By Serghei Markedonov - Russia Profile - Moscow, RussiaWednesday, August 1, 2007
The threats and political challenges in the Russian North Caucasus are changing rapidly at present. Similarly, the geography of the political instability is also changing.
Now, the main opponent of the Russian state--and therefore the main challenge to security and stability in the region--will not be "defenders of a free Ichkeria" or secular nationalists, but participants in the "Caucasian Islamic International."
Today it is not Chechnya, but Dagestan that is the hotspot in the region. Reports from the area's largest republic now recall the "counterterrorism operation" in Chechnya. What is striking, however, is the ideological and methodological inability of those in the government who have created the strategy for the Caucasus.
The events of 1999 in Chechnya and around the "rebellious republic" were categorized as a "terrorist threat" and the struggle against it was dubbed a "counterterrorist operation"; it's also frequently termed "the fight against international terrorism."
The Russian authorities at least attempted to place the Chechen crisis within a defined system of coordinates. What is now happening in Dagestan, however, is not explained through any kind of framework, not even an inadequate one.
In the first half of 2006 alone over 70 terrorist acts were carried out. And, unlike terrorist acts in Chechnya, the majority of those in Dagestan are not anonymous in nature. Thus, an understanding of what is happening in the largest republic in the North Caucasus should become the top priority for Russia's leadership.
At the beginning of the 1990s, during the period of the so-called "parade of sovereignties," ethno-nationalism and the idea of ethnic self-definition dominated in the North Caucasus. In practice, this resulted in the implementation of the principle of ethnic domination in politics, administration and business. Radical ethno-nationalists actively used terrorist methods in their struggle, and it would be wrong to say that the outbreak of terrorism in Dagestan began only recently.
Between 1989 and 1991, over 40 politically-motivated attempted murders were carried out. The number dropped to just under 40 in 1992, but in 1993, there were around 60 attempted murders and armed attacks. There were also key terrorist acts in the early 1990s.
In June 1993, gunmen of the ethnic Avar Imam Shamil People's Front and the ethnic Lak "Kazikumukh" movement seized personnel of the regional military commission in Kizlyar and demanded that the Russian Interior Ministry remove its special forces units from the city. Unlike the terrorist acts of 2005-2007, the attacks committed during this period were not ethno-political in character and not driven by religious justifications.
The same motivation lay behind the actions of the Chechen separatists who, from 1991, were fighting for an "independent Ichkeria." After 2000, however, the ethno-nationalistic slogans lost their former attraction and began to give way to those of religious radicals. Dagestan became the distinctive leader in the political struggle for the "purity of Islam."
It was this republic that evolved into the distinctive intellectual center for religious radicalism in which the "Wahhabis" carried out their most stubborn acts of armed resistance against the official authorities--both those in the republic and on the national level. What caused this change in events?
The Role of Religion
In Dagestan, the replacement of the nationalist discourse with the discourse of religious radicalism was made easier because the republic is the most multiethnic in Russia. Until the recent reforms to the Dagestani administration, the State Council, the executive body of power in the republic, was formed on the basis of ethnic parity and comprised 14 different ethnic groups.
It's also worth noting that certain ethnic groups in the republic weren't considered separate during the compiling of censuses; both during the Soviet era and during the preparation of the All-Russian Census of 2002, for example, the Botlikh were recorded as Avars and the Kubachins were recorded as Dargins. Due to this diversity, ethnic nationalism simply has no future in Dagestan.
The groups living in the republic seemed to realize this: At the beginning of the 1990s, Dagestan was the only republic in the North Caucasus not to adopt a declaration on independence and sovereignty.
During those years, there was only one "separatist party" in the republic--the Party for the Independence and Revival of Dagestan. Almost from its foundation in June of 1992, however, it was a marginal party.
