Islam and Intolerance in Central Asia: The Case of Kyrgyzstan

The article uses individual-level survey data from Kyrgyzstan to focus on the implications of Islamic religious beliefs for political attitudes, particularly political tolerance. Its most general finding is that Islamic belief does not drive intolerance: Muslims are not particularly predisposed to deny the basic political rights of their opponents. Economic factors also have little or no effect upon levels of intolerance. However, substantially lower levels of intolerance are found among Muslims who identify atheists as their least liked group. The results have some implications for interpreting data used to measure intolerance. (Quotes from original text)