the Azerbaijan people Azerbaijanis (Azǝrbaycanlı), and their language the language of Azerbaijan (Azǝrbaycan dili).20 Thus, Azerbaijani became the official name for the national identity, the citizenship, and the language of Azerbaijan, and was justified based on the idea that the term covered all peoples living in Azerbaijan, regardless of their ethnicity, leaving no room for disturbances among ethnic minorities. Emphasis on nation-building shifted to Azerbaijanism (Azǝrbaycançılıq), an ideology with roots in the Soviet period that sought to ease ethnic tensions within the country. Further consolidation of the Azerbaijani citizenship identity has taken place during the Ilham Aliyev’s period. Since 2003, this notion of Azerbaijanism has provided a basis for a civic understanding of Azerbaijanism and inclusionary citizenship identity. Ilham Aliyev preserved his father’s heritage, with an added emphasis on diversity, multiculturalism, and tolerance. This new discourse can also be interpreted as accommodating all ethnic and religious groups within society and welcoming their differences. In this definition, the idea of secularism has constituted one of the main pillars of both national and citizenship identities.
The Azerbaijanism or the Turkism propagated by opposing political elite did not make any reference to religion. This does not imply that they deliberately neglected to define the place of religion in the making of national identity, but rather that it did not constitute a priority. While the post-independence leaders of Azerbaijan have not made strong references to Islam, this does not mean that they have not acknowledged the meaning attributed to Islam culturally. Bedford and Souleimanov argue that “all three presidents have used religion as a legitimation tool, making the presidential oath on both the Azerbaijani Constitution and the Quran, often referring to religion in their speeches, and in the cases of the father and son Aliyev, even performing a minor pilgrimage to Mecca.”21 Yet these culturally symbolic acts should not necessarily be interpreted as evidence of an emphasis on Islam but rather a politically correct acknowledgement of the relevance of Islam within Azerbaijani society. On the contrary, the Azerbaijani leaders have been strong advocates of secularism in their discourses of nation and state building.
It has been common to see the late Soviet and early independence period in post-Soviet Azerbaijan as a time of religious revival.22 Observers have often analyzed increasing religiosity and to some extent religious activism in Azerbaijan with reference to the activities of foreigners.23 The popularity of some Muslim/Islamist YouTubers, or social unrest expressed through religious motives and led by religious leaders (e.g., Cuma Mesjidi, Nardaran events), are also mentioned by the respondents. 24 However, others have argued that what some have seen as a religious revival was in fact increasing religiosity rather than religiousness.25 In the same way, Valiyev underlines the “shallowness of Islamic revival” in Azerbaijan and emphasizes the peculiar importance of Novruz celebrations, a pre-Islamic shamanic tradition, as a public celebration.26 While one can detect an element of piety in Elchibey as a believer, Heydar and Ilham Aliyev’s payments of tribute to Islam publicly were more an acknowledgement of a cultural heritage that defined Azerbaijani identity than a display of religiosity or a concession made to so-called religious circles. For Heydar Aliyev, Islam is a source of morality and yet remains distinct from politics: “Our state is secular. However, we are not separated from the religion. The state and the religion closely collaborate with each other. We believe that Islam in Azerbaijan would inculcate its wonderful spiritual values in the citizens of Azerbaijan.”27 For Heydar Aliyev, the Azerbaijani people “[have] never felt estranged from their religion, [but have] kept it in their hearts and souls.”28 In other words, Aliyev was very well aware of the meaning of religion in Azerbaijan and acknowledged its cultural importance and embeddedness in norms and values, yet he was an unquestionable advocate of secularism. His term in office was marked by the reconsolidation and strengthening of secular institutions; the institutionalization of the state-religion relationship through the establishment of the State Committee on Religious Affairs; the preparation of the legal framework to control and regulate religious activities; the securing of commitment and unconditional loyalty of the country’s main cleric, Allahshukur Pashazade, and the monitoring and prohibition of foreign religious activities in the country.
For Bashirov, it is possible to talk about an “Azerbaijani Islam,” which “was a part of secular identity of the Azerbaijani people,” accepting “the supremacy of secular values over religious ones.”29 This native version of Islam is “tolerant . . . and accepts the peaceful coexistence of different faith groups, particularly Jews, Christians, and Muslims.”30 Azerbaijani Islam was interpreted by Swietochowski as “national Islam” aiming at “downplaying the Shi’a-Sunni differences.”31 In a similar vein, a prominent theologian describes the nature of Islam in Azerbaijani society as “secular religiosity,” which comprises learning Islamic principles, being close to praying and fasting, but remaining far from Sharia.32 This peculiar place of Islam and legal and institutional structures of Azerbaijani state-religion regime have been shaped and informed by the Russian Enlightenment under the Tsarist rule, the ADR’s ideological tenets, atheist propaganda of the Soviet rule, and post-Soviet Azerbaijani elite’s treatment of Islam.
State-Religion Regime in Azerbaijan: A Legal and Institutional Inquiry
The legal basis of the state-religion relationship in post-Soviet Azerbaijan is the 1992 “Presidential Decree on the Protection of the Rights and Liberties of National Minorities, Less Populated and Ethnic Groups and State Assistance for the Development of their Language and Civilization” adopted under the presidency of Elchibey. It was mainly designed to address the protection of the rights and liberties of ethnic and religious minorities, ensuring equal treatment by the state. Without mentioning the principle of secularism specifically, it guarantees the freedom of religious belief and equality of all religions, declares the separation of religion and state, and specifically mentions that public education is separated from religion. The subsequent amendments themselves were responses to a series of developments at both the domestic and international levels.33 They provide a more rigorous legal framework to regulate the state-religion relationship, including restrictions on the activities of foreign missionaries, registration requirements for religious communities, limitations on religious propaganda and dissemination of religious publications, and restrictions for persons having diplomas from foreign theological institutions.
