Religious Challenges in the Georgian Socio-Political Environment

Salome DUNDUA
Nika GIGAURI^*

Abstract: This study aims to determine which factors drive religious conflict between Georgian Muslims and Orthodox Christians: dogmatic and value differences between the religions or the fear of the dominant religious group that the public performance of religious rituals by the minority will lead to the loss of their dominant position and privileges? The study also aims to analyze the effectiveness of the state’s response in the conflict resolution process. The study is based on a qualitative method, namely ‘case study’. The work purposefully selects and studies the high-profile religious conflicts in modern Georgia in 2010-2013, in particular those that occurred in the village of Nigvziani, the city of Kobuleti, and the village of Chela between the local Georgian Muslim and Orthodox populations. The study showed that state policy is less focused on resolving religious conflicts at the root and is primarily focused on appeasement rather than in-depth resolution. As a result, the study revealed that state institutions are less able to serve as a neutral “arbitrator” in the regulation of religious conflicts. Despite the adoption of numerous laws, decisions, and regulations by the state at the legislative, formalized level, unresolved or difficult-to-resolve issues persist in practice, hindering mutual acceptance and the perception among ethnically Georgian people of different faiths of themselves as one society. Finally, the research process confirms that the concept of the modern Georgian nation was to some extent based on Orthodox identity, leaving people of other faiths outside the Georgian national identity, and, most of all, the ethnically Georgian but religiously Muslim population.

Keywords: Orthodox Georgians, Muslim Georgians, Ethnicity, Challenges, State Role.

Introduction

In the modern world, one of the most fundamental human rights is freedom of religion – a right without which it is inconceivable for a demo­cratic state to exist. Georgia is a di­verse country in terms of ethnicity, culture, and religion. Here, people of different faiths have lived and coex­isted peacefully side by side for cen­turies. In modern Georgia, secularism and complete freedom of belief and religion are legally established by the Georgian Constitution. In particular, “it is inadmissible to persecute a per­son because of his or her faith, reli­gion or conscience, as well as to force him or her to express his or her views on them”¹ . Also, under the Association Agreement with the European Union, as well as the Inter­national Covenant on Civil and Polit­ical Rights and the European Con­vention on Human Rights, the Geor­gian state has undertaken the respon­sibility to take adequate measures to ensure religious freedom, including through effective investigation of cases of restrictions on religious freedom and punishment of perpetra­tors. Despite this, there are still chal­lenges regarding religious tolerance and acceptance of diversity. That is why it is important to determine to what extent the state fulfills its obli­gations. In this paper, we examine religiously motivated conflicts in several regions of Georgia: namely, the village of Nigvziani, the city of Kobuleti, and the village of Chela. The selection of these cases was based on the fact that, in all three cases, religious confrontation oc­curred between followers of different confessions within the same ethnic group, Georgians. It is noteworthy that, despite Georgia being an ethni­cally quite diverse country, which in itself determines religious diversity, religious-based disagreements mainly occur between one dominant ethnic group – Georgians. Our goal in this study is, on the one hand, to investi­gate the specific factors driving reli­gious conflicts between Muslim and Orthodox Georgians and, on the oth­er hand, to examine the extent to which the state can resolve these con­flicts.

Theoretical aspects and research methodology

Georgia, as we have already men­tioned, is a multi-ethnic country from an ethno-confessional perspective. One of its tasks is to create a public space where people of different reli­gions and ethnic backgrounds will feel loyalty to the state². This loyalty largely depends on the existence of intergroup loyalty. Suppose such loy­alty and mutual acceptance are not created between the dominant Ortho­dox Georgians and representatives of other faiths and/or ethnic groups. In that case, it will also be challenging to establish a loyal attitude towards the state. In conditions of reduced loyalty in intergroup relations, state institutions should be strong and, even more, there must be a political will on the part of the state to act as a neutral arbiter and not be seen as a vehicle for the interests of the domi­nant group. In the current reality, im­plementing this practice is not very common. There are numerous studies in Western scientific literature on the formation of intergroup relations in multi-member societies, the process of nation-building, and the role of religion and ethnicity in this process. Anthony Smith³, one of the promi­nent representatives of ethnosymbol­ism, considers religion an important factor in the “myth-symbol” complex of the historical past, a determinant of nations’ modern identity. Accord­ing to Anthony Smith’s definition of ethnicity, “The sacred territory, holy cities, and ancestral religion are of­ten embedded in the ethnic concep­tion and preserved in the national one”⁴. Arnold Toynbee also empha­sizes the role of religion as a con­structive factor in identity. According to his theory of civilizations, religion is one of the main markers of cultural unity and local civilization, identity⁵. Toynbee when speaking of religion as one of the constructive factors, does not mean religion in a dogmatic sense, but rather a system that con­structs a nation from a socio-cultural perspective. John Armstrong also emphasizes the stability and im­portance of religious symbols and believes that this remarkable stability is reflected in their role in maintain­ing ethnic continuity⁶. Ernest Gellner’s views⁷ On nationalism and the origin of nations differ, as he de­velops a modernist theory of the na­tion. According to this theory, na­tionalism arises from the demands of modernization, in which the state seeks to standardize culture. Howev­er, even in this case, if we consider Christianity as one of the most im­portant aspects of culture, we can easily see that, in the political dis­course on building the modern Geor­gian state, the standardization of this culture was primarily based on Chris­tian symbolism⁸. Unlike Gellner, Barth⁹ does not attach importance to cultural commonality for ethnic uni­ty. According to his theory, the main thing is not a common culture, but the boundary by which “us” and “them” are separated from each oth­er. National identity often takes on religious identity structures¹⁰, or, at the very least, national identity itself may be of religious origin¹¹, and it can also become a powerful form of social organization¹². Alternatively, in extreme cases, it may take the form of religious nationalism and serve as the basis for national unity¹³.

