The International Network in Russian, East European and Eurasian Studies (INREES) is proud to welcome Dr. Renat Bekkin as the speaker at the next INREES seminar on 27 March at 14.00–15.30 at Metsätalo. With 14 monographs and more than 100 peer-reviewed articles, Bekkin is a prestigious guest to have. He shall be presenting his current research on Mirsaid Sultan Galiev’s political ideas and the future of Russian federalism after 24 February 2022.
Mirsaid Sultan-Galiev (1892–1940) was among the most high-ranking Muslim Bolsheviks. He was a member of the board of the People’s Commissariat for Nationality Affairs of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR), a chairman of the Central Muslim Commissariat, and the Central Muslim Military Collegium under the People’s Commissariat for Military and Naval Affairs of the RSFSR as well as the head of the Central Bureau of Communist Organizations of the Peoples of the East under the Central Committee of the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks).
During his career, Sultan-Galiev raised the question of the political, economic and cultural equality of the national republics in the USSR with the Russian regions. He stated that the Soviet Union would not to survive as a single state without resolving the issue of equal rights for all peoples of the USSR. These words were spoken back in the 1920s, but they turned out to be prophetic as increasing amount of politicians from national republics are urging the need to reconsider the existing relations between Moscow and the subjects of the federation under Putin's rule and diminishing freedoms.
Mirsaid Sultan Galiev’s political ideas and the future of Russian federalism
27 March |14.00–15.30 | Metsätalo (Unioninkatu 40), hall C324
Dr. Renat Bekkin
Renat Bekkin holds D.Sc. in Economics (2009), Cand. Sc. in Law (2003), and Ph.D. in Religious Studies (2020). Professor of the Russian Academy of Sciences (2015). In 2002–2014 Bekkin worked as a lecturer at MGIMO University. Senior research fellow (since 2006), then — leading research fellow (since 2020) at the Institute for African Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences. In 2014–2019 he was a Doktorand at Södertörn University. Professor Bekkin was the founder and the head of the Islamic Studies Department at the Kazan Federal University (2010–2014). In 2019–2022 Bekkin worked as a professor at the Institute of Oriental studies, the Herzen State Pedagogical University of Russia. Bekkin is the author of 14 monographs and more than 100 articles published in peer-reviewed journals, including the monographs Insurance in Islamic Law: Theory and Practice (three editions: 2001, 2012, 2015); Islamic Economic Model Nowadays (three editions: 2008, 2009, 2010); The concept of ‘traditional Islam’ in modern Islamic discourse in Russia / ed. by R.I. Bekkin (2020); People of reliable loyalty…: Muftiates and the state in modern Russia (2020).