AVETIK CHALABYAN: “IT IS IMPORTANT TO REASSESS THE NATIONAL TRAJECTORY”
Avetik Chalabyan
Interviews | March 16, 2015 14:46
exclusive
On the threshold of the Armenian Genocide Centennial, Mediamax
continues a series of interviews with the intellectuals of Armenia
and the Diaspora. It is an attempt to collect opinions as to whether
the Armenian Genocide Centennial will serve a certain “New Beginning”
for Armenians or not.
Our today’s interlocutor is the Co-Founder of Repat Armenia Foundation
Avetik Chalabyan.
– What is the meaning of the Armenian Genocide Centennial for you?
– We shouldn’t focus too much on the Centennial. It’s only a
milestone in the 3000-year-old history. Though, given the historical
and geopolitical context of the Centennial, it’s probably a good
occasion to look back on our path over the past 100 as well as 25
years, and try to reassess our national trajectory.
– Should we strive to have a single trajectory for the Diaspora and
Armenia, or can they be different with some common focal points?
– First of all, it’s important to clarify the definition of “the
national” as we often confuse national with the ethnic. The national is
a common living area, common historical destiny, common future, goals
and aspirations, a common political, economic and cultural system,
common society. The national consists of all these common elements,
although for us, Armenians, it’s not confined to a single country,
Armenia.
Not all ethnic Armenians, living in the world now, make part of the
national system, and even have such a desire. A considerable part of
ethnic Armenians left the system; they are trying not to be associated
with the national system and are in a process of gradual assimilation.
It’s hard to say what will happen to them in 100 years – a large part
of them will be totally assimilated, while some others will move from
mere ethnic identity to the national one. Our goal should be increasing
the number of the second group at the expense of the first one.
The national system hinges on Armenia, Artsakh and all the overseas
Armenian institutions (I don’t use the word “Diaspora” on purpose)
which associate them with that system. For instance, the Armenian
General Benevolent Union (AGBU) which is created, funded and managed by
the Armenians of the Western world, has recently come to realize that
their activities should be based on the national system – national
educational and governmental institutions, army and everything that
keeps the nation together.
Similarly, Repat Armenia Foundation, where I have been one of the
founders, is a purely national institution. Some of the founders are
from Russia, some from Western countries, and the others come from
Armenia. But we all are united with a single vision of developing the
national system. In particular, we are convinced that repatriation
should make a pivotal element of national development, and it should
be clearly managed to make it more attractive for each repatriating
family. Repatriating individuals and their families shouldn’t suffer
from repatriation, vice versa, they should benefit personally – only in
this case they will consciously become a part of the national system.
– What can be done to considerably improve Armenia-Diaspora
cooperation?
– I think that the claims that cooperation between Armenia and Diaspora
institutions is not successful are not necessarily true.
There are many successful projects and initiatives in Armenia now which
resulted from cooperation between Armenian and Diaspora institutions
and individuals. Cafesjian Museum, Zvartnots Airport, TUMO Center,
Ayb School, UWC Dilijan and others are vivid examples.
As we are engaged in repatriation program, we also deal with the real
numbers and see that every year around 2 000 Armenian families move to
Armenia, without taking into account the additional inflows, caused
by the war in Syria. In that sense, Armenia-Diaspora interaction is
already quite dynamic. Of course, we all would like to have it on a
larger scale and see more sizable results, but what we have now is
already giving some promise.
– Why is Armenia not attractive for the Diaspora now?
– Currently, Armenia is not a “promised land” for the Diaspora
Armenians, as it’s in a tough geopolitical and economic situation –
which by the way is a direct outcome of the Genocide.
The Genocide was aimed at depriving the Armenians of the platform for
their national development – first and foremost, a self-sufficient
territory and sizable material resources. Modern Republics of Armenian
and Artsakh make only 15% of our historic homeland. We lost the
remaining 85% before the Genocide and as a result of it.
Consequently, we now have a country with rather small, landlocked
territory and limited resources, which doesn’t seem to be attractive
and capable of ensuring prosperous and secure life for all Armenians.
But there is an interesting peculiarity we have observed recently.
When the war started in Syria, the majority of Syrian Armenians first
would not even want to hear about moving to Armenia. But afterwards,
when more than a half of the Syrian Armenian community left the
county, over 1/3 of them actually moved to Armenia. That means that
under certain historic conditions, the previously unattractive may
became relatively appealing. We should still make plenty of efforts
to see this repatriation experience becoming successful, unlike the
Soviet-era inflows when the majority of the repatriates didn’t adjust
to the new life conditions – however, the first precedent is set now,
and it is an important one.
Of course, you can ask why American Armenians don’t return to Armenia
en masse. Indeed, we should be realistic and understand that in case
of coming back to Armenia they will immediately loose at least 80%
of their well-being. Thus, it is unlikely that hundreds of thousands
of American Armenians will suddenly return to Armenia. Despite it,
there is a constant inflow, especially among young people, from the
U.S. and Canada. Before repatriation, they make serious efforts to
build sound starting platform in Armenia, and this is not easy. Yet
the flow exists – several hundred individuals each year, and it gives
hope that we can expect more in case conditions on the ground improve.
– What should be the role of Genocide in our lives after the
Centennial?
– We have a bit mystified notion of the Genocide. We generally narrate
our history from a very Armenian-centric viewpoint, which is also
an issue on its own. For instance, when we claim that we gained a
“moral victory” at Avarayr battle, we rarely ask ourselves – what
did it mean to Persia and how the process of proselytism went on
afterwards in the empire? We are simply not interested in exploring it.
