The interviewee of “Aravot” is “Civil Consciousness” Liberal NGO Chairman, Narek Samsonyan.
-During the Fourth Convention of “Civil Consciousness” Liberal NGO, which took place on the 21st of September, you delivered quite an ambitious speech. Citing: “Taking into account the international experience and our readiness to create a liberal democratic state, we, together with all the civil society organizations which share democratic values, will do our best to change the current situation developed in the Armenian society, where civil society has been turned into a source of personal income and by strengthening it carry on the democratization process started in the beginning of the 1991s but halted in 1995-1996. The vision of that process can be the formation of the “Armenian Dream” belonging to each and every citizen of the Republic of Armenia but the area of its implementation should be exclusively the RA. This will be the distinctive feature of the “Armenian Dream” distinguishing it from the currently spread idea of “Dream of the Armenians”. First of all, is it a declaration of intending to enter into politics? More specifically, do you have any intention of starting a political party?
–We declared our intention to have an influence on political decision-making process a long time ago. Our experience of the past 5 years shows that our intention is considered to be a positive and necessary at least among the social group, to which we connect the future of our country. Generally, in a democratic society, the only effective means to have a direct influence on the decision-making process in politics is starting a new political party, but the Armenian reality is far from the abovementioned. Unfortunately, political parties in our country are the most infamous, the most unproductive institutions enjoying the lowest possible confidence in the society. Under such circumstances, it is impossible to give a solution to the problem by starting a new political party because first, an appropriate environment needs to be created. In this context, no matter how serious our intention of having an influence on the political decision-making process is, and institutionally how ready we are to start a political party, we have no intention right now to start one.
We have clearly defined the logic of our imagined process and it is identical with the democratic movements encountered in many countries during the third wave of democratization. In these movements, the most active role was played by the institutional units and due to their efforts first the undemocratic system was replaced with the democratic one and then only some of those institutional units turned into political parties. As a brief historical overview, it is worth recalling Polish “Solidarity”, Armenian “Karabakh Committee”, civil movements of the Baltic States, Ukrainian “Maidan”, Serbian “Otpor”, etc. The core of all these movements has always been a collective vision, which we will try to formulate within the “Armenian Dream”.
-Is there a visible willingness to create a liberal democratic state in our society? How are you going to succeed in it? They say liberal democracy in the world is weaker than ever today.
-It is true, that liberal democracy today is not in its best days, but it should not be forgotten that it was the liberal democracy that overthrew the Soviet anti-human system during the Cold War. Today liberal democracy is in crisis not because of the institutional deficiencies, but because of the incompetent human factor. We will come back to this question on another occasion.
The perceptions of liberal democracy within the Armenian society are directly proportional to the knowledge of it. Many people even do not have elementary perceptions either about the meaning of the term or its political component. That is why our primary task today is the formulation of a qualitative minority with a full understanding of liberal democracy, after which, I’m sure, it will find enough support among a wider range of the society.
-How are you going to spread the perception of the “Armenian Dream” in the society? How are you going to achieve the full understanding of it among the people?
–We have always had a clearly designed strategy as well as the tactical measures needed for its implementation during all the years our NGO exists. Making the “Armenian Dream” public property is of a strategic importance to us. Extensive work has already been done towards that direction. Such wide presence of the youth during our Fourth Convention is actually the result of it. The complete formulation of the “Armenian Dream” is the very way by which we will make it everyone’s property. In other words, all that we have today must be complemented and consummated by the citizens of the Republic of Armenia.
We will not impose our vision on the people; moreover, we will formulate the “Armenian Dream” by engaging people in the direct discussions, educational programs, campaigns, as well as by establishing structural and territorial subdivisions.
-You say that the authorities are on the opposite side of the democratic working style, the opposition is busy with weather ”revolutions”, those who proclaim themselves to be human right defenders, shout out that there exists the right of the armed rebellion against the state in international law. There are some civil society organizations with sonorous names, the number of which beneficiaries does not exceed a few dozen, but this picture seems to be favorable to everyone. How are you going to break that ”wall”?