The 1995 Constitution was in line with the 1992 decree but went further, enshrining secularism explicitly as a characteristic of statehood. Its preamble mentions the intention “to build a law-based, secular state to provide the command of law as an expression of the will of the nation.” Article 7 defines the Azerbaijani state as a “democratic, legal, secular, unitary republic.” Article 18 specifically refers to the separation of religion and state and the equality of all religions before the law, defines the state educational system as secular, and recognizes the freedom of worship. Article 25 “guarantees equality of rights and liberties of everyone, irrespective of race, nationality, religion, language, sex, origin,” and Article 48 recognizes the freedom of worship.34
The main institution dealing with religious affairs until 2001 had been the Caucasus Muslim Board (CMB) (Qafqas Müsǝlmanları İdarǝsi). However, a new institution, the State Committee on Religious Affairs (Azerbaycan Respublikası Dini Qurumlarla İş Üzrǝ Dövlǝt Komitǝsi), was established in June 2001, in line with the logic of the 1992 decree and its amendments and the 1995 Constitution. In this sense, the institutional structure of the state-religion regime in post-Soviet Azerbaijan displays both continuities and changes with the Tsarist and Soviet periods. The duality of this institutional structure itself can be seen as manifesting the nature of the relationship between religion and Azerbaijani national identity: a particular synthesis of the significant place of religion—though only as a source of morality and cultural heritage—on the one hand, and the secularist assertion of state control over religion on the other.
The origins of the board reach back to Tsarist Russian rule as part of the Russian colonial policy towards the Caucasus, which, particularly after the end of the reign of Catherine II in the late eighteenth century, aimed at increasing the incorporation of Islamic religious officials to Russian governmental structures. Thus, there was a shift from a policy of broadly tolerant imperial policy towards Muslims of the empire, relying mostly on “indirect governance through intermediaries,” to a policy of more direct management and control of Muslims in the nineteenth century.35 After the imposition of Russian control in the Caucasus, the office of the Seyh-ul Islam was created in 1823 with an ethnic Azerbaijani at its head. The recognition of such a religious structure and an official clergy by the Russians was to be followed by the establishment of a Spiritual Board of the Transcaucasia Muslims in 1872, having two spiritual departments, one for the Shia community, headed by a Seyh-ul Islam, and another for the Sunni community, headed by a Mufti and covering the whole Caucasus region.36 Thus, the incorporation of the Muslim clergy and its bureaucratization were largely accomplished in the last quarter of the nineteenth century and displayed more or less continuity throughout Soviet rule, though with brief interruptions when Stalin closed the Spiritual Board along with many mosques after 1927.37 During the short-lived independence period (1918–1920), the two departments of the Spiritual Board were brought together, as president Resulzade of the ADR had stated that “we should unify the thing that is under two different names,” referring to the division between the Shia and the Sunni and seeing it as a product of Russian divide-and-rule imperial Muslim policy. Thus, the then recently unified board was the result of the nationalists’ intention to transcend the Sunni/Shia divide.38 During the Second World War, in April 1944, as the mosques were being reopened, the Spiritual Board was restored.39 This aimed mostly to promote an image of freedom in the Soviet Union to the outside world; but this time, it was to be headed by a Seyh-ul Islam and a Mufti as his deputy, in line with the ADR’s unification reform.40
In terms of state-religion relations, the Soviet period is characterized with official atheism and repression of religion.41 But Islam in particular “was perpetually vilified as a significant danger.”42 This led to a variety of administrative and pedagogical measures, including closing down of churches and mosques, denying religious groups legal registration, a ban on teaching religion, and biology lectures.43 Hence the survival of low levels of religious knowledge, transmitted from grandparents.44 Thus, official atheism brought the notion of “official Islam” with itself where its control was ensured by the state and communist party.45 In turn, the “unofficial Islam”—the respect for “folk mullahs” and veneration of saints and shrines—though “outlawed,” remained popular, especially in the countryside.46 The Spiritual Board and its structure survived Soviet rule with its Seyh-ul Islam Pashazade having headed the institution since 1980. Its name was changed to the Caucasus Muslim Board in 1989. Moreover, the end of Soviet rule ushered in a new period, where freedom of religion was guaranteed by the state through the 1992 decree, which represented a major “turn away” from the Soviet religious policy.47
The most important change from the previous periods was that, with the 1992 decree, state funding for the board was withdrawn and the Muslim clergy ceased to be salaried employees of the state, a practice that had been in place since the 1820 s.48 Thus, although the CMB has a place in law through the 1992 decree, it is considered a civil society organization (ictimai tǝşkilat) with apparent state control. The CMB was the sole institution in charge of religious affairs until the establishment of the State Committee in 2001. In other words, the board was put in charge of regulating state-religion relations in Azerbaijan in a way that was ensured by the unquestionable loyalty of Pashazade to the presidential administration. The religious affairs that are delegated to the responsibility of the CMB are related solely to Muslims, as it oversees all mosques, appoints axunds (Shia heads of mosques) and imams (Sunni clerics), and supervises Muslim religious organizations and all Muslim (both Shia and Sunni) religious rituals and ceremonies as well as religious education through Baku Islamic University.49
The establishment of the State Committee can be considered as the most important institutional innovation in the evolution of the state-religion regime in Azerbaijan. Though formally called a “committee,” it is a cabinet-level ministry, which had the added prestige of having Rafiq Aliyev, a well-known and respected Arabist, as its founder and first head until 2006.50 Presidential Decree No. 512, which established the State Committee, defined the duty of the committee as “to create proper conditions for the implementation of Article 48 of the Constitution,” that is, the freedom of worship, as well as “the prevention of radicalism.”51 Thus, the establishment and the mission of the committee followed the spirit of the multiple amendments to the 1992 decree, and the strengthening of the institutional framework can be interpreted as a systemic reaction towards external influences.
