Common religious, cultural, and ethnic bonds can hold communities together, while differences along these same lines often lead to calls for national independence, complicate nation building, and confound inter-communal peacemaking efforts. In particular, when religious differences exist between groups in conflict there is a marked tendency for such differences to become emphasized. This is not to say that religion is the root cause of all internecine and inter-communal conflict, which certainly is not the case. But conflicts become fundamentally altered as they rage on, and factors that were at the root cause of a conflict at its outset may no longer be the primary causes in later stages. That is, once conflicts have significantly evolved, the prior causes may no longer be the primary causes.

Much of the social science literature pertaining to the development of civil society in post-communist Eastern Europe focuses on the issue of religious pluralism, especially the relationship of religious minorities and new religious movements (NRMs) to the state and their established Orthodox churches. Their findings suggest that the equation of ethno-religious nationalism, cultural identity, and the state becomes a hindrance to religious pluralism and the development of civil society in these nation-states. As a result, social scientists depict these national churches, and in most cases rightly so, as being the caretakers and fomenters of ethno-religious nationalism in their particular states. A factor in this debate that is often overlooked, however, is the role of the local church in intra-ecclesial relations. Is the concept of the “local church,” which developed in the time of the Roman and Byzantine Empires, to be identified with the modern national church? If this is the case, these churches may be guilty of the sin of ethno-phyletism, which the Council of Constantinople condemned in 1872 in regards to the Bulgarian schism. Additionally, while the development of religious pluralism in post-communist society with the proliferation of Protestant Christian sects and NRMs challenges the religious hegemony of the national churches, even more problematic has been the issue of inter-territorial Orthodox churches in Eastern Europe. The existence of a plurality of national Orthodox churches in the same territory violates the ecclesiological principle of the “local church” as well as perpetuates the sin of ethno-phyletism. While some social scientists may laud the development of a multiplication of churches in the same territory, from an ecclesiastical standpoint such a multiplication denies the unity and identity of the Orthodox Church as the one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church, which it confesses to be. What social scientists have failed to discuss is this important self-understanding of the Orthodox churches, especially as it pertains to inter-Orthodox ecclesial relations. Only with this self-understanding of the church blended with the issue of ethno-nationalism can the problems pertaining to the relations and development of ethno-national churches be properly understood.

The 1997 Russian law on religion recognizes Orthodoxy, Islam, Judaism, and Buddhism as the “traditional religions” of Russia. These religions see themselves as having an important role to play in achieving social stability, and particularly in overcoming religious “extremism” and the perceived threat it poses to society. “Traditional'” religions stand shoulder to shoulder, explaining that the values they champion tend towards the creation and preservation of peace and reconciliation in society, and that, moreover, these are shared values, common to all “traditional'‘ religions. Indeed, the primary criterion for identifying a “traditional'” religion in Russia today may be that it is “noncompetitive” with other religions. The Moscow Patriarchate rejects the idea, for example, that Orthodox Christians should proselytize among Muslims. The fact that each religion sees itself as having possession of the “truth” does not endanger the cooperation, harmony and mutual respect among the traditional religions in Russia at the level of official and institutional interaction. Regarding the controversy over the school textbook, Foundations of Orthodox Culture, which human rights activists accused of constituting pro-Orthodox propaganda, an Orthodox priest and a Muslim chief mufti filed a joint claim against those who initiated the case, and a Protestant leader came out in support of the use of the textbook in the public schools.

The officially atheist Soviet Union did not tolerate any open manifestations of faith except for the rare ones it overtly allowed and covertly controlled. Since all religions were almost entirely suppressed from above, there were no visible manifestations of inter-religious intolerance “from below,” i.e. among the adherents of different faiths. Yet our paper shows that in less than two decades after the demise of the Soviet state and its official atheism, there emerged in Russia an entirely new landscape of widespread and strong interfaith intolerance from below. We describe that landscape using the data from our representative national survey conducted in Russia in 2005.

The end of the Cold War drew increasing attention to ongoing and new ethnic conflicts—particularly because many of the high-profile new conflicts broke out amid the ruins of communism. Since 11 September 2001 there has been even more discussion about whether and how Islam contributes to international and civilizational conflict. However, there has been little work attempting to understand whether Islam plays any distinctive role in ethnic conflicts. Much work on ethnic conflict assumes that Islam is just one possible component of ethnic and national identities, and that it has no distinctive influence. Others examine whether Islam always has a similar impact on ethnic conflict—typically based upon identifying states or minority groups as having majority Muslim populations.

The basis of a civil nation is common goals, common values, trust in the government, and the understanding that the government serves us. The main task of the people [now] is to avoid military service, taxes, and the authorities in general. Under such conditions, it is impossible to form a civil political nation.