Mansour Kildeyev The Level of Muslim Religiosity in the Middle Volga and Ural Regions According to Soviet Sociological Surveys (1966 - 1991) Mansour Kildeyev - Leading Researcher, Scientific Center for Safety Research (Kazan, Russia). tegel76@yahoo.de This article explores the methods and results of the research of Muslim religiosity in the Middle Volga and Ural regions in the late Soviet Union. The article draws upon the sociological surveys conducted in 1966-1991. These surveys revealed some interesting trends that did not correspond to ideological objectives and expectations. The article also demonstrates regional specifics of the Soviet sociological school and its relationship with the ideological authorities. The surveys of religiosity of the Soviet population were, in a sense, a vote of confidence to the official ideology. Keywords: religiosity, Islam in the USSR, atheism, atheistic education, social surveys, the Council for Religious Affairs. The main function of sociological research on religion and atheism in the USSR, as now in Russia, was to study the level of religiosity, that is, to establish the relationship in society between the carriers of religious and non-religious consciousness. In the USSR up to the end of the 1980s, sociological studies of the religiosity of the NACE- The publication was prepared with the financial support of the Russian Foundation for Scientific Research (project N 12 - 03 - 18003). page 131The research was conducted not by specialized sociological institutes, but by the Institute of Scientific Atheism at the Academy of Social Sciences of the Central Committee of the CPSU, the highest party educational institution. The results did not reach the scientific community, as they were published not in scientific journals, but in closed bulletins. The use of selective sociological research methods has become an alternative to departmental accounting of information related to the activities of religious societies operating in accordan ... Читать далее