I recently talked with Aleksan Hakobyan, Doctor of Historical Sciences, and he expressed a remarkable idea. In 1988-90, decisions were made in the “Karabakh” committee, often after discussions at the academic level. I do not intend to glorify the “Karabakh” committee and the First President of RA, and, on the other hand, I do not want to answer his “haters” (who, like all “haters,” are blind). It’s about methodology.
Let’s say you are considering whether it is worth inviting EU observers to the Armenian-Azerbaijani border. It involves examining several issues. For example, what will be the mandate of these civilian observers, what will they do in case of a possible Azerbaijani attack, what will be Russia’s reaction, is it worth communicating with the Russian Foreign Ministry before the final decision, in the case of the presence of the Russian army and Russian border guards, will there not be tension between them and the EU observers, especially considering the Russia-West stress? Naturally, I don’t have definite answers to those questions because I need more information. Collecting and collating information requires long-term and regular work from the authorities. I believe neither the prime minister nor the foreign minister organizes such work.
I wouldn’t say that the teams of the Second and Third Presidents made decisions with an “academic” methodology. But, given the business orientation of those teams, politics was based on “common sense,” which, of course, can often be deceptive in serious matters.
The current government, however, is driven by populist logic: let’s make as many people as possible like what we do. And based on this, the main questions are as follows. What will we say (how will we “blow”) when we take this or that step, and what will we say when we are criticized? In domestic politics, it mainly works.
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But there is a significant difference between the naive citizens of Armenia and international players. Especially in the case of a small country, all kinds of populist games end badly.
ARAM ABRAHAMYAN
