Imagine an intrepid web explorer looking for information on the Czech Republic. He or she might well stumble onto the SunSITE at the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics at Charles University in Prague. When our websurfer clicks on the “Czech Republic” link, the screen displays the image shown in Figure 1.

The Setus are an ethnic group, small in numbers, in the southeastern part of the Republic of Estonia and the Russian territories bordering on Estonia (Petseri raion of the Pskov oblast). The Setus can be seen as ethnographic raw material that both Estonian and Russian nationalists have attempted to claim. Generally, the Setus has been viewed as an ethnographic subgroup of Estonians and their language as part of the South Estonian dialect. Unlike the Estonians, who are predominantly Lutheran by tradition, the Setus are Orthodox. The specific characteristics of the Setus have emerged as a result of the combined influence of religious and linguistic peculiarities and a historic fate that is different from the Estonian. Because of the fact that they were considered Estonians when the censuses took place, the exact number of the Setus is unknown; however, I estimate the number of the Setus living in Setumaa and in Estonian towns to be about 5,000–6,000.

The demise of the Soviet Union entailed a reconfiguration of the political space and a reforging of collective identities within the boundaries of the new successor states. In the view of Anthony Smith, this was inevitable: “the rediscovery of the national self is not an academic matter, it is a pressing practical issue, vexed, and contentious, which spells life or death for the nationalist project of creating a nation.” Defining the national “self not only accomplishes a symbolic break with the previous political community but also sets out the parameters of statehood with regard to language and minority rights. However, even if the newness of the polity precipitates ”the definition, creation, and solidarification of a viable collective identity,“ this can be anything but straightforward. New states dwell on particularism, that is they look to ”local mores, established institutions, and the unities of common experience—to ‘tradition,’ ‘culture,’ ‘national character,’ or even ‘race’ for the roots of a new identity.“ And yet defining the national particularism may be fraught with inherent difficulties because, as Geertz observed, ”new states tend to be bundles of competing traditions gathered accidentally into concocted political frameworks rather than organically evolving civilizations.“

In June 1996, the newly reconstructed waterfront in Cheboksary, the capital of the Chuvash Republic, was officially opened with a formal ceremony led by the President of the Republic, Nikolai Fedorov, and attended by the Patriarch of All Russia, Alexei II. “We have built a road to the temple,” the President declared. In a literal sense, he was referring to the construction of an embankment leading to one of the city's oldest Orthodox churches. But his phrase had a symbolic meaning as well. Metaphorically the phrase equated the physical reconstruction of the capital city with the cultural and spiritual revival of the Chuvash nation.

Ten years ago, the destruction of totalitarian Soviet society led many to fear that in a country with little experience of democracy, another totalitarian regime would supersede the old one. But which regime, and in what form? The national conflicts that accompanied the disintegration of the Soviet Union suggested a feasible answer right away, namely, a national dictatorship of the fascist sort, composed of nationalistic ideology and a totalitarian social structure. No such dictatorship has occurred in contemporary Russia and none is anticipated in the near future. The “Weimar Russia” scenario, which the political science expert Alexander Ianov developed in such great detail, has not materialized.