As for the Genocide, we are only concerned with our huge losses and
pain. Why and in what historic context did it happen? We often dodge
this question, yet here where we should also look for the answers.
The Genocide was our failure to shake off the colonial rule, and our
massive geopolitical defeat. The Ottoman Empire’s decline had dated
back to the early 19th century whereupon various former parts such as
Egypt and the Balkan states, gradually disintegrated from it. Besides
the central Turkish ethnos inhabiting mostly in Anatolia, only
Armenians, Greeks, Kurds, Assyrians and Arabs remained in the Empire
prior to the World War I, and they all were aspiring for independence.
Yet the War resulted in eviction or extermination of the whole Greek
ethnos living in Anatolia, and the majority of Assyrian ethnos was also
massacred during the eviction. The Armenian ethnos of the Empire was
similarly massacred and evicted, and only the Arabic ethnos managed
to gain independence, while the Kurds collaborated with the Ottoman
Empire and benefited hugely, receiving the areas cleansed of Assyrians
and Armenians.
The reasons for our failure are a separate issue. We suffered grave
losses and every Armenian family felt that immense pain- with human
losses, deprivation of property, and alienation from the homeland.
They found themselves in alien countries in miserable conditions,
having to restore their personal, family and community lives from a
scratch. But we should consider the tragedy in the context of the
collapse of the Empire, where we didn’t manage to take our share
from it. Vice versa, in its last convulsions, the Empire seized
several extra pieces from us, such as Mount Ararat, Kars – not even
the territories of Ottoman but the Russian Empire prior to war. As
a result, not only we suffered huge human losses, but we failed to
shrug off the colonial rule, and emerge as an independent national
entity from the ashes of the Empire.
>From this standpoint, we should properly formulate the key objective
of our national agenda. It is not about demanding justice for the
past, or, conversely, finding reconciliation with the Turks – it is
about creating sufficient conditions for our national development. We
should view the future from a standpoint of national sustainability –
and to this end, it becomes critical to what model of the world we
tend to believe.
According to a first model, the world is moving towards universal
peace, democratic values and liberal economy. Civil society is
developing in Turkey, which exerts pressure on the nationalistic
government and ruling elites, and forces them to seek real peace with
the neighbors, as well as unconditionally acknowledge the Armenian
Genocide. In this logic, we can find forms of peaceful coexistence
with the neighbors, become involved in regional economic projects,
trade and mutual investments. This logic no longer focuses on any
territorial claims as the issue of development is not addressed
through territories – eventually, up to 10mln people can reside in
this area of Armenia and Artsakh. Besides, those who are willing, can
also return and settle in our historical areas in the modern Turkey,
getting closely connected to Armenia and forming a common economic
and cultural space with it. Potentially, we should only propose Turkey
to return Mount Ararat, and it’s even possible that it will make this
symbolic gesture for the sake of reconciliation and regional peace.
In the end, this is not entirely impossible, as the European countries
took exactly this path after the World War II, but in our case,
the probability is quite low.
By a diametrically opposite model, the world is moving toward complete
chaos. A real collision among several major centers of power – Islamic,
Western, Slavonic and Chinese – is brewing up. The centers of power
fiercely fight against each other. The borders in that world are
conventional, defined by the physical location of your soldier. The
status-quo set after the World War II is disappearing. It’s partially
happening now in our region, where the degree of flux is the highest.
In this logic, one has to adopt an entirely different strategy. It
mostly focuses on geopolitics rather than economy, and rests on much
tougher political instruments. In these conditions, we are not pursuing
past justice, but moving forward in an expectation that Turkey may
weaken as a result of its inner tensions, and we should be ready to
return some part of our historic territory through our proactive
moves, and then consistently integrate them into Armenian world,
using the restoration of justice as a justification for our moves,
as well as defensively against potential Turkish aggression.
These are totally different models. The challenge is that we should
have these both models in mind as it’s really not obvious which way
the world would evolve. The reality on the ground will more likely
evolve between these two extremes, resulting in lack of any conclusive
resolution in a foreseeable future.
– But this long-term modeling requires respective far-ranging
programs and approaches, while our elite seem to be concerned only
with short-term issues.
– The quality of our elite is the most pivotal question of any. We
should look at the Centennial through this lens in the first place.
Can we form self-sufficient national elite? The national life and
any upward development trajectory imply that there is a nucleus of
the national elite which can formulate an agenda and take respective
steps to accomplish it. To this end, it should have a considerable
potential of inner sovereignty. Yet, our current elite possess a very
low level of sovereignty. It’s partially conditioned by the fact that
the overwhelming majority of our elite are the descendants of former
Soviet system. They can even speak of Nzhdeh but they largely bear
the legacy of the old system.
The former system is now being consolidated as a new trans-national
construct, led by Russia. This makes the formation of independent
national elite a formidable challenge, and we may very well fail it.
If we look back at our recent history, we would see that we failed
to build sustainable national elite in 1914-1920. In 1991, we became
independent from the former USSR due to its rapid disintegration,
but now the next reincarnation of the Soviet Union is shaping up
now, and there is not guarantee that we won’t become part of it
again. Hence, this is the most important question – can we really
become an independent nation or not in these conditions, as only
in this case we will be preserve a chance to overcome the dire
consequences of the Genocide in our lives.
Ara Tadevosyan talked to Avetik Chalabyan
http://www.mediamax.am/en/news/interviews/13509#sthash.f2u8HJX8.dpuf