The article by Arman Grigoryan, a political scientist and lecturer at the Faculty of International Relations of Lehigh University, USA, published in the periodical “National Interest,” which was translated and published in our newspaper, prompted me to reflect on the nature of science in general and political science in particular.
Suppose I claim that water, under certain conditions, normally boils when the temperature reaches 100 degrees Celsius. This claim belongs to the realm of science. However, if I say that I want water to boil at 60 degrees, if I complain that the “rogue water” doesn’t boil when I want it to, or if I propose a referendum to decide at which temperature water should boil, then my speech is not scientific.
In Armenia, there are at least several hundred individuals who present themselves as political scientists. Approximately 70 percent of them are part of Pashinyan’s propaganda team. This team is described in the aforementioned article as follows: “With transparent approval from the government, several pro-government media outlets, a massive army of pundits, and several satellite political forces launched a relentless public relations (PR) campaign to propagate the myth that the war was inevitable, as it was the result of a Russian-Turkish-Azerbaijani collusion against Armenia. ”
In this context, I am interested in the following question: are these so-called experts truly experts? I don’t think so. A genuine expert (political scientist) does not preach or try to “sell” anything to the public. Instead, they seek to explain to the public (and preferably to decision-makers) patterns and cause-and-effect relationships without resorting to a Manichean division of “good” and “evil.” This is especially important when analyzing foreign policy.
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Preaching, on the other hand, is based on manipulating people’s emotions. For example, consider the domestic thesis “the Russian has cheated us.” Whether this statement is right or wrong, neither politics nor political science can be built on it.
I dream of a time when the government, setting aside its infantile passions, will read the analyses of real political scientists and try to evaluate their arguments impartially, rather than giving an attack order to its gang of “fakers” who will repeat the charge “du caxvac es rsin” (“you are a Russian sympathizer”) in different shades. It is this level of “arguments” that forms the basis of modern pro-government “political science.”
Aram Abrahamyan
