The history and contemporary situation of Muslim communities in Eastern Europe are explored here from three angles. First, survival, telling of the resilience of these Muslim communities in the face of often restrictive state policies and hostile social environments, especially during the Communist period. next, their subsequent revival in the aftermath of the Cold War. And last, transformation, looking at the profound changes currently taking place in the demographic composition of the communities and in the forms of Islam practiced by them. The reader is shows a picture of the general trends common the Muslim communities of Eastern Europe, and the special characteristics of clusters of states, such as the Baltics, the Balkans, the Višegrad states and the European states of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS)
Abstract The article focuses on the relation between the socio-legal status of national Orthodox Churches and their role in the legal, institutional and social 'othering' of Islam and ethnic groups of Muslims in three Balkans countries, namely, Bulgaria, North Macedonia and Serbia. The research reveals that the state-pursued construction of national identity and politics of belonging are expressly permeated by ethno-confessional nationalism, which is at the core of the deep-running tensions between the dominant ethnic group and the marginalized Muslims. There is an alliance between the political and the Church elites to keep ethnic groups of Muslim background either altogether outside the 'national Us' or at least at its outer margins.
Lithuania formally distinguishes between what it terms "traditional," "state-recognized," "registered," and "unregistered" religions. Though constitutionally Lithuania is a secular state and all religions are declared equal vis-à-vis the state, religious communities recognized as "traditional" have, nonetheless, been favored by the state. They have been granted preferential treatment both in the legislation and extralegal handling by various state actors and institutions. At the same time, traditional religious communities are formally equal among themselves and vis-à-vis the state. However, the size of their membership puts them into two distinct camps. While the Catholic community constitutes 77 percent of the country's population, the remaining eight traditional religious communities together hardly make up 6 percent, of which 4 percent are Orthodox, with Lutherans, Calvinists, Greek Catholics, Old Believers, Judaists, Karaites, and Sunni Muslims making up the remaining numbers. This article focuses on one of the smaller traditional religious communities, Sunni Muslims, and through this example seeks to show looming complications arising from the current legal system for the governance of religion in Lithuania, which, as a country, starts inter alia being affected by the appearance of revivalist and other "nontraditional" forms of Islam on its territory. The article argues that with the changing makeup of the Lithuanian religious landscape—not related only to Islam—the current system of the governance of religion is not only outdated but also unsustainable and needs to be thoroughly overhauled to come more in line with the developing social reality ; Regionistikos katedra ; Vytauto Didžiojo universitetas
This Country Profile provides a brief overview of religious diversity and its governance in the above-named state. It is one of 23 such profiles produced by GREASE, an EU-funded research project investigating religious diversity, state-religion relations and religiously inspired radicalisation on four continents. More detailed assessments are available in our multi-part Country Reports and Country Cases. ; This project has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement number 770640.
This Country Profile provides a brief overview of religious diversity and its governance in the above-named state. It is one of 23 such profiles produced by GREASE, an EU-funded research project investigating religious diversity, state-religion relations and religiously inspired radicalisation on four continents. More detailed assessments are available in our multi-part Country Reports and Country Cases. ; This project has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement number 770640.
This Country Report offers a detailed assessment of religious diversity and violent religious radicalisation in the above-named state. It is part of a series covering 23 countries (listed below) on four continents. More basic information about religious affiliation and state-religion relations in these states is available in our Country Profiles series. This report was produced by GREASE, an EU-funded research project investigating religious diversity, secularism and religiously inspired radicalisation. ; This project has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement number 770640.
This Country Report offers a detailed assessment of religious diversity and violent religious radicalisation in the above-named state. It is part of a series covering 23 countries (listed below) on four continents. More basic information about religious affiliation and state-religion relations in these states is available in our Country Profiles series. This report was produced by GREASE, an EU-funded research project investigating religious diversity, secularism and religiously inspired radicalisation. ; This project has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement number 770640.
Routinely, people, who have, over the past five years, travelled to Western Asia to settle, are being referred to, in the Western popular discourse, as 'foreign fighters'. Though, admittedly, many among them did join various armed groups, a rather significant part of them did not or even could not have become members of armed groups. This is first of all true of children who travelled with their parents but also young females, in the Western popular parlance pejoratively called 'jihadi brides'. However, even these categories aside, those (young) men who did join armed groups in Syria and Iraq, though they may be identified as 'fighters', may also not be regarded (and certainly many among them do not see themselves) as 'foreign'. As the overwhelming number of people who travelled to West Asia joined the Islamic Khilafa State (IKS), their status in the entity is more of 'naturalized citizens', whose naturalization process is epitomized in the joining of the armed forces of the Islamic Khilafa State. Those, who did not (or could not) join the IKS armed forces, became citizens through pledging allegiance to the khalifa (Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi) and by performing what they themselves regard as compulsory hijra – relocation from the lands of unbelief to the land of Islam under the declared khilafa. The khilafa project initiated by the Islamic State is a unique phenomenon, not only from the point of view of the theories of international relations but also in respect to the classical notions of state formation and nation building, and puts the conceptualization of citizenship in a new light. As such, it poses new challenges not only from the perspective of narrow military security but also from a much broader one, particularly, to the countries, among them European, the citizens of which forsake their original contracts for a new one.