While the State Committee is presented as a complementary institution in the regulation of state-religion relations, the relationship between the committee and the CMB is one of competition or even “tension,” where the committee aims to balance and check the CMB, if not outright “control” it.52 In fact, the amendments to the 1992 decree had already required the registration of religious communities with the state. But it was with the establishment of the State Committee that registration started to be enforced with rigor.53 According to Balcı and Goyushov, the primary aim of the committee is to promote a “national Islam” that is “loyal to the ideological orientation of the regime.”54 This idea of a national Islam has gained a new rationale as a response to and a shield against the post-Soviet encounter with foreign religious organizations and movements in the immediate aftermath of independence, be they of Iranian, Wahhabi, or Turkish origin.55 Similarly, Swietochowski argues that in the late 1990s “there was an effort underway to forge a form of ‘national Islam,’ an integral part of national identity, rather than to be subordinated to ‘international Islam’, which tends to disregard state boundaries.”56 It was therefore precisely a perception of a rising threat of foreign influence that led the state to take a sharp stance against religious propaganda, religious instruction by clergy with foreign diploma, and religious publications with foreign origins. Hence, the State Committee lists its responsibilities as overseeing the smooth functioning of state-religion relations in accordance with the laws; organizing and controlling the material of religious education such as books, films, and conferences; registration with the state of all religious communities, both Muslim and non-Muslim; and preventing radicalism by organizing conferences and other educational activities and projects.57 Accordingly, there are two major differences between the CMB and the State Committee. First, the State Committee is an organ of the state bureaucracy, whose head is a secular bureaucrat without any religious credentials, while Pashazade is an Islamic cleric and scholar with an Islamic education. Second, the State Committee has a broader regulatory task than the CMB as it oversees the activities of and supports good relations among all religious communities, whereas the CMB is responsible only for Muslim—both Shia and Sunni—communities, their mosques, and their religious personnel. The CMB’s shift from a position of primacy to a more specialized institution, which is subject to the monitoring of the newly established State Committee, was due to, among other things, the general unpopularity of the former.58
What can be described as the institutional eclecticism of the state-religion regime in Azerbaijan is reflected in two major ways. In the first place, religious personnel are not salaried employees of the state, and mosques and their religious personnel are mainly self-financing. Out of 1,500 functioning mosques, only 400–500 have imams or axunds with a salary. The salary comes from donation boxes (nazir qutusu) located at the mosques, from religious alms (zekat) paid by the faithful, and from fees related to marriage and funeral ceremonies conducted by religious officials. It is the CMB, which takes the donations, but it is subject to monitoring by the Ministry of Finance. The remaining majority of mosque leaders do other things for a living, as they only occasionally have to lead prayer in congregations with very small numbers of mosque attendees. However, while it is not in the law, the state gives financial aid to religious groups.59 The State Committee also gives funding (not to exceed 5,000 manat) to icmas for projects, which specifically aim to prevent radicalization, for a period of three months.60 Secondly, the duality and eclecticism can also be found in the responsibility for the appointment of imams and axunds and the writing of hutbes, which was initially taken over by the State Committee.61 However, they were eventually returned to the CMB.62
Thus, the response of the post-Soviet Azerbaijani elite to the role of Islam in Azerbaijani society shifted from an initial tolerance, indifference, and unpreparedness towards more sensitivity, alertness, and control vis-à-vis Islamic activity. This shift was accompanied with an increased sense of the threat Islamic radicalism posed to the make-up of Azerbaijani society and the well-being of the state.
Dünyǝvilik: Secularism à la Azerbaijan
Secularism in Azerbaijan can be broken down into five main components. First, secularism in post-Soviet Azerbaijan encompasses separation between religion and state, the state’s equal distance to all religions, and freedom of belief.63 Thus, dünyǝvilik means separation, to the extent that the state is this-worldly and not religious, and that religion has no place in state or in politics. Mübariz Qurbanlı, a former deputy of the ruling New Azerbaijan Party and currently the head of the committee, argues, “No one can transform a mosque into a political arena. We shall not allow this. Mosques are there to pray, to worship Allah.”64 Rafiq Aliyev defines the relationship between state and religion as one of “autonomous co-existence.”65 However, separation in this sense is hardly defined as a two-way relationship since, in the Azerbaijani context, it is mostly defined as the “separation of religion from the state.”66 It was also sometimes formulated as “religion not interfering with state affairs.”67 This one-way relationship is also one of inequality as “religion must be under (dövlǝt nǝzarǝti).”68 Koch, Valiyev, and Kaini argue that this state control extends to the state authorities determining which mosques will be crowded and which ones will be closed down, as the recent favoring of the Heydar Mosque demonstrates.69 To emphasize this unequal relationship between religion and state, a theologian states that “religion should never be situated on a horizontal plane with the state but it must be placed on a vertical axis,” quoting Heydar Aliyev’s statement that “Religion is above us. We must move it down to where it belongs.”70 Most of our respondents see Azerbaijan’s flag as attesting to this hierarchy between religion and state with the “green” of Islam being lowered to the bottom by 1918, with blue (Turkishness) at the top and red (modernization) in the middle.71
