Ethnic Identity in Abkhazia and the Paradigms of Its Institutionalization: From the Soviet Past to the Present [Etnicheskaia identichnost’ v Abkhazii i paradigmy ee institutsionalizatsii: ot sovetskogo proshlogo k nastoiashchemu

Abstract

The article focuses on the aspects of nation-building and the main paradigms of the institutionalization of ethnicity in Abkhazia during the Soviet era and assesses the impact of Soviet practices of ordering ethnic categories on the modern ethnocultural and ethnopolitical landscape of the country. I examine the history of formation of the ethnic mosaic of Abkhazia, analyze the particular Abkhazian ways of solving general issues of the early Soviet nation-building, and discuss the influence of Soviet nation-building on the modern identity of various groups of Abkhazia’s population. The article further assesses the impact of ethnic mixing on the shaping of identity of Abkhazia’s population and explores the questions of civil nation-building and multilevel identity.