–That is correct. Everyone has become adjusted to this situation and that is why we work outside of that conformity and conjuncture. That “wall” has as decrepit basis as its creators and for breaking it we only need to not follow the rules set by those creators. From the first sight, these are opposite forces, but the reality is that by complementing each other they simply prolong the life of the system.
There is no difference for the citizen of the Republic of Armenia between the official dissipating the money which should have been directed to the development of the people and those NGOs regularly being granted financial support in the form of tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of dollars which distort the true notion of the civil society.
From the first sight, this situation seems quite insurmountable, but the study of successful international experiences shows that all the tremendous changes that took place towards democracy were accompanied by such “walls”, but these “walls” were demolished like the Berlin wall. A wide range of sympathizers and supporters, plus effective nonviolent civil resistance and, I’m sure, that there will be no alternative to breaking that “wall” in our country. During the independence movement in India that “wall” was several times stronger and higher, but the Indian people were able to break it. In the 60s those “walls” in the USA and in France were much stronger than in Armenia, but they also were broken. In the end of the 20th Century, these “walls” were much stronger in Serbia, Chile, Argentina, Greece, Spain, Portugal and many other countries, but they were also broken. Finally, Armenia is not an exception in this context, as the breakup of the Soviet “wall” began in our country in 1988.
-There is still a month and a half left before the EU EaP Summit. It is expected that in November the Comprehensive and Enhanced Partnership Agreement will be signed between Armenia and the EU. What do you think, will it be signed? Is force majeure possible before the Summit?
-On the one hand, having as an example the well-known case of 2013, it’s a thankless job to try to predict Armenia’s foreign policy priorities. On the other hand, this time the situation is favorable for the authorities in the sense that, unfortunately, this agreement has nothing to do with the agreement which was envisaged to be signed in 2013. This time there are no “disputable” points for Moscow in the agreement, and if we take into account the fact that the National Assembly adopted several documents having nothing to do with the interests of the RA last week, we can say, that having reached necessary concessions from Armenia, Moscow will not want to hinder the signing of this document. Moscow is not the only party that tries to hinder the signing of the document. Some civil society institutions representing themselves as “advocates of western values” and having huge financial support from the West at the same time having no support among the population, also try to have a negative influence on this matter by organizing mild provocations. Their goals are obvious. After all, should there be fertile soil for demonizing the authorities, without which there will be no use in funding them. But I’m more than sure that this time all their maladies will not help them either by fulfilling their own goals or with the realization of their Russian goals and will not hinder the signing of the document. In short, “the ball is in Serzh Sargsyan’s field”.
-Do you see any obstacles to Serzh Sargsyan’s stay in power in 2018? Can we consider Karen Karapetyan as the pole around which the ruling elite can be united? Many people say that ‘it won’t be right if Serzh Sargsyan carries on ruling after 2018’. Is there a political force that enjoys today public confidence and is there a leader who is more or less acceptable to the public?
-Let me start from the last question. No, there is no such a political force that enjoys public confidence, and if taking into account the fact that even the RPA doesn’t enjoy that confidence, talking about the other political parties is simply from the genre of populism. Those who speak about the rights and wrongs of Serzh Sargsyan’s stay in power should be encouraged to take several constitutional right classes at law departments of our universities. After that, I’m sure at least theoretically, there will be no unanswered questions for them.
As for the question about Serzh Sargsyan’s stay in power, first, Serzh Sargsyan already solved the problem of staying in power for the next 5 years back in April through the outcome of the elections. In the RPA today there is no other politician having that much high level of legitimacy rather than him. Therefore, it is redundant to speak about the obstacles. Karen Karapetyan’s role was not initially designed for party theme activities. He has successfully fulfilled what he came to Armenia for. Moreover, he has publicly pointed out several times that he is a figure who has nothing to do with politics. Thus, he is not a politician and even in his greatest desire, he can never be the one to unite the ruling elite.
Emma GABRIELYAN