A strong reference to a universal definition of secularism can also be found in the emphasis on the equality of all religions. In addition to the Constitution’s recognition of equal citizenship, regardless of ethnic or religious affiliation, and the provision of freedom of belief and worship for all religions in the law, it is emphasized that the official representatives of all religious communities have a place in state protocol.72 While this principle is not new and can be observed in the first majlis (assembly) of the ADR with a considerable number of Armenian Members of Parliament (MPs), the principle of the freedom and equality of all religions has recently gained a new role in the definition of Azerbaijani secularism. One can find a new emphasis on the themes of multiculturalism and tolerance as defining the very essence of the Azerbaijani way of life or lifestyle. Bakı Beynǝlxalq Multikulturalizm Mǝrkǝzi (Baku International Multiculturalism Center) was established on May 15, 2014, by presidential decree as an institution to promote Azerbaijan’s image as a secular country with a long tradition of multiculturalism and tolerance and as a model or ideal example (nümunǝ).73 A high-ranking state official notes that this principle is crucial in a world increasingly characterized by religious radicalism and conflict, and that the history of Azerbaijan, from the construction of Baku as a cosmopolitan city after the oil boom at the end of the nineteenth century to the historical presence of Jews and Christians in Azerbaijani territory, testifies to the role of multiculturalism and tolerance as “a way of life.” Further, he argues, “the principle of secularism is a precondition for the accomplishment of these values.”74 Moreover, for our respondents, this history of secularism can also be seen as embedded in the “genes” of the Azerbaijani people.75 In fact, there is a strikingly high percentage of people (51percent) who believe that “it is possible to belong to Azerbaijani society and not be Muslim.”76 Beyond what Wistrand calls “strategic tolerance,” there is a widespread belief in the tradition of peaceful coexistence as evidence of secularism in Azerbaijani society.77
The second component of secularism in Azerbaijan is a rigorous public/private distinction. This understanding of what Swietochowski calls “privatized religion” has roots in the Soviet regime, which did not allow public religious observance.78 Religion is thus perceived as a private matter, which should be confined to one’s “self (öz), home, and mosque” and should remain “a matter of conscience and faith only.”79 Thus, as a matter of primarily individual conscience, religion “should not overstep the boundaries set by the state,” and “religion and beliefs concern privacy of men.”80
Third, while religion is understood to be essentially a matter of private realm, it is also understood as having a social value, consisting of two main components: the source of individual morality and cultural heritage. Rafiq Aliyev underlines the role of religion as enabling the “spiritual well-being” of both the individual and society.81 He also argues that “criteria of spirituality and morality, national and spiritual values are closely connected with religion.”82 Significantly, Islam is counted as one of the components that make up Azerbaijani identity, not as a religion, but as a set of “moral values,” coming last after “Azerbaijanism” at the top and “the idea of a unitary secular state system” in perfect consistency with the sequence of the colors of the Azerbaijani flag.83
Islam also holds an important social value because it is a cultural and historical heritage. Rather than worship, ritual, and practice, Islam represents a sort of cultural glue, bonding Azerbaijanis to their past and connecting them to their ancestors—atayadigarı.84 Rather than knowledge and practice of Islam and its dogma, which is, as Valiyev argues, still very low in post-Soviet Azerbaijan, Islam constitutes a cultural component of the Azerbaijani national identity.85 According to one respondent, “People are not religious but being Muslim is a civilizational identity.”86 It is frequently asserted that Azerbaijanis “are not prone to faith” and that “[religion] is not in their structure.”87 This belief leads Azerbaijanis to argue that religiousness itself is foreign to their society and that to the extent that fundamentalism exists, it can only be imported from outside. Hence they reacted intensely against Wahhabi and Iranian influence, especially after the initial period of ambivalence and relatively free space for foreign missionaries in the 1990s. Indeed, many scholars agree that one reason for the limited nature of the increasing interest in Islam in the post-Soviet period is that this “renewed interest” has not been led by theological institutions.88 This is itself related, to a great extent, to Soviet rule, which, according to Motika, cut Azerbaijan off from the traditional Islamic centers of learning.89 This prevented the development of a religious hierarchy comparable to that in Iran or in Iraq.90 At the same time, it is also plausible that a disjuncture between faith and practice has become viable and normal due to historical reasons. As Aliyeva argues, despite the open atheism of the Soviet Union and its repression of religion, “most Muslims were able to maintain their faith.”91 Some respondents even argued that “[Azerbaijanis] have no religion but have faith,” and that under Soviet rule “they lost religion but not Allah!”92 This led to the creation of what some scholars have variously called “parallel Islam.”93 This unofficial Islam revolved around shrines, perceived as “the last bastions of religious observance.”94
The fourth characteristic of secularism in Azerbaijan is its use as a source of social cohesion. Azerbaijani history after the fourteenth century contains examples of both rivalry/wars and coexistence between the Sunnis and Shias. In the 1830 s, the percentage of Sunnis and Shias was almost equal.95 The Shia/Sunni tension, which started after the 1850 s, declined with the breakout of large-scale ethnic clashes between the Azerbaijani Turks and the Armenians, which led to a unified Shia-Sunni effort against the Armenians.96 The emergence of a national consciousness within the Azerbaijani intellectual elite was first and foremost an endeavor to define the Azerbaijanis as Turks, rather than as Muslims. As Swietochowski has argued, the emerging nationalist movement was also characterized by a serious concern with overcoming this sectarian schism.97 He describes Mirza Fath ‘Ali Akhunzade (1812–1878), a well-known figure of the nationalist movement, as an example of the intelligentsia’s perception of secularism as a source of social cohesion in a society with sectarian divisions.98 Most importantly, the intelligentsia sought to create a national identity. According to Resulzade, “it was not just the fault of the Russians. But we ourselves also used Muslim (İslamiyet) in lieu of national (milliyǝt) identity.”99 Thus, parallel to Swietochowski, one could argue that secularism was the nationalist elite’s response to sectarian division, a potentially divisive and undermining force for the emerging Azerbaijani nation.100 This was reflected in the unification of the formerly Shia and Sunni boards in the ADR, as mentioned previously.