At the same time, Dagestan is the most heavily Islamic region of the Russian Federation. Over 90 percent of the population of Dagestan is Muslim. Ninety-seven percent of Dagestan's Muslims are Sunni, with Shiites making up the remaining 3 percent. The non-Muslim population is split between the Russian Orthodox and Armenian churches and a small minority of Mountain Jews (Tats).
At the same time, unlike the other republics, Dagestan has strong theological traditions that sometimes manifest as religious radicalism. The penetration of the republic by "renovationist Islam," whose adherents are called Wahhabis in the media, dates back to the 1920s and 1930s.
Traditionalism versus Radicalism
At the beginning of the 1990s, Islam was regarded as an integrating force that could bind together the ethnic mosaic of Dagestan. According to Zagir Arukhov, a leading expert on the study of Islam in Dagestan, who was killed in a terrorist attack, "It was expected that the all-out nature of the Islamic system of regulation, the limited nature of Islam as a socio-cultural system, and flexible interaction with the state authorities would give Islam important advantages in the conditions of the socio-political reconstruction of society."
However, the transformation of Islam into a factor of stability and unity failed to occur. In the process of the "rebirth" of Islam in Dagestan, fundamental contradictions between the followers of traditional Caucasian Islamic traditions--Sufis--and the Wahhabis became evident. In the opinion of expert Dmitri Makarov, "Wahhabism and Sufism occupy different positions with regard to the existing social-political order in Dagestan, which is founded on clan ties. Sufi Islam is structurally incorporated into those ties. In rejecting Sufism, Wahhabism also rejects the social order that is sanctioned by it."
Dagestan's Wahhabis made criticism of the republic's authorities the keystone of their propaganda and promotional efforts. Widespread misuse of official positions by bureaucrats, corruption, social differentiation and, as a result, high levels of unemployment, the lack of transparency among the authorities and their insensitivity to the needs of the population lay behind the successes in recruitment achieved by the Wahhabis who were able to offer an alternative: True "Islamic order," a radical rejection of communism, democracy and "false Islam" as political models incapable of providing social harmony and ethnic peace.
This desired "order" could only be achieved through the path of the struggle for the true faith--a jihad. Wahhabism appealed not to the clans, but to values of equality and brotherhood that were higher than clan links. As communist values collapsed, the universal, inter-ethnic principles of Wahhabism, focused on social justice, filled the ideological vacuum. In these circumstances, the Wahhabis created their social foundations in the republic.
The Role of the State
But the rise of Wahhabism in Dagestan also resulted from a loss of Russian influence in the republic and the regionalization of authorities. The political elite in Dagestan has, in effect, not changed since the early 1990s. It proved to be effective in the struggle with ethnic extremism during the "parade of sovereignties," the "Chechen revolution" and at the time of Basayev's raid in 1999.
But to counteract religious extremism, a more subtle adjustment to the administrative system is required. But what are the options facing the Russian state in this context? The first immediate goal is to bring the power of the federal authorities to Dagestan and to the Caucasus as a whole.
The remoteness of Moscow from the region's problems can no longer be endured. The ignorance of the Russian community--both expert and political--should also no longer be tolerated. Additionally, Russian ideology--the idea of a Russian nation--needs to be spread actively and, in the best possible sense of the word, aggressively.
Many Dagestanis are not yet ready for a radical break with Russia in favor of an Islamic state.
Consequently, the Russian project, universal and supra-ethnic, should win out if handled correctly. The assertion of Russian state institutions in the Caucasus is not just an anti-terrorist struggle, which would in itself be ineffective. It is the normal regulation of internal migration.
Dagestan is densely populated, and the movement of its working-age population into the rest of Russia is a timely goal. But that movement into the country's internal regions is impossible without a sense that Dagestanis are citizens of a united nation--as well as some efforts to combat xenophobia among ethnic Russians.
Without that sense, such a movement will merely provoke a new wave of inter-ethnic tension. As early as 1993, in an interview, Magomedsalekh Gusayev, who was at the time the chairman of the committee on national policies and external relations of the Republic of Dagestan, maintained: "Migration is very active among the peoples of Dagestan; 400,000 Dagestanis are living beyond the republic's borders. Returning to Dagestan, often embittered, having lost their housing and property, they become a sort of detonator for the migration of the Russian-language population of Dagestan."
