210147 SE BAK15: East European Studies (2019W)

Soviet contempt for religion and the communist government’s attempts to repress it had great consequences for the religious situation in the post-Soviet sphere. Seventy years of anti-religious policies and propaganda left many citizens uninterested in religion and uninformed about its procedures and values. Nonetheless, processes of religious revival and religion’s increased presence in public life have since made the leaders of the now independent states having to practically and ideologically determine the relationship between state and religion.

The course will focus on the role of religion in society and contemporary domestic and foreign politics in the states of the former Soviet Union, with occasional comparative outlooks to other East European countries. It explores the different functions religion plays for various religious and secular actors and how these roles, either real or envisioned, sometimes can be conflicting. The seminar aims to develop the students’ knowledge of the relationship between religion, state and society in the region and to provide them with tools to independently analyze and evaluate ongoing developments in the area. Through discussing matters such as ‘religion as soft power,’ ‘securitization of religion’ and ‘religion in conflict’, students learn to analyze and problematize this complex development using various social science concepts and theories. This will give an understanding of state-religion relations as well as deepen the students’ knowledge about the regional and domestic political situation in these contexts.

The seminar will mainly consist of discussions and exercises in small working groups and sometimes in the class with the purpose of supporting the students to reflect and elaborate on the content of the literature. Prior to each session the students are provided a number of mandatory texts and different tasks in order to prepare for class.