Research Methodology

This study is a case study and us­es a qualitative research method. At the first stage, both foreign and Georgian-language scientific litera­ture was studied about the relation­ship between religion and politics, religious diversity, and Georgia’s cur­rent and past experience in this re­gard. In the next stage of the re­search, we analyzed the country’s existing legislative-level normative acts on religious tolerance: the Con­stitution of Georgia, Georgian legis­lation, and government decrees. In the third stage, we conducted a con­tent analysis of news articles from various news agencies and inter­views. Specifically, 35 articles, 13 interviews, and 32 information blogs were analyzed about the cases under study. The studied materials were published in the most popular Geor­gian online publications and agen­cies, such as Radio Liberty, Netgazeti, Publica, Tabula, and GHN. We conducted the research from the perspective of studying spe­cific cases, which means analyzing specific events – religious conflicts – and examining the interdependence among the groups involved. In addi­tion, to answer the research ques­tions, we use another qualitative re­search technique – an expert survey. As part of the research, eight in-depth interviews were conducted with ex­perts on the relationship between re­ligion and politics, representatives of the Agency for Religious Affairs, a conflictologist, and lawyers from the Institute for Tolerance and Diversity. For the expert survey, we used pur­posive, nonprobability sampling, se­lecting respondents based on their qualifications and experience. The selected political scientists and con­flict analysts have experience study­ing these religious conflicts. At the same time, representatives of the State Agency for Religious Affairs and lawyers from the Institute for Tolerance and Diversity were in­volved in regulating and resolving them. The interviews were conducted during the period 2021 September-2022 February.

The study has certain limitations. In particular, it covers only those high-profile religious conflicts that have occurred in modern Georgia, about which court rulings and public defender’s reports already exist, which allowed us to study the role of the state in the conflict management process; therefore, the study does not cover ongoing or unreported reli­gious conflicts. Also, the study does not include ethnically motivated con­flicts, which may have had a reli­gious character, but the main reason for the conflict was ethnic, not reli­gious affiliation. As a limitation, we note that the study includes only con­flicts among ethnic Georgians on religious grounds.

The Question of Georgian Muslims: A Brief Historical Retrospective

As mentioned earlier, the coexist­ence of representatives of different religions side by side has never been foreign to Georgian history. It was also the case in the nineteenth centu­ry, when Georgia ceased to exist as an independent political entity and was annexed by the Tsarist Russian Empire. Although the official policy of Tsarist Russia prioritized Ortho­doxy, in practice, this priority applied only to Russian Orthodoxy. Never­theless, based on centuries-old tradi­tions of ethnic and religious tolerance and coexistence, it remained com­monplace in Georgian society. Espe­cially in Tbilisi, the country’s capital, and other large urban areas, Ortho­dox Georgians, Armenians, Jews, Greeks, and Muslims participated together in public and economic life, engaged in trade and cultural ex­change, and lived side by side in the same public spaces. A clear example of all this is the presence of cult buildings of various denominations – Orthodox churches, a synagogue, a mosque, and a Georgian cathedral – operating side by side on one of Tbi­lisi’s main streets, Kote Abkhazi Street. However, the same cannot be said about relations with ethnically Georgian, but religiously Muslim Georgians. According to the 2014 census, the Muslim population in Georgia is 398,677, of whom 132,852 – mostly ethnic Georgian Muslims – live in the territory of the Autonomous Republic of Adjara, along the Black Sea coast in south­western Georgia¹⁴. The Islamization of the Adjara population dates back to the 16th century, when the territo­ry became part of the Ottoman Em­pire fol­lowing its conquest. Over time, the Christian Adjarians (Geor­gians) under the Ottoman Empire were forced to renounce Orthodoxy and convert to Islam under pressure. The reunification of Adjara with Georgia occurred only in the 19th century, following Russia’s victory in the Russo-Ottoman War of 1877-1878, the Treaty of San Stefano, and the Congress of Berlin. However, taking drastic steps to integrate the Adjara population with the Georgian population was not in the interests of Tsarist Russia – Adjara became part of the Russian Empire, not Georgia (since the latter was already part of the Russian Empire). Such was the idea of ​​the Tsarist imperial policy. Part of this policy was that the Rus­sian government considered the Ad­jarian Georgians not Georgians, but ‘Tatars’, which means Muslims¹⁵. Moreover, they were considered po­litically unreliable because they lived in Ottoman border regions and might be carriers of Ottoman influence.

Throughout Georgia’s centuries-old history, Orthodoxy has been the most important marker that defined being Georgian. One of the main goals of all historical conquerors was to fight against Orthodoxy. During various wars of conquest and inva­sions, the destruction and burning of churches, the killing of clergy, and the forcing of conquered and defeat­ed populations to reject Orthodoxy and convert to Islam were important steps towards this goal. Accordingly, it is logical that Orthodoxy has be­come the most important determining factor of Georgian identity. Given these historical experiences, it is probably not difficult to understand why Georgian society found it diffi­cult to accept and perceive as “one of its own” the ethnically Georgian, Georgian-speaking (Georgian re­mained the language of communica­tion throughout the reunified territory of Adjara) but religiously non-Orthodox Muslims.

