National Identity, Religion, and Religiosity in Central and Eastern Europe: Types, Patterns, and Correlations

Müller, Olaf; Rosta, Gergely

Abstract

This paper investigates the complex interrelation between national identity and religion in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE), moving beyond binary conceptualizations by integrating multiple forms of national belonging, religiosity, and spirituality. Drawing on data from the Pew Research Center’s Religious Belief and National Belonging in Central and Eastern Europe survey across 16 post-communist countries, we performed a k-means cluster analysis that identifies a robust threefold typology of national identity—nationalist, ethnic, and patriotic—arranged along a continuum from exclusivist to inclusive orientations. The nationalist type combines patriotic pride and respect for the country’s laws and institutions with an emphasis on ethnic origin and cultural superiority, and represents the most exclusionary form of national identification. The ethnic type remains exclusivist through its emphasis on ancestry, but lacks chauvinistic elements. The patriotic type, by contrast, embodies an open, non-exclusivist orientation that links national pride to respect for the country’s laws and institutions, while rejecting ethnic criteria of belonging and chauvinistic positions. Overall, exclusivist understandings of national identity predominate across the region, though their prevalence varies systematically according to confessional context, with nationalist identities particularly widespread in countries with an Orthodox majority. The findings also show that religious dogmatism and institutional religiosity reinforce exclusivist orientations, whereas non-religious, individualistic spirituality aligns rather with inclusive patriotism. The study thus provides an empirically grounded typology and highlights the heterogeneous, non-monolithic character of the religion-nation nexus in CEE.

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