UNITED, SORT OF: SURVEY REVEALS FAMILY COHESION AMONG ARMENIANS, BUT CIVIL INVOLVEMENT “CRITICALLY LOW”
NAZIK ARMENAKYAN
ArmeniaNow
04.11.11 | 12:41
By Sara Khojoyan
ArmeniaNow reporter
According to the UNDP monitoring on social cohesion, people in
Armenia are very united on the level of families, neighborhoods and
communities; however, they use their togetherness only for settling
their family issues or private problems, while outside their homes
they lose the feeling of ownership.
Enlarge Photo
Many people are not active in demanding maintenance and reconstruction
of village roads or public parks, school yards or forests near their
communities, even though these are the main problems that are found
in almost all communities of Armenia.
Olga Yesayan, 27, resides in the Nalbandyan village of Armavir
province, where she believes that people avoid demanding performance
of duty from appointed bodies. She says villagers are afraid that
if they demand solutions to problems, they will lose friendships and
“they do not understand that those people are entitled to do all that
for them because of the positions they occupy.”
Meanwhile, her father-in-law, Davit Baghdasaryan, has a different
explanation.
“It doesn’t matter if we make demands or don’t, nothing will be
changed. We are co-villagers. Why should we spoil relations? We may
need each other later for other issues,” he says, adding that he deals
with cultivation and he usually needs the community head’s letter of
recommendation to get credits (from banks). “Even though, for example,
I have turned to him with the water issue and asked him to settle it.”
The first research into social cohesion in Armenia, which has been
done by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) along with the
Caucasus Research Resources Centers (CRRC), aims to promote dialogue
and trust in Armenia (3,200 citizens of Armenia above 18 years old
have participated in the survey).
“UNDP expects that this initiative may have its influence upon
decision making on different levels, aiming to arm national and
local governments with complete strategy of social cohesion,” says
Dafina Gercheva, UN Resident Coordinator/UNDP Resident Representative
in Armenia.
Meanwhile, the level of civil participation is critically low.
According to the research, within the recent 12 months only four
percent of the survey participants have attended a public meeting or
procession, and only three percent – a picket. Moreover, only 0.4
percent of adults have entered a protest over local services and
problems to proper bodies.
Nonetheless, answers show that people do not consider themselves to
be isolated from society, which inspires hope among analysts that
the situation will be changed in the future.
Manvel Sargsyan, expert of the Armenian Center for National and
International Studies (ACNIS) believes the fact people started fighting
for their own rights is very important.
“It happens slowly, but people fight for their basic rights on their
own initiative, which will later grow to active public movements,”
says Sargsyan bringing a number of initiatives as examples, which
were mainly done through online social networks.
IT specialist Samvel Martirosyan says that especially Yerevan city
residents are active on social networks.
“Social network activism has not reached provinces yet. People are
a little bit active in Gyumri and Vanadzor. As for other places –
they are still sleeping. People still do not understand that a
social network can be used for the formation of a civil society,”
Martirosyan says.
http://www.armenianow.com/social/32967/armenia_civil_involvement