On the other hand, the “Muslim” Georgians were also less accepting of Christian Georgians, the ‘Gurjs’. In this regard, the Ottoman Empire did not lack any attempts over the centu­ries. This problem was well under­stood by Georgian thinkers of the second half of the nineteenth century; they did not lack efforts in this direc­tion and did everything within their power to promote the integration of Georgian Muslims. On the one hand, they should raise awareness in this direction among the Georgian popu­lation. On the other hand, they aimed to spread Georgian literacy among the predominantly Muslim popula­tion.

The defining postulate of being Georgian, precisely considering the history of Georgia, was formulated by the famous Georgian writer and public figure, recognized as the father of the nation, Ilia Chavchavadze back in 1863 in the following way: “Who­ever seeks the good of the nation must love its language, its homeland, and its faith, for in the unity of these three lies its soul and life.¹⁶” Alt­hough the reunion with Adjara caused great excitement in Georgian society, the establishment of the per­ception of Muslim Georgians as eth­nic Georgians and not as “Turks” remained a significant problem¹⁷. This reality led to a gradual change in the three hypostases proposed by Chavchavadze: in the letters pub­lished since 1977, “faith” is replaced by the ‘spirit of unity. Moreover, in 1895, he directly emphasizes that the main condition for the nation’s sur­vival is unity: “Language and home­land are dead without unity, but unity is the soul and life of the nation”¹⁸. What could have been the reason for such a transformation? It is clear that the replacement of faith within the triad—homeland, language, and reli­gion—began precisely when the ter­ritory of Adjara was returned to Georgia and, accordingly, the inte­gration of Muslim Georgians into Georgian society became necessary to recognize them as “ours”.

“Well, Georgians, you know how to show yourself to your newly joined brothers! Now you know how to prove to the country the will of your fathers: “A brother is for a brother, for a black day.” Now it will become clear whether this will be an empty word or a full deed for you”¹⁹.

Georgian public figures made significant efforts towards this “full deed” in the 19th century. Georgian enlighteners actively sought to lay the groundwork for unity between Georgian Orthodox Christians and Adjarian Muslims. Georgian news­papers of that period often published the history of the Georgians of Adjara, emphasizing this region as a historical part of Georgia. Freedom of religion is a natural human right, and forced conversion from one reli­gion to another restricts this right. In addition to the distrust among Ortho­dox Georgians, as mentioned above, the matter was further complicated by the fact that, although Muslim Georgians spoke Georgian and pre­served Georgian traditions, folklore, and the institution of the family, they also had little trust in Christian Geor­gians. The spread of education and cultural integration was considered the only and most important way to restore national unity by 19th-century Georgian educators. In this regard, the contribution of Zakaria Chichi­nadze is particularly noteworthy, as he was among the first to promote the dissemination of Georgian books and literature among Georgians. The teaching of the history of Georgia (as a homeland) and the Georgian lan­guage was considered by Z. Chichi­nadze to be the most important work aimed at “awakening the dormant national feelings” among Georgian Muslims²⁰. To achieve this goal, Z. Chichinadze traveled to Adjara for about 10 years, distributing Geor­gian-language books with his own funds. Many Muslim Georgians learned to read and write Georgian thanks to him. However, the overall background of relations between Muslim and Christian Georgians re­mained unfavorable. It is confirmed by the fact that in the 20th century, during the period of Georgia’s inde­pendence (1918-1921), in 1920, a member of the Social Democratic Party, Petre Geleishvili, was sent to Atjara specifically to study the situa­tion of the “Makhmadian Georgians” (the same as “Muslim Georgians”) and to formulate recommendations. The fact that the Constituent Assem­bly of Georgia sent a special repre­sentative on a similar mission during the drafting of the Constitution is a strong indication of the issue’s rele­vance. “They hate us… Unfortunate­ly, we have not done anything that would, if not eradicate this feeling of hatred from the hearts of the people, at least change the attitude of such people towards us²¹” wrote P. Geleishvili to the government of in­dependent Georgia. At a formal level, the 1921 Georgian Constitution rele­gated ethno-cultural and religious differences among the population to the background (Adjara was also granted autonomous status). Reli­gious rights were also enshrined, but this was not implemented in practice. The independent Republic of Georgia lasted only three years and ended on February 1921, due to Bolshevik an­nexation²².

As a result of Sovietiza­tion, a new stage in Georgia’s nation-building emerged. Soviet national­ism, which was based on a primordi­alist understanding of the nation, cre­ated the practice of titular nations and, accordingly, the extreme polari­zation of ethnicity. It is also interest­ing that the Soviet Union was offi­cially based on an atheistic ideology. In reality, this was the state’s control of spiritual independence. In the early stages of the Soviet period, the result of this policy was the massive demo­lition of churches, their destruction, a change of function, and the persecu­tion of clergy with particular cruelty. The goal of the Soviet project was one: the formation of Homo Sovieti­cus, and religion was not a field of interest in this process. Accordingly, the Soviet repressive policy, which, among other things, massively perse­cuted religious institutions (especial­ly in the first stage of the Soviet era), paid no attention to the rapproche­ment of religious differences between the Muslims and Christians. It was not its goal. As Richard Sakva notes, the Soviet man was to be formed as a member of a supranational unity, and in this unity, there was no place for ethnic or even religious ties²³. Ac­cordingly, the result of such 70-year politics was that during the Soviet period, there was practically no reli­gious conflict between Orthodox Georgians and Muslim Georgians (as well as between representatives of other religions). However, this did not mean at all that the concept of religious difference, “ours and oth­ers”, had disappeared somewhere. It soon became apparent after the col­lapse of the Soviet Union.

