For Immediate Release
January 28, 2018
USC INSTITUTE OF ARMENIAN STUDIES
University of Southern California
Los Angeles, California, USA
Contact: Syuzanna Petrosyan, Associate Director
[email protected]
213.821.3943
In Armenia, Going From Politics to Policy
As Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s face filled the screen, the Bovard audience
surged to its feet. Acknowledging the standing ovation with a warm smile, the
charismatic journalist-turned-parliamentarian shyly waved his hand.
“I want to congratulate you all, and mention that your support has played a
vital role in the success of our struggle,” he said, speaking live from Yerevan
via Skype on May 20.
Sunday’s landmark event, “Armenia Tomorrow,” featured 15 political leaders,
activists and intellectuals testing the way forward. Weeks earlier, the world
had watched in wonder as peaceful protests—accompanied by line-dancing,
folk-singing and spontaneous hugging—had overthrown Armenia’s autocratic regime
without spilling a drop of blood, sparking hope of real democracy in the
post-Soviet republic.
Riding the wave of Armenia’s Velvet Revolution, the USC Institute of Armenian
Studies put together an ambitious program in just two weeks. The timely event
drew more than 1,500 live spectators, and 50,000 others watched via web stream,
available in English or Armenian.
Institute Director Salpi Ghazarian framed the event around open-ended questions
and a solemn promise.
“There’s a reason,” she said, “we are calling this program ‘Armenia Tomorrow.’
None of us are expecting anyone to have answers and formulas so quickly. But
it’s by asking, exploring, studying, weighing, judging and choosing that we go
from politics to policy, from the street to institutions. It’s the job of the
academy to feed those institutions with facts, with analysis and with options.
“So today we commit to supporting and asking these questions. Our commitment is
that this isn’t a one-off. This is the beginning of a long process: to break
down each aspect of life in a democratic society.”
The program began with a 20-minute dialogue between Ghazarian and the new prime
minister.
Speaking in Armenian via English translator, Pashinyan described the
“pan-Armenian nature of the movement,” noting that the overarching goal must be
to make Armenians feel ownership of their country—a transformation that can
only happen with free and fair elections. “A sovereign citizen,” he said, “sets
the just and honorable path for its people and a just government.”
Pashinyan’s words drew repeated applause from the audience.
David Usupashvili, former speaker of Georgia’s parliament, followed up with
humorous tips on how to avoid the pitfalls of past “color revolutions.”
Armenians were wise to postpone their revolution, he said archly, because it
allows them to observe and learn from their neighbors’ painful errors. Speaking
on a panel moderated by USC Dornsife professor and post-Soviet politics expert
Robert English, the Georgian lawmaker said, “I’m more than ready to share our
mistakes.”
Usupashvili urged the new government to “treat every single Armenian as a
citizen. We (Georgia) jumped directly from the concept of communist comrade to
the voter,” he said, referring to his country’s 2003 Rose Revolution. “We
skipped the very important concept of the citizen.”
In other pointers, he cautioned Pashinyan to avoid the temptation to demonize
political opponents. Rather than portraying itself as “sole actor,” the
leadership should support rivals and plan its own exit strategy. “Peaceful
political transition must be possible,” he said.
Usupashvili called the political transformation now underway pivotal to his own
nation’s well-being. “A prosperous, democratic, stable Georgia is impossible
without a stable, democratic, prosperous Armenia,” he said, earning
enthusiastic applause.
On the same panel, Middle East expert Fayez Hammad, a USC lecturer in political
science and international relations, offered his list of red flags to watch for
based on the failed Arab Spring experience. “I urge everybody, including this
audience, to be vigilant,” he said, advocating special attention to changes in
military culture, any rise in sectarianism or political schisms, and signs of
interference from regional actors with their own agendas.
Joining by video from Paris, energy expert Bedros Terzian, president of the
Paris-based Petrostrategies, weighed in on landlocked Armenia’s resource
challenges. He strongly encouraged the leadership to abandon the country’s
decrepit nuclear power infrastructure in favor of abundant wind, solar and
hydrocarbons, explaining that as the path to economic and political
independence.
Speaking from Boston, MIT economist Daron Açemoglu suggested ways to root out
Armenia’s culture of kleptocracy. Cultivate human capital, he advised, instead
of finding ways to punish corrupt people. “You cannot fire 5,000 judges and
prosecutors,” he said. “You have to do that slowly.”
Yerevan-based jurist Edward Mouradian elaborated on the uphill battle Armenia
faces. Absent an independent judiciary empowered to enforce the rule of law,
civil society cannot thrive, he warned.
Mouradian appeared on a panel moderated by USC Price Policy Professor Daniel
Mazmanian, along with Washington D.C.-based journalist Emil Sanamyan and
political analyst Irina Ghaplanyan.
All expressed optimism for the future. “There’s a new sense of buy-in that
people didn’t have before,” said Sanamyan. “No more excuses that nothing can
change, that everything is fixed.” Mere weeks into Nikol Pashinyan’s term as
prime minister, Sanamyan said he already looks forward to the new leader’s
“exit moment—hopefully not by protest but by elections.”
Speaking via Skype from Yerevan, Ghaplanyan contrasted the new government’s
commitment to transparency with the old regime’s dissemination of Soviet-style
propaganda—a cynical tactic that created “a huge gap between the people and the
state.”
As proof of Armenians’ new connection with their government, she pointed to the
historic May 1 parliamentary Q&A that held all Armenians glued to their screens
for 10 straight hours. “That’s more than the average American’s viewing-time on
CPSAN in his or her entire life,” Ghaplanyan said, grinning.
Newly elected Armenian president Armen Sarkissian closed out Sunday’s event.
Joining via a pre-recorded video from Yerevan, responding to questions posed to
him from the Institute, the career Armenian diplomat directly addressed youth
in the diaspora.
“You are sons and daughters of Armenia,” Sarkissian said, “no matter where you
live. It doesn’t matter if you carry American, Argentinian, French or Armenian
passport. You have to believe you are a part of this great nation.”
That message resonated with Arpi Barsegian, 24, and Zara Hovasapyan, 25. They
chatted at a reception following the program, sipping coffee and nibbling on
Armenian gata pastries. The young women had come to size-up the prime minister
and president.
“Hearing their vision, hearing them be excited for the future role of the
diaspora in Armenia, that topped everything,” said Barsegian, a business
consultant at PricewaterhouseCoopers. “We haven’t seen that outreach in the
past.”
Swept up in last month’s euphoria, she had traveled to Armenia with her brother
to participate in the peaceful protests.
“Those five days were among the happiest days of my life,” said the
Armenia-born Barsegian, who emigrated 10 years ago with her family. “It was so
incredible to see people dancing, hugging each other, awakened and hopeful. For
a very long time, that was missing. We thought that we really didn’t have the
power to bring change or to be the change.”
Her friend Zara Hovasapyan had also left Armenia as a child. A USC graduate who
works as a financial analyst for Lionsgate, Hovasapyan, MBA ’16, was moved by
President Sarkissian’s call to the sons and daughters of Armenia to re-engage
with their homeland.
“I have been talking about repatriating for a really long time,” she said. “The
change of government allays the fears we had. It’s a new beginning!”
Aram Telian, 51, sees a new beginning for the descendants of genocide
survivors, too.
“As I’ve gotten older,” said the third-generation Armenian-American from Van
Nuys, “I’ve felt the desire to search for people and ideas that, being born
here, I never had a connection to. Now there’s a call to visit the homeland, to
engage and make friends with people in Armenia. I think it will heal us, in a
way.”