The Shia-Sunni divide seems to be perceived as left in the past as a conflict of the pre-Soviet period.101 For most Azerbaijanis, their sectarian identity is something they have inherited from their ancestors (atayadigarı), rather than a guiding set of principles or a distinct dogma. In fact, most Azerbaijanis have little, if any, knowledge of the doctrine of their distinct sect or of Islam broadly.102 According to one respondent, national identity must be superior to religious identity precisely because “unlike national identity, religious solidarity, especially in a context of sectarian differences, would create division and open the way for outside religious influence.”103
The last component of dünyǝvilik is an acute sense of uniqueness or exceptionalism, conveying an implicit sense of pride. It is the idea that while secularism is a universal principle, which is promoted and defended by embracing its universal characteristics such as separation of religion and state, freedom of religion, and equality, its particular institutional and legal manifestations are believed to be unique. This constitutes the particularism of the Azerbaijani case and enables an “Azerbaijani model.” Although Bedford and Souleimanov argued that the discourse of “the uniqueness of Azerbaijani Islam” is “increasingly being highlighted as authoritarians are trying to promote the international image of Azerbaijan as a showcase for religious tolerance and multiculturalism,” it is secularism, not religion, that has been promoted.104
Conclusion
A study of the place of secularism and religion in Azerbaijani national identity reveals their simultaneous coexistence. This article argues that the former supersedes the latter in its significance. In that, it is secularism rather than Islam that emerges as one of the core elements of national identity. Secularism, along with Turkish ethnic identity, has been historically considered essential to the independence, viability, and survival of the Azerbaijani nation. Turkishness is a much more contested issue and has been at times marginalized such as under the Soviet rule and starting from the mid-1990s. In fact, there has been a striking stability to the role of secularism in the national identity. As for Islam, it constitutes a component of national identity because of its social value, its being a source of morality, and as part of cultural heritage. Accordingly, religion has been subordinate to the Turkish ethnic identity and secularism.
This argument, however, does not imply that there have been no challenges of religious fundamentalism and radicalism in Azerbaijan. Nardaran events have proved to be a major source of anxiety and concern for the government elite as well as the intelligentsia, the opposition included. Notwithstanding the existence of such threats and challenges, we argue that an inquiry into the role of secularism as a constitutive component of national identity is crucial to understand the present-day Azerbaijan.
She is the author (with Tunahan Yildiz) of the forthcoming article “The Multiple Identities of the Middle East: A Case of Iraqi Turkmen Refugees in Turkey,” in Journal of Balkan and Near Eastern Studies. Her articles have appeared in Global Networks: A Journal of Transnational Affairs, International Journal of Discrimination and the Law, Annuaire Droit et Religions, Cahiers de l’obTic, Journal of Church and State, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, and Middle Eastern Studies. Çitak’s primary scholarly interests include nationalism, religion, and Islam in Europe. AYÇA ERGUN (BA, Ankara University; MS, Middle East Technical University; PhD, University of Essex) is Associate Professor in the Department of Sociology, Middle East Technical University, Ankara, Turkey. She is the author (with Hamlet Isaxanli) of Security and Cross-Border Cooperation in the EU, the Black Sea Region and the Southern Caucasus, NATO Science For Peace and Security Publication Series E: Human and Societal Dynamics, vol. 107 (IOS Press, 2013) and (with Ayşe Ayata, and Işıl Çelimli) of Black Sea Politics: Political Culture and Civil Society in an Unstable Region (IB Tauris, 2005). Her other major recent publications have appeared in Turkish Studies, Journal of Developing Societies, Field Methods, Journal of European Integration, Electoral Studies, and Journal of Royal Asiatic Society. Ergun’s primary scholarly interests include post-Soviet studies, South Caucasus, and qualitative methodology. The fieldwork of this research was supported by Middle East Technical University Research Fund (Project No: BAP-07-03-2016-006).
Acknowledgement: The fieldwork of this research was supported by Middle East Technical University Research Fund (Project No: BAP-07-03-2016-006).
Footnotes
2018 is officially declared as the centenary of the establishment of the ADR, with endorsement by and much enthusiasm on the part of the Ilham Aliyev regime.
Audrey L. Altstadt, The Azerbaijani Turks (Stanford: Hoover Institution Press, 1992).
Bryan Wilson, Religion in Secular Society (London: C. A. Watts, 1966); P. B. Berger, The Sacred Canopy: Elements of a Sociological Theory of Religion (New York: Anchor Books, 1969).
Rodney Stark, “Secularization, R.I.P. (Rest in Peace),” Sociology of Religion 60, no.1 (1999): 249-73; Peter Berger, “Secularism in Retreat” in Islam and Secularism in The Middle East, ed. Azzam Tamimi and John Esposito (New York: New York University Press, 2000), 38-51; José Casanova, Public Religions in the Modern World (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1994); Charles Taylor, A Secular Age (Cambridge, MA: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2007).
Liah Greenfeld, Nationalism: Five Roads to Modernity (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1992); Rogers Brubaker, “Religion and Nationalism: Four Approaches,” Nations and Nationalism 18, no. 1 (2012): 2-20.
Talal Asad, Formations of the Secular: Christianity, Islam, Modernity (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2003).
Altstadt, The Azerbaijani Turks; Audrey L. Altstadt, Frustrated Democracy in Post-Soviet Azerbaijan (Washington D.C.: Woodrow Wilson Center Press, 2017); Svante E. Cornell, Azerbaijan since Independence (USA: M. E. Sharp, 2011); Ayça Ergun, “Post-Soviet Political Transformation in Azerbaijan: Political Elite, Civil Society and Trials of Democratization,” Uluslararası İlişkiler 7, no. 26 (2010): 67-85.
Catherine Lemercier-Quelquejay, “Islam and Identity in Azerbaijan,” Central Asian Survey 3, no. 2 (1984): 33-34.
Audrey L. Altstadt, “Azerbaijani Turks’ Response to Russian Conquest,” Studies in Comparative Communism XIX, no. 3/4 (1986): 279.
Tadeusz Swietochowski, Russia and Azerbaijan: A Borderland in Transition (New York: Columbia University Press, 1995), 61-62.
A review of the parliamentary hearings of the ADR period reveals “independence” (istiqlal), “future” (istiqbal), “democracy,” and “right to self-determination”(öz müqadǝrratını öz ǝline almak) in line with Wilsonian principles, “nationalization of education” (maarifin millilǝşmǝsi), “fundamental rights and liberties,” and “international recognition” as an independent and democratic member of the League of Nations (Cemiyet-i Akvam) as the most frequent references in the speeches of the members of the parliament. For a complete coverage of the parliamentary hearings, see Azerbaycan Gazetinde Parlament Hǝsabatları ve Şǝrhler [Parliamentary hearings and notes in the Azerbaijan newspaper] (Noyabr 1918-Aprel 1920) I. Cild [First Volume] (Baku: Qanun Neşriyyatı, 2015).