Religious denominations and formalized institutional relations since 1990th

After the collapse of the Soviet Union and Georgia’s independence (1991), Georgia, like other post-Soviet republics, faced many chal­lenges. Chief among these challenges was the long-standing “tradition” of statelessness, which ultimately influ­enced all subsequent processes. The absence of state institutions, civil war, ethnic and territorial confronta­tion within the country (with Russian intervention and incitement), and the difficult economic and social back­ground have pushed into the back­ground such important issues as the protection of human rights, civic ac­tivism, urban development, and the determination of the political, social, and other rights of members of vari­ous religious groups as all the popu­lation of the country. Accordingly, the issue of religious tolerance, like many other important topics, was neither on the agenda nor could it be. One of the first and most significant steps in state-building was the adop­tion of Georgia’s 1995 Constitution. Article 9 of the Constitution of Geor­gia stipulates that “the state pro­claims complete freedom of belief and religion and declares the inde­pendence of the state and religious associations from each other”²⁴. Thus, in this article, the state clearly establishes a secular model, implying that it is not affiliated with any par­ticular religion and ensuring the equality of all religious communities. Considering the country’s social and cultural realities and historical past, the 2002 Constitutional Agreement (concordat) between Georgia and the Georgian Apostolic Autocephalous Orthodox Church can be considered an important institutional step to­wards establishing a legal frame­work. The Concordat was an attempt to formalize the relationship between the state and the Orthodox Church. This treaty recognized the special role of Orthodoxy and the Church in Georgia’s history, reflected in the granting of special status to the Or­thodox Church. However, at the same time, the document once again con­firms the state’s tolerant policy to­wards other religious denominations living in the country: “The state rec­ognizes the special role of the Geor­gian Orthodox Church in the history of the country, but ensures the free­dom and equality of all other reli­gious associations by law’²⁵.

An important step in regulating legal norms in the field of religion was the determination of the legal status of religious associations in 2011. In particular, following legisla­tive amendments to the Civil Code enacted by the Parliament of Geor­gia, religious associations in Georgia were allowed to register as legal enti­ties under public law (LEPLs). Until 2011, only Orthodox Christians had such a legal status, while other de­nominations (for example, Muslims, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Catholics, Gre­gorians, Jews) functioned as private organizations. This change was an important step towards legal guaran­tees of religious equality and toler­ance. This reform was primarily as­sessed as a progressive step by vari­ous international organizations (the OSCE, Council of Europe, and Am­nesty International). However, inter­national organizations were also con­cerned about the law’s shortcomings and the dangers it poses. One of the shortcomings is the excessively rapid pace of adoption of the changes. For example, the law in question was adopted in five days following three hearings and ‘excludes the possibility of participating in the religious com­munities, and especially the involve­ment of religious minorities in this process’²⁶. The fact that the Orthodox Church continues to enjoy a privi­leged legal and factual position under the amendments, for example, priori­ty in the matter of property restitu­tion, has been considered contrary to the principle of equality in terms of religious tolerance in general²⁷. Although implementing these chang­es creates a legal framework, it can­not eliminate the institutional ine­qualities between different confes­sions²⁸.

One of the shortcomings of Geor­gia’s steps towards religious toler­ance is that the state has never calcu­lated the amount of damage caused to the Orthodox Church during the So­viet period, even though this topic has been repeatedly discussed on the agenda of both the government and opposition parties. As a result, the church’s funding practice is not based on compensation for damages, but on a direct subsidy model. This funding rule also applies to Muslim and Jew­ish communities, the Armenian Ap­ostolic Church, and the Catholic Church. The practice of determining the amount of damage caused during the Soviet period is also not taken into account in this case. Among the problems noted is that, unlike the Orthodox Church, the state fully con­trols the purpose and spending of funding for four religious organiza­tions, which poses a risk of interfer­ence with their autonomy²⁹.

The creation of the State Agency for Religious Affairs in 2014, whose goal is to promote dialogue between the state and religious communities and prevent conflicts, was also met with conflicting assessments. On the one hand, the stated goals of return­ing property lost as a result of repres­sion of religious groups, developing state strategies on education and tol­erance, and participating in dialogues between representatives of different religions in regions characterized by religious conflict can be considered positive; on the other hand, there are also concerns about several aspects of the newly created agency’s man­date. In particular, the establishment of this institution was not preceded by consultations with the Council of Religions under the Public Defender and non-governmental organizations working on issues of religious free­dom. The creation of a non-representative body on religious is­sues, subordinate to the Prime Minis­ter, also carries risks. This practice of creating a centralized state institution carries the risk of arbitrary state inter­ference in the autonomy of religious communities³⁰.