Unfortunately, over the past 14 years, little has changed. The number of migrants has merely grown, as has the extent of dissatisfaction with the corruption of the authorities. Today, in light of ever-increasing terrorism in Dagestan, it should also be acknowledged that bringing order to this republic will be impossible without changes in the very heart of Russia. Dagestan is merely a specific case in the general crisis of Russian internal politics.
Regional elections held in early March showed again how dangerous it is to introduce change into the power structures of Dagestan. These elections, the first held under new rules requiring representatives to the local parliament to be elected on party lists, resulted in the marginalization of the Communist Party, which traditionally played a popular and positive role in the republic.
Unlike in central Russia where the Communist Party is an archaic, nationalist force, in Dagestan, the Communist Party is the only political movement not structured around ethnic groupings or clans. It is a secular force that cites ideas of social justice. It promotes the virtues of science and education as well as the "friendship of peoples."
The United Russia party, which won a crushing victory on March 14, will not bring political stability to the region. The local branch of United Russia suffers from internal power struggles between bureaucratic clans led by Mukhu Aliyev, the republic's current president and Said Amirov, the mayor of Makhachkala [Capital city].
Party list voting in regions like Dagestan that have no multi-party tradition will only weaken local power structures and leave the door open for Islamic extremists to act outside the system if they feel their concerns aren't being addressed.
Sergei Markedonov is head of the Department for International Relations at the Institute for Political and Military Analysis
Visit also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dagestan
http://www.eurasianet.org/
[picture: Portrait of a Dagestani Couple in region of Gunib on the north slope of the Caucasus Mountains (nowadays Dagestan Republic of the Russian Federation). An early color photograph from Russia, created by Sergei Mikhailovich Prokudin-Gorskii as part of his work to document the Russian Empire from 1909 to 1915.]
The threats and political challenges in the Russian North Caucasus are changing rapidly at present. Similarly, the geography of the political instability is also changing.
Now, the main opponent of the Russian state--and therefore the main challenge to security and stability in the region--will not be "defenders of a free Ichkeria" or secular nationalists, but participants in the "Caucasian Islamic International."
Today it is not Chechnya, but Dagestan that is the hotspot in the region. Reports from the area's largest republic now recall the "counterterrorism operation" in Chechnya. What is striking, however, is the ideological and methodological inability of those in the government who have created the strategy for the Caucasus.
The events of 1999 in Chechnya and around the "rebellious republic" were categorized as a "terrorist threat" and the struggle against it was dubbed a "counterterrorist operation"; it's also frequently termed "the fight against international terrorism."
The Russian authorities at least attempted to place the Chechen crisis within a defined system of coordinates. What is now happening in Dagestan, however, is not explained through any kind of framework, not even an inadequate one.
In the first half of 2006 alone over 70 terrorist acts were carried out. And, unlike terrorist acts in Chechnya, the majority of those in Dagestan are not anonymous in nature. Thus, an understanding of what is happening in the largest republic in the North Caucasus should become the top priority for Russia's leadership.
At the beginning of the 1990s, during the period of the so-called "parade of sovereignties," ethno-nationalism and the idea of ethnic self-definition dominated in the North Caucasus. In practice, this resulted in the implementation of the principle of ethnic domination in politics, administration and business. Radical ethno-nationalists actively used terrorist methods in their struggle, and it would be wrong to say that the outbreak of terrorism in Dagestan began only recently.
Between 1989 and 1991, over 40 politically-motivated attempted murders were carried out. The number dropped to just under 40 in 1992, but in 1993, there were around 60 attempted murders and armed attacks. There were also key terrorist acts in the early 1990s.