Altstadt, The Azerbaijani Turks; On January 20, 1990, at 12:20 a.m., Soviet troops entered Baku. After the bloody events, the idea of independence flourished. See Aydın Balayev and Rasim Mirze, 20 Yanvar Hadiseleri, Senedler, Mövgeler, Serhler [20 January Events, Documents, Positions, Notes] (Baki: Casioglu, 2000), 20.
Arif Yunusov, Islam in Azerbaijan (Baku: Zaman, 2004).
Tadeusz Swietochowski, “Azerbaijan: Perspectives from the Crossroads,” Central Asian Survey 18, no. 34 (1999): 419-34.
Authors’ interviews, Baku, November 2016.
Cited in Adalet Tahirzade, Elçibeyle 13 Saat Üz-Üze [13 hours face-to-face with Elchibey] (Baku: Tanıtım, 1999), 142.
Tahirzade, Elçibeyle 13 Saat Üz-Üze, 189.
Tahirzade, Elçibeyle 13 Saat Üz-Üze, 191.
Altstadt, Frustrated Democracy in Post-Soviet Azerbaijan, 183.
The Constitution of the Republic of Azerbaijan (1995), Article 21, https://en.president.az/azerbaijan/constitution.
Emil Aslan Souleimanov, “Azerbaijan, Islamism and an Unrest in Nardaran,” The Central Asia and Caucasus Analyst, last modified December 27, 2015, accessed April 15, 2018, https://www.cacianalyst.org/publications/analytical-articles/item/13316-azerbaijan-islamism-and-unrest-in-nardaran.html.
Sofie Bedford and Emil Aslan Souleimanov, “Under Construction and Highly Contested: Islam in Post-Soviet Caucasus,” Third World Quarterly 37, no. 9 (2016): 1559-80; Ansgar Jödicke, “Shia Groups and Iranian Religious Influence in Azerbaijan: The Impact of Trans-Boundary Religious Ties on National Religious Policy,” Eurasian Geography and Economics 58, no. 5 (2017): 533-56; Hannah O’Rear, “Negotiating Faith and Government in the Post Soviet Islamic Republics: Azerbaijan as a Case Study,” McGill Journal of Middle East Studies 78 (2012): 78-90.
Galib Bashirov, “Islamic Discourses in Azerbaijan: The Securitization of Non-Traditional Religious Movements,” Central Asian Survey 37, no. 1 (2018): 31-49.
Authors’ interviews, November 2016.
O’Rear, “Negotiating Faith and Government in the Post Soviet Islamic Republics: Azerbaijan as a Case Study,” 81.
Anar Valiyev, “Azerbaijan: Islam in a Post-Soviet Republic,” Middle East Review of International Affairs 9, no. 4 (2005): 6.
Cited in Adil Abdullah Al-Falah, Heydar Aliyev and National-Spiritual Values (Baku: Gısmet, 2007), 87.
Al-Falah, Heydar Aliyev and National-Spiritual Values, 35.
Bashirov, “Islamic Discourses in Azerbaijan: The Securitization of Non-Traditional Religious Movements,” 34.
Bashirov, “Islamic Discourses in Azerbaijan,” 34.
Swietochowski, “Azerbaijan: Perspectives from the Crossroads,” 424.
Authors’ interview with a theologian, Baku, November 15, 2016.
For the full list of amendments, see “Religion,” Presidential Library, accessed on March 15, 2018, http://files.preslib.az/projects/remz/pdf_en/atr_din.pdf. The Islamist Party of Azerbaijan was registered in 1992; see Farid Guliyev, Crossing the Discursive Space: Political Parties and the Poverty of Ideologies in Azerbaijan (Baku: Samizdat Press, 2017); Valiyev, “Azerbaijan: Islam in a Post-Soviet Republic,” 8. It “preached an anti-Turkic, anti-semitic and anti-American doctrine”; see Valiyev, “Azerbaijan,” 7. The party, which did not have much public support, was closed down in 1995. The Cuma Mosque became the center of so-called Islamic opposition in Azerbaijan in the early 2000s. See Bedford and Souleimanov, “Under Construction and Highly Contested: Islam in Post-Soviet Caucasus”; Bruno De Cordier, “Islamic Social Activism, Globalization and Social Change: The Case of Hajji Ilgar Ibrahimoglu and the Cuma Ehli in Baku Azerbaijan,” Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs 34, no. 2 (2014): 134-52; Murad Ismaliyov, “A Resacralization of Public Space and the Future of Political Islam in Azerbaijan: Quo Vadis?” CAP Papers 186, (2017). Its head, Hacı Ilgar Ibrahimoglu, appeared to be a strong opponent of the government and “refused to be controlled by the official Islamic structures.” See Julie Wilhelmsen, “Islamism in Azerbaijan: How Potent?” Studies in Conflict & Terrorism 32, (2009): 730. After the government closed down the mosque, its affiliated NGO, DEVAMM, remains, engaging in a significantly reduced criticism. Nardaran is a small town near Baku where anti-government protests took place in 2002 and 2006 mainly due to social and economic problems. Although observers noted a religious dimension, protests mainly targeted the government’s unresponsiveness to people’s grievances. Yet in 2015, another series of protests occurred in Nardaran, this time led a by Shia cleric, Taleh Bagirov, which increased concerns and resulted in the intervention of Azerbaijani law enforcement units. See Souleimanov, “Azerbaijan, Islamism and an Unrest in Nardaran.”
See the Constitution of the Republic of Azerbaijan, https://en.president.az/azerbaijan/constitution.