An important step was taken to further strengthen the institutional framework for religious equality in 2021, when, at the initiative of the State Agency for Religious Issues of Georgia and with the support of in­ternational organizations OSCE/ODIHR, UNDP Georgia, and the Council of Europe’s Tolerance and Diversity Program, an interfaith working group was established wit­hin the State Agency for Religious Issues. Moreover, since 2021, an in­terreligious working group has been operating with the agency, with a format more akin to a consultative platform between the state and reli­gious communities.

In conclusion, since 1995, the Georgian state has established a leg­islative and institutional framework to ensure religious freedom and the principle of tolerance. Despite short­comings in the legislation, the steps taken to establish a legal framework for religious equality can be assessed as a positive development. At the legal level, the rights of all religious groups are recognized and protected.

Case study: Overview

of challenges

Nigvziani village incident. The village of Nigvziani is located in the Guria region. 35% of the population consists of eco-migrants who settled from Atjara in the 1970s and again in the late 1980s, many of whom identi­fy as “Georgian Muslims”³¹. During the Soviet period, religious differ­ences did not become (at least open­ly) a cause of religious conflict (as we have already mentioned above, this was facilitated, on the one hand, by the mass repressions of the Soviet government at the initial stage, in­cluding the suppression of religious services, and on the other hand, by the established policy of atheism). After gaining independence, the peaceful coexistence of the Christian and Muslim populations continued for more than two decades. However, in 2010, a conflict between them on religious grounds took place for the first time. According to the Public Defender of Georgia, the conflict was sparked by the Muslims’ desire to open a chapel. According to the local mufti, the district municipality again opposed the plan. It offered to organ­ize transportation for Muslims to Kobuleti (a nearby city) instead of the mosque so that they could pray there. However, instead of a mosque, Muslims opened a public chapel in a private house where Georgian Mus­lims prayed every Friday. This con­troversy was not widely covered and, accordingly, did not cause a nation­wide response. However, the conflict soon continued, and in 2012, on the holiday of Bayram, after the end of Friday prayers, 150 Christians blocked the road for Muslims and demanded the closure of the chapel³². Finally, as a result of meetings held at the village council involving vari­ous institutions, the parties agreed that no new religious buildings would be built without permission, but that Muslims would be allowed to use their place of worship. As a result, the conflict was stabilized to some extent, and the Muslim population of Nigvziani was granted the right to pray.

The Kobuleti Incident. Another high-profile incident of conflict be­tween Georgian Muslims and Chris­tians occurred in Kobuleti. Kobuleti is the second largest city in the Adjara region, where the majority of the population (unlike the mountain­ous villages of Adjara) is Christian. In 2014, ethnic Georgian Orthodox Christians, the dominant religious group, protested the construction of a Muslim school in Kobuleti and hung a severed pig’s head on the building’s door. The aforementioned action elic­ited a strong response from Muslims living in Georgia and representatives of civil society. A case was opened under Article 151 of the Criminal Code, i.e., threats³³.

Regarding this incident, the Geor­gian Patriarchate issued a statement, according to which the incident in Kobuleti is a gross insult to the reli­gious feelings of Muslim believers and such an act is unacceptable for both Christianity and any traditional religion. However, the Patriarchate representative also stated that the construction of an Islamic boarding school, whose religious purpose is beyond doubt, was carried out against the will of the absolute major­ity of the population, which could not be morally justified. On the other hand, in the same statement, the Pa­triarchate assessed the action in ques­tion – hanging a pork roast on the door of a Muslim – as a provoca­tion³⁴. At this stage, the mosque in Kobuleti is still not officially func­tioning.

The case of the Village of Chela. Finally, the study included a conflict that occurred in the village of Chela, Chechla community, Adigeni munic­ipality, Samtskhe-Javakheti region. The village of Chela is also mixed in terms of religion, with both the local Orthodox population and eco-migrants from Adjara living there. The confrontation between Orthodox and Muslim Georgians began in July 2013, when local Muslims installed a minaret next to a mosque. The local Muslim community believes that a minaret is a necessary attribute of a mosque. Followers of Islam believe that the construction of a minaret will not restrict the rights of Christian neighbors, because from this place neither the mullah will call the faith­ful to prayer, nor will anyone be dis­turbed by loudspeakers³⁵. However, the construction of this mosque was mainly carried out in violation of le­gal norms. “They had no intention of erecting the minaret and explained this by saying that they could not obtain such a permit, since there is no law that defines the rules for the con­struction of a mosque,” ​​says a repre­sentative of the Tolerance Center in an interview³⁶. In addition, as it turns out, the minaret was imported from Turkey to Georgia. The Muslim resi­dents of Chela explain this by saying that it would not have been possible to manufacture it in Georgia (they even collected 9,000 dollars for the minaret), so they placed the order in Turkey³⁷.

The Adigeni City Council ruled that the construction of the minarets was illegal without the local authori­ties’ permission, and fined the land­owner 200 GEL and ordered the structure dismantled. When the gov­ernment began dismantling the mina­ret amid clashes with local Muslims, it was assumed that government offi­cials were implementing the city council’s decision. However, the Ministry of Finance’s Revenue Ser­vice was formally behind the disman­tling, stating that it acted for an ex­amination to determine whether the weight and commodity code of the minaret structure corresponded to the data declared at customs during its import to Georgia from Turkey in July³⁸.

