Religious, National Cultural and Territorial Forms of Autonomy for Muslims in the Volga-Ural Region from the End of the Eighteenth through the Beginning of the Twenty First Centuries

Abstract

In his article Aydar Khabutdinov gives a historical analysis of three forms of autonomous regimes set up for Muslims in the Volga-Ural region under the imperial and socialist rules. In 1788-1917 they were granted with a limited religious autonomy in the framework of the Orenburg Mohammedan Spiritual Assembly as an official umbrella association established for all the Muslims in the region. This form was substituted with national cultural autonomy under the rule of Milli Idare government in a short period between the February Revolution of 1917 and the end of 1919. From the 1920s onward territorial autonomy became the principal form of the regional organization in Soviet Russia. Nowadays none of these forms is representative for the majority of Muslim population what leads to vacuum of power in the region.