For Putin and for Sharia: Dagestani Muslims and the Islamic State By Iwona Kaliszewska. Translated by Arthur Barys. Ithaca, NY: Northern Illinois University Press, an imprint of Cornell University Press, 2023. 168 pp.

The book, authored by Iwona Kaliszewka, offers a comprehensive account of the development of Islamism in Dagestan in the 21st century, delving into the challenges and complexities arising from the collapse of the Soviet Union. While addressing well-studied academic topics like terrorism and Islamism, Kaliszewka challenges simplistic narratives by immersing herself in meticulous ethnographic inquiry, exploring the intricate layers of Dagestan's multiethnic, religious, and linguistic landscape. The book's strength lies in its extensive multiyear fieldwork conducted in a highly volatile environment, where the author confronted a myriad of ethical, logistical, and security challenges. Despite Dagestan's reputation as “the most dangerous place in Europe,” and despite Russia's bureaucratic, ironfisted response to jihadist insurgency, Kaliszewka not only interviewed people in Dagestan but did so consistently over nearly a decade. The exceptional nature of her fieldwork is matched only by her counterintuitive argument, highlighting the unexpected interplay between Sharia law and Islamism, nostalgia for the Soviet Union, and the policies of Vladimir Putin's Russia. Kaliszewka adeptly underscores the challenges faced by Dagestanis after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, which led to the cessation of modernization efforts and a lack of cohesive social projects for economic and social development. She illuminates the deep-seated nostalgia for the Soviet era among Dagestanis, including the Stalinist period, and explores the intriguing connection forged between the Soviet past and the newly adopted aspirations for an Islamic state governed by Sharia law. Through her fieldwork, Kaliszewka demonstrates how Islamization is perceived as a logical progression from socialism, offering an alternative to the tumultuous capitalism experienced in the 1990s, while also seeking to preserve Dagestan's cultural identity, social morality, and traditional way of life. In addition to challenging conventional narratives, Kaliszewka's research offers a nuanced perspective on Islam in Dagestan, transcending the traditional dichotomy between state-sanctioned Islam and perceived “nontraditional” forms such as Wahhabism and Salafism. Through her interviews and vignettes, she traces the evolution of attitudes toward Wahhabism and nontraditional Islam in Dagestan. From moral and social panic in her early fieldwork to social acceptance of Islamic diversity in the context of a jihadist insurgency, the book reveals a complex interplay of social dynamics and lived experiences among Dagestanis. By interrogating the concept of new Muslims in the Caucasus, Kaliszewka shows how Islam in Dagestan has more to do with individuals and their own lived experience than clear categories delineating Islam. The book shows the eclectic and heterogeneous experience of people as Muslims in Dagestan, describing the vast array of Islamic practices. Rather than presenting the discourse surrounding the development of a unitary Islamic State in Dagestan focused on a social and violent revolution, Kaliszewka's book depicts it as a gradual and consequential project understood very differently by Islamists. This analysis is a breath of fresh air in a scholarly literature saturated by research focusing on the creation of the so-called Islamic State in Syria and Iraq, its extremist propaganda, and its resonance in the North Caucasus. At the same time, the book provides a multifaceted examination of terrorism in Dagestan, moving beyond a narrow security-focused lens to explore the broader sociopolitical and cultural implications of counterterrorism. From the description of the everyday encounters of terrorism and counterterrorism in the life of Dagestanis to the manufacturing of counterterrorism as racketeering and a business venture, the author expands the understanding of violence and terrorism to a whole different perspective. The many vignettes and field-based stories underline the lived experience of Dagestanis facing the challenges of living in a war-torn republic. The book avoids the pitfall of strictly focusing on extraordinary phenomena such as the rise of the Islamic State or the wave of suicide bombings. It provides an anthropologically rich description of the complexity of Dagestan and its dysfunctional sociopolitical system. Kaliszewka walks the reader through the slippery slope of conducting fieldwork in Dagestan, resulting from her insider as well as outsider perspectives as a foreigner with extensive local networks. The author demonstrates how intensive ethnographic research in Dagestan has uncovered a changing perspective on the role of Islamic law, the understanding of insurgent mobilization and local support, the role of security forces, and the overall perception of hope and the future in the North Caucasus republic. She shows that there is a thin line between the normalization process of living in a perpetual counterterrorist environment and its impact on research and moral dilemmas. Overall, the book offers a nuanced and complex depiction of Dagestan, setting the stage for a better understanding of the social landscape and political dynamics of the rise and consolidation of Islamism in the republic. Connecting the collapse of the Soviet Union with Dagestan's Islamic revival and the rise of a jihadist insurgency in the region, Kaliszewka provides a rich and detailed analysis of life in the peripheries of the Russian republic. The richness of the author's ethnographic material and the analysis will make this book a reference for scholars studying the influence of the Islamic State in the North Caucasus, Islamism in the post-Soviet period, and the growing trend of decolonization initiated by the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine.

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