The Orthodox Church and Russian Politics

Abstract

Irina Papkova, a professor of international relations at Budapest's Central European University, has written a new book that analyzes post-Soviet church-state affairs in Russia as well as the broader political engagement of the Russian Orthodox Church (ROC). The book pursues a number of objectives, the most important of which are aimed at dispelling the popular notion prevalent in Western media and political analyses that the ROC is a unitary and all-powerful institution “capable of influencing political processes in the Russian Federation” (p. 70). Whether Papkova succeeds in dispelling this notion in the long term remains to be seen, but she has done an admirable job of marshalling all available evidence in making her case. The main virtue of Papkova's study is her portrayal of the ROC as a complex institution not immune to intra-church intrigue, personality clashes, ideological incongruences, and overall difficulty in formulating a coherent political platform on many significant matters of concern. In Papkova's study, special attention is paid to the Moscow Patriarchate (the formal administrative structure of the ROC), its inner workings, and its political lobbying efforts. The patriarchate emerges as an institution that has demonstrated ample political acuity in juggling various contentious groups and moderated significantly the political discourse within the ROC, which has at times vacillated between the rhetorics of extreme right and left. Yet despite its reputed capital with the majority of Russian citizens, the church has not been able to translate this capital into real political gains, despite claims to the contrary.