Religious Conflict: Causes

and Mediation

The results of research revealed that in the cases studied, representa­tives of the dominant religious group, Georgian Orthodox Christians, had no problem with Islam as a religion. For example, the Orthodox popula­tion of the village of Nigvziani said in interviews with various local me­dia outlets that they lived peacefully with their Muslim neighbors and did not want a mosque in their village. They urged Muslims to pray not in public, but in their own homes. If there were a functioning Christian chapel in the village, where Orthodox Christians could pray publicly, the question arises: why couldn’t Mus­lims do the same in a mosque? How­ever, the only argument justifying this attitude was that the Orthodox represented the majority of the rural population³⁹. Also in the village, Chela, there had never been religious conflict between Muslim and Ortho­dox Georgians before the incident discussed in the study. As the inves­tigation revealed, despite their reli­gious differences, good-neighborly relations always existed between them. Moreover, as one of the Mus­lim Georgians noted, they even helped their Orthodox villagers build the church. An Orthodox resident of Chela also confirms this. “Yes, that is true. They brought stone and other materials in their own vehicles. We were like brothers. There was no con­flict between us in life; we had a per­fect relationship”⁴⁰. Moreover, as is clear from the statement issued by the Council of National Minorities under the Public Defender of Georgia re­garding the aforementioned confron­tation, no Georgian Orthodox signed the request from one of the initiative groups to demolish the mosque. Moreover, the entire village, includ­ing the Christian Chela residents, followed the people beaten and ar­rested as a result of the conflict dur­ing the demolition of the minarets in Akhaltsikhe (the central city in the region)⁴¹.

The study also revealed fascinat­ing facts about the government’s in­volvement in the conflicts under study. On the one hand, in all three cases considered, the government is quite passive in resolving the con­flict; on the other hand, representa­tives of local government are, to some extent, considered instigators of the conflict. As the Muslim popula­tion of the village of Nigvzinai states, for example, in their case, the nega­tive involvement of a local govern­ment representative, the village gov­ernor, was an obvious fact:

“They tell us that since we settled in Guria, we have to convert to Christi­anity. Two years ago, when the disa­greement first arose, the district gov­ernor, Gia Goguadze, also intervened. Goguadze also cared about our Chris­tianization. We are working because we have to convert you to Christiani­ty. During my term as governor, there was no mosque, and there will never be one”⁴².

We can also speak about the dis­criminatory treatment of Muslim Georgians by the authorities in the pre-conflict period in the case of Kobuleti. City Hall restricted the wa­ter supply to a religious school in Kobuleti. However, in the same Kobuleti case, another state structure, the court, partially satisfied the claim of the chairman of the “Georgian Muslim Relations”. Individuals were ordered to eliminate ongoing dis­criminatory practices in order to en­sure the unrestricted use of property in Kobuleti, including the opening and operation of a boarding house for Muslim students in the building. It meant the termination of the plain­tiffs’ and persons associated with the boarding house’s enjoyment of prop­erty rights, their freedom of entry into the boarding house, and their freedom of movement in the sur­rounding area of ​​the building⁴³. Georgian Muslims consider the local government and its initiative to be one of the actively involved parties in the confrontation that took place in the village of Chela. The Adigeni City Council decided to demolish the minarets after a part of the local Or­thodox community collected signa­tures. However, even in the face of the demolition of the minaret and the resulting conflict, part of the same Georgian Orthodox population states that they had no problem with the existence of the minaret, and when collecting signatures, the issue was not the dismantling of the minaret, but rather the fact that prayers were not loud and did not disturb the rest of the population. As one representa­tive of the Orthodox community stat­ed, “If it does not bother anyone, why shouldn’t it be there? It should be there. The minaret was standing there, and nothing bothered me. I do not even know what a minaret repre­sents”⁴⁴. The respondents interviewed during the research process also point to this type of involvement by the government and the dangers of a one-sided approach, believing that in re­gions such as Adigeni and the village of Chela in particular, where there is a threat of inciting conflict on reli­gious grounds, it is entirely unac­ceptable for the government to com­mit such actions and, accordingly, to some extent, provoke conflict⁴⁵.

Another interesting fact emerged during the research process: in the case of the village of Chela, one ar­gument for dismantling the minaret was that it had been imported from Turkey. It is also interesting that the local government used this argument. As one of the respondents noted, the state’s dismantling of the minaret was clearly linked to its construction by a foreign country⁴⁶. The state’s pas­sivity is clearly evident in its approach to conflict resolution. On the one hand, for example, in the village of Nigvziani, the police did not inve­stigate individual violations of the law and failed to ensure effective investigations⁴⁷. On the other hand, it indirectly entrusts the solution of the problem to the clergy, thus failing to demonstrate the state’s function as the exclusive guarantor of human rights. “The state often fails to be impartial and enforce the law, which then allows some groups to place themselves above the law, along with frequent political provocations and the use of religious immorality to score political points with the religious majority”⁴⁸.

Conclusion

Thus, the analysis of the research results shows that, despite the his­torical tradition of tolerance, religious conflicts still occur among local communities in modern Georgia. In a religiously diverse settlement, citizens coexist peacefully until representatives of the religious minority demand the public expression and enforcement of their beliefs, which then provokes protests from the religiously dominant gro­up⁴⁹. During the research process, it was revealed that the conflict takes on an overt character in the construction of cult religious temples. Even though Muslim Georgians in the studied cases do not deny or hide their religion and openly follow their own faith and defend the dogmas defined by it, the dominant religious group confronts the religious minority on religious grounds precisely when they decide to build a cult temple.

