Religious References in the Constitutions of European Post-Communist Countries and Ethno-symbolism

In this paper, the relevance of the ethno-symbolist approach for explaining the presence of concrete references to religion(s) in some European post-communist constitutions were examined by way of qualitative content analysis. The key research question was whether the constitutive nature of religion for the national identity was decisive in explaining why such references were made, or whether other circumstances, for instance pointing to pure political instrumentalism, should also be taken into serious consideration. Our research relates to the 23 post-communist European countries referred to at the beginning of the introduction. Some of these countries have an Islamic past, but most hold a Christian one, involving either Eastern Orthodoxy or Western Christianity, whereas Armenia stands out as the only one with a Monophysite, Oriental Orthodox Christian tradition, purportedly also having the oldest Christian state.