Routinely, people, who have, over the past five years, travelled to Western Asia to settle, are being referred to, in the Western popular discourse, as 'foreign fighters'. Though, admittedly, many among them did join various armed groups, a rather significant part of them did not or even could not have become members of armed groups. This is first of all true of children who travelled with their parents but also young females, in the Western popular parlance pejoratively called 'jihadi brides'. However, even these categories aside, those (young) men who did join armed groups in Syria and Iraq, though they may be identified as 'fighters', may also not be regarded (and certainly many among them do not see themselves) as 'foreign'. As the overwhelming number of people who travelled to West Asia joined the Islamic Khilafa State (IKS), their status in the entity is more of 'naturalized citizens', whose naturalization process is epitomized in the joining of the armed forces of the Islamic Khilafa State. Those, who did not (or could not) join the IKS armed forces, became citizens through pledging allegiance to the khalifa (Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi) and by performing what they themselves regard as compulsory hijra – relocation from the lands of unbelief to the land of Islam under the declared khilafa. The khilafa project initiated by the Islamic State is a unique phenomenon, not only from the point of view of the theories of international relations but also in respect to the classical notions of state formation and nation building, and puts the conceptualization of citizenship in a new light. As such, it poses new challenges not only from the perspective of narrow military security but also from a much broader one, particularly, to the countries, among them European, the citizens of which forsake their original contracts for a new one.
Routinely, people, who have, over the past five years, travelled to Western Asia to settle, are being referred to, in the Western popular discourse, as 'foreign fighters'. Though, admittedly, many among them did join various armed groups, a rather significant part of them did not or even could not have become members of armed groups. This is first of all true of children who travelled with their parents but also young females, in the Western popular parlance pejoratively called 'jihadi brides'. However, even these categories aside, those (young) men who did join armed groups in Syria and Iraq, though they may be identified as 'fighters', may also not be regarded (and certainly many among them do not see themselves) as 'foreign'. As the overwhelming number of people who travelled to West Asia joined the Islamic Khilafa State (IKS), their status in the entity is more of 'naturalized citizens', whose naturalization process is epitomized in the joining of the armed forces of the Islamic Khilafa State. Those, who did not (or could not) join the IKS armed forces, became citizens through pledging allegiance to the khalifa (Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi) and by performing what they themselves regard as compulsory hijra – relocation from the lands of unbelief to the land of Islam under the declared khilafa. The khilafa project initiated by the Islamic State is a unique phenomenon, not only from the point of view of the theories of international relations but also in respect to the classical notions of state formation and nation building, and puts the conceptualization of citizenship in a new light. As such, it poses new challenges not only from the perspective of narrow military security but also from a much broader one, particularly, to the countries, among them European, the citizens of which forsake their original contracts for a new one.
Routinely, people, who have, over the past five years, travelled to Western Asia to settle, are being referred to, in the Western popular discourse, as 'foreign fighters'. Though, admittedly, many among them did join various armed groups, a rather significant part of them did not or even could not have become members of armed groups. This is first of all true of children who travelled with their parents but also young females, in the Western popular parlance pejoratively called 'jihadi brides'. However, even these categories aside, those (young) men who did join armed groups in Syria and Iraq, though they may be identified as 'fighters', may also not be regarded (and certainly many among them do not see themselves) as 'foreign'. As the overwhelming number of people who travelled to West Asia joined the Islamic Khilafa State (IKS), their status in the entity is more of 'naturalized citizens', whose naturalization process is epitomized in the joining of the armed forces of the Islamic Khilafa State. Those, who did not (or could not) join the IKS armed forces, became citizens through pledging allegiance to the khalifa (Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi) and by performing what they themselves regard as compulsory hijra – relocation from the lands of unbelief to the land of Islam under the declared khilafa. The khilafa project initiated by the Islamic State is a unique phenomenon, not only from the point of view of the theories of international relations but also in respect to the classical notions of state formation and nation building, and puts the conceptualization of citizenship in a new light. As such, it poses new challenges not only from the perspective of narrow military security but also from a much broader one, particularly, to the countries, among them European, the citizens of which forsake their original contracts for a new one.