In fact, the research process has shown that the incitement of religious conflicts among the local population in Georgia is not caused by the dogmatic and value differences between religions, but by the fear of the dominant religious group that the public performance of religious rituals by the minority will lead to the loss of their dominant position and privileges.

On the other hand, in religiously motivated conflicts, state policy is fo­cused not on resolving them funda­mentally, but on temporarily stopping them (pacifying them). Moreover, often the harsh steps taken by the state itself lead to the intensification of conflicts between Orthodox and Muslim citizens. State institutions fail to fulfill their role as a neutral “arbitrator” in the regulation of religious conflicts. It is noteworthy that the judicial branch of government, when making decisions, takes into account the fundamental human rights recognized by the Constitution of Georgia and inter­national law. However, the main problem is the implementation of court decisions. Local authorities, as a rule, create procedural obstacles for religious minorities and demonstrate bias towards the dominant religious group.

The research process confirms that the concept of the modern Georgian nation was, to some extent, based on Orthodox identity, which excluded people of other faiths from Georgian national identity, and, most of all, the ethnically Georgian but religiously Muslim population. The study clearly showed that the last component of the triad of homeland, language, and unity – what Ilia Chavchavadze and 19th-century Georgian educators considered one of the most important aspects of the nation-building process – has not been fully achieved, even in modern Georgia. The study showed that the leading cause of conflicts between Muslim and Christian Georgians is the cultural-symbolic narrative based on Christianity, which often portrays Muslim Georgians as an outgroup. In conclusion, despite the legal esta­blishment of the ideas of religious equality and civic nationalism, there is still a religious division: “us” and “them” in modern Georgia’s socio–political life, which causes some challenges to the ideas of tolerance and equality in practice.

Notes

^*    The grammar check of the article was conducted using Grammarly.