In June 1993, gunmen of the ethnic Avar Imam Shamil People's Front and the ethnic Lak "Kazikumukh" movement seized personnel of the regional military commission in Kizlyar and demanded that the Russian Interior Ministry remove its special forces units from the city. Unlike the terrorist acts of 2005-2007, the attacks committed during this period were not ethno-political in character and not driven by religious justifications.
The same motivation lay behind the actions of the Chechen separatists who, from 1991, were fighting for an "independent Ichkeria." After 2000, however, the ethno-nationalistic slogans lost their former attraction and began to give way to those of religious radicals. Dagestan became the distinctive leader in the political struggle for the "purity of Islam."
It was this republic that evolved into the distinctive intellectual center for religious radicalism in which the "Wahhabis" carried out their most stubborn acts of armed resistance against the official authorities--both those in the republic and on the national level. What caused this change in events?
The Role of Religion
In Dagestan, the replacement of the nationalist discourse with the discourse of religious radicalism was made easier because the republic is the most multiethnic in Russia. Until the recent reforms to the Dagestani administration, the State Council, the executive body of power in the republic, was formed on the basis of ethnic parity and comprised 14 different ethnic groups.
It's also worth noting that certain ethnic groups in the republic weren't considered separate during the compiling of censuses; both during the Soviet era and during the preparation of the All-Russian Census of 2002, for example, the Botlikh were recorded as Avars and the Kubachins were recorded as Dargins. Due to this diversity, ethnic nationalism simply has no future in Dagestan.
The groups living in the republic seemed to realize this: At the beginning of the 1990s, Dagestan was the only republic in the North Caucasus not to adopt a declaration on independence and sovereignty.
During those years, there was only one "separatist party" in the republic--the Party for the Independence and Revival of Dagestan. Almost from its foundation in June of 1992, however, it was a marginal party.
At the same time, Dagestan is the most heavily Islamic region of the Russian Federation. Over 90 percent of the population of Dagestan is Muslim. Ninety-seven percent of Dagestan's Muslims are Sunni, with Shiites making up the remaining 3 percent. The non-Muslim population is split between the Russian Orthodox and Armenian churches and a small minority of Mountain Jews (Tats).
At the same time, unlike the other republics, Dagestan has strong theological traditions that sometimes manifest as religious radicalism. The penetration of the republic by "renovationist Islam," whose adherents are called Wahhabis in the media, dates back to the 1920s and 1930s.
Traditionalism versus Radicalism
At the beginning of the 1990s, Islam was regarded as an integrating force that could bind together the ethnic mosaic of Dagestan. According to Zagir Arukhov, a leading expert on the study of Islam in Dagestan, who was killed in a terrorist attack, "It was expected that the all-out nature of the Islamic system of regulation, the limited nature of Islam as a socio-cultural system, and flexible interaction with the state authorities would give Islam important advantages in the conditions of the socio-political reconstruction of society."
However, the transformation of Islam into a factor of stability and unity failed to occur. In the process of the "rebirth" of Islam in Dagestan, fundamental contradictions between the followers of traditional Caucasian Islamic traditions--Sufis--and the Wahhabis became evident. In the opinion of expert Dmitri Makarov, "Wahhabism and Sufism occupy different positions with regard to the existing social-political order in Dagestan, which is founded on clan ties. Sufi Islam is structurally incorporated into those ties. In rejecting Sufism, Wahhabism also rejects the social order that is sanctioned by it."
Dagestan's Wahhabis made criticism of the republic's authorities the keystone of their propaganda and promotional efforts. Widespread misuse of official positions by bureaucrats, corruption, social differentiation and, as a result, high levels of unemployment, the lack of transparency among the authorities and their insensitivity to the needs of the population lay behind the successes in recruitment achieved by the Wahhabis who were able to offer an alternative: True "Islamic order," a radical rejection of communism, democracy and "false Islam" as political models incapable of providing social harmony and ethnic peace.