Firouzeh Mostashari, On the Religious Frontier: Tsarist Russia and Islam in the Caucasus (London: I. B. Tauris, 2006); Mustafa Tuna, Imperial Russia’s Muslims: Islam, Empire, and European Modernity, 1788-1914 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015). The same point was also emphasized in the authors’ interview with an expert, Baku, November 14, 2016.
Valiyev, “Azerbaijan: Islam in a Post-Soviet Republic,” 4-5.
Mostashari argues that the bureaucratization of the Muslim clergy by the Russians was in line with the bureaucratization of the Orthodox clergy through the establishment of the Holy Synod for the Russian Orthodox Church under Peter the Great. See Mostashari, On the Religious Frontier: Tsarist Russia and Islam in the Caucasus, 32. The recognition of freedom of religion for Islam in 1849 required the Muslim clergy “to abstain from contacting their co-religionists abroad without knowledge of the higher religious administration, respect the churches and holy places of other religions in the empire, and pray for the long life of the emperor.” This recognition itself was, to a great extent, a response to the Murid revolt of the 1830s, instigated by the Murid movement, which advocated a rigorous practice of Islam as well as nonrecognition of an “infidel” ruler. See Mostashari, On the Religious Frontier: Tsarist Russia and Islam in the Caucasus, 87-88.
Our respondent mentioned “Mehmet Emin Resulzade argued that they had to unify what had been separate (İki namda olan şeyi birleştirmeliyiz).” Authors’ interview with a theologian, Baku, November 15, 2016. See also Bayram Balcı and Altay Goyushov, “Changing Islam in Post-Soviet Azerbaijan and Its Weighting on the Sunnite-Shiite Cleavage” in The Dynamics of Sunni-Shia Relationships: Doctrine, Transnationalism, Intellectuals and the Media, ed. Brigitte Maréchal and Sami Zemni (London: Hurst & Company, 2013).
Authors’ interview with an expert, Baku, November 14, 2016. For a discussion on the broader Soviet Union’s policy vis-à-vis Islam, see Hans Bräker, “Soviet Policy toward Islam,” in Muslim Communities Reemerge: Historical Perspectives on Nationality, Politics, and Opposition in the Former Soviet Union and Yugoslavia, ed. Edward Allworth (Durham: Duke University Press, 1994).
Valiyev, “Azerbaijan: Islam in a Post-Soviet Republic,” 3-4.
Jödicke, “Shia Groups and Iranian Religious Influence in Azerbaijan: The Impact of Trans-Boundary Religious Ties on National Religious Policy”; For the contradictions of Soviet policies regarding religion, see Sonja Luehrmann, Secularism Soviet Style: Teaching Atheism and Religion in a Volga Republic (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2011).
Altstadt, Frustrated Democracy in Post-Soviet Azerbaijan, 183.
Victoria Smolkin-Rothrock, “The Ticket to the Soviet Soul: Science, Religion and the Spiritual Crisis of Late Soviet Atheism,” The Russian Review 73, no. 2 (2014): 171-97.
Altstadt, Frustrated Democracy in Post-Soviet Azerbaijan, 185.
Altstadt, Frustrated Democracy in Post-Soviet Azerbaijan, 183.
Altstadt, Frustrated Democracy in Post-Soviet Azerbaijan, 184.
Jödicke, “Shia Groups and Iranian Religious Influence in Azerbaijan: The Impact of Trans-Boundary Religious Ties on National Religious Policy.”
For the full text of the law, see Azǝrbaycan Respublikasında Dövlǝt-Din Münasǝbǝtlǝrini Tǝnzimlǝyen Resmi Sǝnedler [The official documents regulating state-religion relations in the Azerbaijani Republic] (Baku: Azǝrbaycan Respublikasi Dini Qurumlarla İş Üzrǝ Dövlǝt Komitǝsi [The State Committee on Religious Affairs of the Republic of Azerbaijan], 2015); see also Raoul Motika, “Islam in Post-Soviet Azerbaijan,” Archives des Sciences Sociales des Religions 115, (2001): 111-24; Valiyev, “Azerbaijan: Islam in a Post-Soviet Republic,” 5.
Balcı and Goyhushov, “Changing Islam in Post-Soviet Azerbaijan and Its Weighting on the Sunnite-Shiite Cleavage,” 211.
Authors’ interviews with officials of the State Committee, Baku, November 16, 2016.
Elnur Ismayilov, “Islam in Azerbaijan: Revival and Political Involvement,” in Religion, Nation and Democracy in the South Caucasus, ed. Alexander Agadjanian, Ansgar Jödicke, and Evert van der Zweerde (New York: Routledge, 2015).
See Altstadt, Frustrated Democracy in Post-Soviet Azerbaijan, 193. Altstadt mentions that the State Committee under Rafiq Aliyev had even tried to require the CMB to register as a religious community with the state, treating the CMB as one religious organization among others. Initially, Rafiq Aliyev was supposed to be appointed as the head of the Department of Religious Affairs, a department which already existed under the Soviet rule continuing through the period of independence. But he did not want that position as the proposed institution had little power, if any, and he insisted on the establishment of the State Committee. Authors’ interview, Baku, November 18, 2016.
Jödicke, “Shia Groups and Iranian Religious Influence in Azerbaijan: The Impact of Trans-Boundary Religious Ties on National Religious Policy.”
Balcı and Goyushov, “Changing Islam in Post-Soviet Azerbaijan and Its Weighting on the Sunnite-Shiite Cleavage,” 211.
Authors’ interview with an expert, Baku, November 14, 2016; authors’ interview with a theologian, Baku, November 15, 2016; and authors’ interview with an NGO representative, Baku, November 17, 2016.
Swietochowski, “Azerbaijan: Perspectives from the Crossroads,” 424.
Authors’ interview with officials at the State Committee, November 16, 2016.