• Constitution of Georgia, Chapter Two, Article 16, 1995.
• Dundua, Z. Abashidze, ‘Etnic and Religious Identities and Civic Integration Issues in Georgia, Tbilisi, 2009.
• D. Smith, The Ethnic Origins of Nations, B. Blackwell, 1987.
• Idem, Chosen Peoples: Sacred Sources of National Identity, Oxford University Press, 2004, p. 18.
• J. Toynbee, Civilization on Trial, Oxford University Press, 1954.
• A. Armstrong, Nations Before Nationalism, Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1982.
• Gellner, Nations and Nationalism, Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1983.
• It is beyond the scope of this study to discuss in detail the role of Christianity in Georgia’s historical past and/or in the process of building a modern state. However, one argument in support of this view is that, as early as the 9th century, the Georgian writer Giorgi Merchule defined ‘Kartli’ (which means Georgia) as the territory where liturgies are performed in Georgian.
• Barth, Ethnic Groups and Boundaries: The Social Organization of Cultural Difference, Oslo: Universitetsforlaget, 1969.
• Calhoun, Nationalism, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1997.
• Hastings., The Construction of Nationhood: Ethnicity, Religion and Nationalism, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1997.
• Van der Veer, Religious Nationalism: Hindus and Muslims in India. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994,
• Juergensmeyer, The New Cold War? Religious Nationalism Confronts the Secular State, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993.
• National Statistics Agency of Georgia, https://www.geostat.ge/ka/modules/categories/739/demografiuli-da-sotsialuri-makhasiateblebi.
• Bubulashvili, „ზაქარია ჭიჭინაძე-აჭარის გულშმატკივარი”, Proceedings of the International Scientific Conference dedicated to the 160th anniversary of Zakaria Chichinadze, June 27-29, 2014, p. 10.
• Chavchavadze, ‘ორიოდე სიტყვა თავად რევაზ შალვას ძის ერისთავის კაზლოვის მიერ „შეშლილის” თარგმანზედა’, 1860, publicist letters, issue 3, 2012, p. 12.
• Dundua, ‘Nationalism and the issue of nation-building in the nineteenth century’s Georgian political thought’, Przegląd Narodowościowy/ Review of Nationalities, no. 8, 2018.
• Chavchavadze, ‘ძალა და ერთობა’, 1895, publicist letters, issue 4, 2012.
• Idem, ‘შინაური მიმოხილვა’, publicist letters, Tbilisi, 1955, issue 5, p. 32.
• Bubulashvili, „ზაქარია ჭიჭინაძე-აჭარის გულშემატკივარი”, Proce­edings of the International Scientific Conference dedicated to the 160th anniversary of Zakaria Chichinadze, June 27-29, 2014.
• Geleishvili, Political situation in Adjara, (1920), პეტრე გელეიშვილის მოხსენებითი ბარ-ათი საქართველოს დემოკრატი-ული რესპუბლიკის მთავრობის თავმჯდომარეს, 1920 წლის 8 ოქტომბერი, editor M. Vachnadze, Intelekti, 1998, p.7.
• Dundua, Z. Abashidze, Ethnic and Religious Identities and Civic Integration Issues in Georgia, Tbilisi, 2009.
• Sakva., Soviet Politics, an Introduction, Routlage, London and New-York, 1989.
• Constitution of Georgia, Article 9, 1995.
• The Constitutional Agreement between the Georgian state and the Apostolic Autocephalous Orthodox Church of Georgia, 2002, Patriarchate of Georgia, https://patriarchate.ge/, (accessed on October 10, 2025.
• Latatia, Georgia adopts a new law on the status of religious organiza­tions, Published: September 26, 2011 https://humanrightshouse.org/articles/georgia-adopts-a-new-law-on-the-statu-s-of-religious-organizations/, (accessed September 23, 2025).
• Report on International Religious Fre-edom – Georgia, Bureau of Democra-cy, Human Rights, and Labor. July 30, 2012, https://www.refworld.org/refe-rence/annualreport/usdos/2012/en/89425, (accessed September 22, 2024).
• Joint statement of the Council of Religions under the Public Defender and NGOs regarding the State Agency for Religious Affairs, 2014, May, 5, https://tdi.ge/ge/statement/ saxalxo-damcveltan-arsebuli-religiata-sabchosa-da-arasamtavrobo-organizaciebis-ertoblivi, (accessed on October 1, 2025).
• Human Rights Education and Moni-toring Center, „სეკულარიზმის კრიზისი და ლოიალურობა დო-მინანტური ჯგუფის მიმართ,” 2013.
• Joint statement of the Council of Religions under the Public Defender and NGOs regarding the State Agency for Religious Affairs, 2014, May, 5 (https://tdi.ge/ge/statement/ saxalxo-damcveltan-arsebuli-religia-ta-sabchosa-da-arasamtavrobo-orga-nizaciebis-ertoblivi, (accessed on Oc-tober 1, 2025).
• Human Rights Education and Monitoring Center, „სეკულა-რიზმის კრიზისი და ლოიალ-ურობა დომინანტური ჯგუფის მიმართ”, 2013.
• Annual Report of the Public Defender of Georgia, “The Situation of Human Rights and Freedom in Georgia”, 2017. file:///C:/Users/user/ Downloads/Public%20Defender%20-%20Human%20Rights%20Report%20-%202017.pdf (accessed on October 10, 2025)
• Ibidem.
• GHN (Online publication), “The Patriarchate assesses the religious confrontation in Kobuleti as a provo-cation”. 2014 წ. 11 სექტემბერი, https://ghn.ge/news/114458-sapatriar-ko-kobuletshi-momkhdar-religiur-da-pirispirebas-provokatsiad-afasebs?-utm_source=chatgpt.com, (accessed on September 25, 2025).
• In-depth Interview, 4, 2021.
• Idem, 8, 2022.
• Netgazeti, შეკითხვები მინარეთის დემონტაჟთან დაკავშირებით – რეპორტაჟი სოფელ ჭელადან, 2013, 28 August, https://netgazeti.ge/ news/24878/?utm_source=chatgpt.com (accsessed on September 28, 2025) .
• Annual Report of the Public Defender of Georgia, The Situation of Human Rights and Freedom in Georgia, 2017. file:///C:/Users/user/ Downloads/Public%20Defender%20-%20Human%20Rights%20Report%20-%202017.pdf (accessed on October 10, 2025).
• In-depth Interview No. 1, 2021.
• Netgazeti, შეკითხვები მინარეთის დემონტაჟთან დაკავშირებით – რეპორტაჟი სოფელ ჭელადან, 2013 , 28 August, https://netgazeti.ge/ news/24878/?utm_source=chatgpt.com (accessed on September 28, 2025).
• Tabula (online oublication), ‘უმცირ-ესობები: მნიშვნელოვანია სახე-ლმწიფომ ობიექტურად გამოი-ძიოს მომხდარი’, 30 August, 2013, (https://tabula.ge/ge/news/555472um-tsiresobebi-mnishvnelovania-sakhel-mcipom, (accessed on October 3, 2025).
• Radio Liberty, (online publication) ‘რელიგიური დაპირისპირება ნიგვზიანში’, 2012, 1 November, https://netgazeti.ge/news/17194/, (accsessed on October 4, 2025).
• In-depth Interview No. 1, 2021.
• Netgazeti (online piblication), „შეკი-თხვები მინარეთის დემონტაჟ-თან დაკავშირებით – რეპორტაჟი სოფელ ჭელადან”, 2013, 28 Au-gust, https://netgazeti.ge/news/2487-8/?utm_source=chatgpt.com (accsessed on September 28, 2025)
• In-depth Interview No. 5, 2021.
• In-depth Interview No. 7, 2022.
• Human Rights Monitoring Report, 2017. https://socialjustice.org.ge/uploads/products/pdf/Raport_1537452439.pdf (accessed October 20, 2025).
• In-depth Interview No. 2, 2021.
• Tsagareishvili, „რელიგიის თავისუფლება საქართველოში”, Human Right Center, Tbilisi, 2015, http://humanrights.ge/admin/editor/uploads/pdf/%E1%83%90%E1%83%9C%E1%83%92%E1%83%90%E1%83%A0%E1%83%98%E1%83%A8%E1%83%98_%E1%83%A5%E1%83%90%E1%83%A0%E1%83%97%E1%83%A3%E1%83%9A%E1%83%98-%E1%83%A1-%E1%83%90%E1%83%91%E1%83%9D%E1%83%9A%E1%83%9D%E1%83%9D.pdf (accessed on Sepetember 1, 2025).

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