This desired "order" could only be achieved through the path of the struggle for the true faith--a jihad. Wahhabism appealed not to the clans, but to values of equality and brotherhood that were higher than clan links. As communist values collapsed, the universal, inter-ethnic principles of Wahhabism, focused on social justice, filled the ideological vacuum. In these circumstances, the Wahhabis created their social foundations in the republic.
The Role of the State
But the rise of Wahhabism in Dagestan also resulted from a loss of Russian influence in the republic and the regionalization of authorities. The political elite in Dagestan has, in effect, not changed since the early 1990s. It proved to be effective in the struggle with ethnic extremism during the "parade of sovereignties," the "Chechen revolution" and at the time of Basayev's raid in 1999.
But to counteract religious extremism, a more subtle adjustment to the administrative system is required. But what are the options facing the Russian state in this context? The first immediate goal is to bring the power of the federal authorities to Dagestan and to the Caucasus as a whole.
The remoteness of Moscow from the region's problems can no longer be endured. The ignorance of the Russian community--both expert and political--should also no longer be tolerated. Additionally, Russian ideology--the idea of a Russian nation--needs to be spread actively and, in the best possible sense of the word, aggressively.
Many Dagestanis are not yet ready for a radical break with Russia in favor of an Islamic state.
Consequently, the Russian project, universal and supra-ethnic, should win out if handled correctly. The assertion of Russian state institutions in the Caucasus is not just an anti-terrorist struggle, which would in itself be ineffective. It is the normal regulation of internal migration.
Dagestan is densely populated, and the movement of its working-age population into the rest of Russia is a timely goal. But that movement into the country's internal regions is impossible without a sense that Dagestanis are citizens of a united nation--as well as some efforts to combat xenophobia among ethnic Russians.
Without that sense, such a movement will merely provoke a new wave of inter-ethnic tension. As early as 1993, in an interview, Magomedsalekh Gusayev, who was at the time the chairman of the committee on national policies and external relations of the Republic of Dagestan, maintained: "Migration is very active among the peoples of Dagestan; 400,000 Dagestanis are living beyond the republic's borders. Returning to Dagestan, often embittered, having lost their housing and property, they become a sort of detonator for the migration of the Russian-language population of Dagestan."
Unfortunately, over the past 14 years, little has changed. The number of migrants has merely grown, as has the extent of dissatisfaction with the corruption of the authorities. Today, in light of ever-increasing terrorism in Dagestan, it should also be acknowledged that bringing order to this republic will be impossible without changes in the very heart of Russia. Dagestan is merely a specific case in the general crisis of Russian internal politics.
Regional elections held in early March showed again how dangerous it is to introduce change into the power structures of Dagestan. These elections, the first held under new rules requiring representatives to the local parliament to be elected on party lists, resulted in the marginalization of the Communist Party, which traditionally played a popular and positive role in the republic.
Unlike in central Russia where the Communist Party is an archaic, nationalist force, in Dagestan, the Communist Party is the only political movement not structured around ethnic groupings or clans. It is a secular force that cites ideas of social justice. It promotes the virtues of science and education as well as the "friendship of peoples."
The United Russia party, which won a crushing victory on March 14, will not bring political stability to the region. The local branch of United Russia suffers from internal power struggles between bureaucratic clans led by Mukhu Aliyev, the republic's current president and Said Amirov, the mayor of Makhachkala [Capital city].
Party list voting in regions like Dagestan that have no multi-party tradition will only weaken local power structures and leave the door open for Islamic extremists to act outside the system if they feel their concerns aren't being addressed.
Sergei Markedonov is head of the Department for International Relations at the Institute for Political and Military Analysis
Visit also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dagestan
http://www.eurasianet.org/
[picture: Portrait of a Dagestani Couple in region of Gunib on the north slope of the Caucasus Mountains (nowadays Dagestan Republic of the Russian Federation). An early color photograph from Russia, created by Sergei Mikhailovich Prokudin-Gorskii as part of his work to document the Russian Empire from 1909 to 1915.]
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