Allahshukur Pashazade has long been identified with the Soviet rule. He is also seen as over-pragmatic and corrupt; Altstadt, Frustrated Democracy in Post-Soviet Azerbaijan, 192; Ismayilov, “Islam in Azerbaijan: Revival and Political Involvement,” 101; Balcı and Goyushov, “Changing Islam in Post-Soviet Azerbaijan and Its Weighting on the Sunnite-Shiite Cleavage,” 211.
Authors’ interviews with officials of the State Committee, Baku, November 16, 2016, and with an expert, Baku, November 14, 2016.
An icma is a mosque congregation, made up of 50 persons.
Authors’ interview with a theologian, Baku, November 18, 2016.
Authors’ interviews with officials of the State Committee, Baku, November 16, 2016.
Authors’ interview with officials of the State Committee, Baku, November 16, 2016.
Cited in Ismayilov, “A Resacralization of Public Space and the Future of Political Islam in Azerbaijan: Quo Vadis?”11.
Rafiq Aliyev, State and Religion (Baku: Abilov, Zeynalov & Sons Publishing House, 2004), 16-22.
Aliyev, State and Religion, 28.
Authors’ interview with officials of the State Committee, Baku, November 16, 2016.
Authors’ interview with an expert, Baku, November 14, 2016; authors’ interview with an MP, Baku, November 17, 2016.
Natalie Koch, Anar Valiyev, and Khairul Hazmi Zaini. “Mosques as Monuments an Inter-Asian Perspective on Monumentality and Religious Landscape,” Cultural Geographies 25, no. 1 (2018): 183-cv99.
Authors’ interview with officials with a theologian, Baku, November 18, 2016.
Authors’ interview with an independent expert, Baku, November 14, 2016; authors’ interview with a theologian, Baku, November 15, 2016; authors’ interview with an MP, Baku, November 17, 2016.
Authors’ interview with a theologian, Baku, November 15, 2016.
Authors’ interviews with officials at the State Committee, Baku, November 16, 2016.
Authors’ interview with a state official, Baku, November 18, 2016. For a discussion of the lively cultural, artistic, and intellectual life in Baku in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, see also Mostashari, On the Religious Frontier: Tsarist Russia and Islam in the Caucasus, 95. For the oil boom and its impact on Azerbaijani society and history, see Tadeusz Swietochowski, Russia and Azerbaijan: A Borderland in Transition (New York: Columbia University Press, 1995), 17-24.
Authors’ interview with a high-ranking state official, Baku, November 18, 2016; authors’ interview with officials of the State Committee, Baku, November 16, 2016.
See 2012 Social Capital, Media and Gender Survey, CRRC Opinion Poll on Religious Tolerance, Caucasus Analytical Digest 44 (2012): 8.
Jennifer Solweig Wistrand, “Azerbaijan and ‘Tolerant Muslims,’” Caucasus Analytical Digest 44 (2012): 5-6.
Tadeusz Swietochowski, “The Hidden Faces of Islam,” World Policy Journal 19, no. 3 (2002): 69-76.
Authors’ interview with an MP, Baku, November 17, 2016.
Authors’ interview with an MP, Baku, November 17, 2016. See also Aliyev, State and Religion, 28.
Aliyev, State and Religion, 29.
Aliyev, State and Religion, 29.
Aliyev, State and Religion, 70.
Authors’ interviews, Baku, November 18, 2016.
Valiyev, “Azerbaijan: Islam in a Post-Soviet Republic,” 5. See also the results of the survey conducted by the non-profit Caucasus Resource Research Centers, in Shahla Sultanova, “Azerbaijan: Islam Comes with a Secular Face.” Eurasianet, accessed August 15, 2013, https://eurasianet.org/azerbaijan-islam-comes-with-a-secular-face. Balcı and Goyushov, “Changing Islam in Post-Soviet Azerbaijan and Its Weighting on the Sunnite-Shiite Cleavage,” 212.
Authors’ interview with an expert, Baku, November 14, 2016.
Authors’ interviews with officials of the State Committee, Baku, November 16, 2016.
O’Rear, “Negotiating Faith and Government in the Post Soviet Islamic Republics: Azerbaijan as a Case Study,” 81.
Motika, “Islam in Post-Soviet Azerbaijan,” 114.
Wilhelmsen, “Islamism in Azerbaijan: How Potent?” 731.
Lala Aliyeva, “Vernacular Islam in Azerbaijan,” Humanities and Social Sciences Review 2, no. 3 (2013): 147.
Authors’ interviews, Baku, November 2017.
Bayram Balcı, “Between Sunnism and Shiism: Islam in Post-Soviet Azerbaijan,” Central Asian Survey 23, no. 2 (2004).
Bruce Grant, “Shrines and Sovereigns: Life, Death, and Religion in Rural Azerbaijan,” Comparative Studies in Society and History 53, no. 3 (2011): 654.
Swietochowski, Russia and Azerbaijan: A Borderland in Transition, 10.
Swietochowski, “The Hidden Faces of Islam,” 70.
Swietochowski, “The Hidden Faces of Islam,” 70.
Swietochowski, Russia and Azerbaijan: A Borderland in Transition, 27.
Aydın Balayev, “Mehmed Emin Resulzade,” in Azerbaycan Türklerinin Önderleri [Leaders of the Azerbaijani Turks], ed. Nesib Nesibli (Ankara: Berikan, 2017).
Swietochowski, “The Hidden Faces of Islam,” 70.
Authors’ interview with an expert, Baku, November 14, 2016.
Valiyev, “Under Construction and Highly Contested: Islam in Post-Soviet Caucasus,” 5; Bedford and Souleimanov, “Under Construction and Highly Contested: Islam in Post-Soviet Caucasus,” 6; Authors’ interview with a chair of an NGO, Baku, November 15, 2017.
Authors’ interview with an MP, Baku, November 17, 2016.
Bedford and Souleimanov, “Under Construction and Highly Contested: Islam in Post-Soviet Caucasus,” 6.
