Paul
Goble
Staunton, April 17 – Because of
demographic trends, Muslims are on their way to becoming the dominant group in
Russian life sometime within the next generation or so, and they need to begin
to think about what that will mean and how they should act in anticipation of
that, according to Abdulla Rinat Mukhametov, a Muslim analyst in Moscow.
Mukhametov, an expert advisor at the
Council of Muftis of Russia and the editor of several leading Muslim portals,
lays out his concerns and his ideas about this development in an article on
Ansar.ru entitled “Quantity into Quality: The Muslims of Russia Face the
Challenges of Demography and Migration” (http://www.ansar.ru/analytics/2015/04/14/58832).
His article is important because it
is a rare example of something that is likely to become more common in the
future, Muslim self-confidence about where the Muslims of Russia are heading
and a belief that they must think about how best to use their growing share of
the population to promote their interests as Muslims and as Russians.
The dramatic change in the share of
Muslims in the population of the Russian Federation reflects three trends: the
demographic collapse of the Russian nation, the much higher birthrates among
Russia’s Muslim nations and in particular the influx of migrant workers from
predominantly Muslim countries in Central Asia and the south Caucasus.
Many people, Mukhametov says, have
spoken about “the Russian cross,” the combination of a low birthrate, super
higher mortality rates among adult males, and the large number of abortions,
that has pushed the size of the Russian nation and the overall population of the
country down.
At present, the UN estimates that
the population of Russia will likely fall to 116 million by 2050. And within that population, the share of
Muslims both native born and new immigrants in the population as a whole will
rise from over 20 percent now to nearly 50 percent by mid-century.
While the number and share of ethnic
Russians has been and will continue to fall, he says, the number and share of
Muslims born in Russia will rise. Between 2000 and 2012, for example, the
birthrate in the predominantly Muslim republics of the North Caucasus increased
by 70 percent, setting the stage for “a baby boom” there in the 2020s.
Immigration will play a key role in
the rise of the Muslim community of Russia, Mukhametov says, because about 64
percent of the gastarbeiters now in Russia are from Muslim countries. That
share is projected to remain stable, with many of them becoming Russian citizens
and having children in the Russian Federation.
As a result of all these factors,
Mukhametov says, citing the words of Damir Mukhetdinov, the deputy head of the
Muslim Spiritual Directorate of the Russian Federation, “mass depopulation, the
decline in the share of Russians, the aging of the population, the immigration
flows and the demographic successes of the Muslim people … mean that in the
near term the role of Islam in Russian social and spiritual activity will
essentially grow.”
Some analysts try to minimize this
shift by suggesting that many people from Muslim nations are “ethnic” Muslims,
people whose culture may have been shaped by Islam but who themselves are not
believers. To a certain extent, that is true, Mukhametov says, but people in
Muslim cultures are more attached to their faith than many in other cultures
are to theirs.
Moreover, there is another
phenomenon already seen in Europe that will be true in Russia as well: “Muslim
immigrants are not assimilated finally. At the very least, in the second and
third generations is observed a burst of interest in their identity and its
awakening,” on that is “not so much ethnic as religious.”
But it is not just that the Muslim
community of Russia is becoming larger: it is becoming internally different.
Immigrants are dominating the parishes in many Russian cities, and there are
many unresolved tensions between Muslim gastarbeiters and longtime Muslim
residents in Russia. Indeed, some of the latter even oppose immigration.
Russia’s Muslims must work far hard
than they have to integrate Muslim gastarbeiters into the Russian umma and
Russian society if they are to consolidate the quantitative growth in the
number of Muslims and ensure that it becomes a “qualitative” one that will allow
for real progress and influence, Mukhametov says.
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