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04.03.2013

ACADEMIC AND EXPERT POTENTIAL OF THE DIASPORA: ISSUES OF ASSESSMENT AND ORGANIZATION

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Arestakes Simavoryan
Head of the Center for Armenian Studies, “Noravank” Foundation

Vahram Hovyan
Expert of the Center for Armenian Studies, “Noravank” Foundation

It is very difficult to underestimate the influence of the intellectual potential on the practical politics. In the world’s leading countries the bodies, organizations and other political actors carrying out state policy, while implementing it, take as a ground the elaborations and analysis of academic organizations as well as analytical centers and think tanks. In other words, very often, the intellectual production of the academic and expert community conditions the essence and content of the decisions taken by the authorities.

The considerable part of the Armenian intellectual resources is outside the Republic of Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh Republic. Living in different countries of the world, including the leading powers, the intellectuals of the Armenian origin are a part of those countries’ academic and analytical organizations. They play important roles in the analytical and academic institutions and think tanks in the U.S., Russia and countries of Europe and CIS. Many of them achieved considerable success; e.g. the president of the U.S. Carnegie Foundation Vartan Gregorian, the Dean of the Baruch College Ervand Abrahamian, Professor of Massachusetts Institute of Technology Daron Acemoglu, the Director of the Institute of the World History of the Russian Academy of Science Aleksandr Chubaryan, etc.

The rational usage of the Armenian intellectual resources abroad (in both academic and expert spheres) can bring tangible benefit to both Armenia and Diaspora. Being a part of the academic and expert communities of the world’s leading powers:

  • they are better informed about the political, domestic and foreign policy processes and tendencies in their countries, the moods of the authorities and opposition, etc., which if not directly but influences the political situation in our region, including the regional standing of Armenia;
  • many of them have better chances to be informed about the global processes, events in any region or country in the world that are taking place or going to take place than the Armenian academic or expert circles; and under the current globalizing conditions the developments in different parts of the world and especially global processes cannot but impact political and economic situation in Armenia;
  • The academics and expert from the Diaspora are the bearers of the academic and expert culture and experience of their countries (American, Russian, European, etc.) and adoption or import of these cultures and experience to Armenia can considerably enrich the local academic and expert culture, thus essentially expanding the intellectual potential of Armenia’s newly formed expert school.

The efficient usage of Diaspora’s intellectual potential for good of the national interests implies some work with this potential which is based on the detailed researches and analysis. Here two key steps are important:

1. Assessment of the potential – Its goal is to make clear idea of the Armenian academic and expert community in the Diaspora, its intellectual capabilities;

2. Elaboration of the mechanisms of its efficient usage – Its goal is to make the Armenian academic and expert community’s potential of the Diaspora serve the national interests. It implies uniting of the Armenian academics and experts working in different countries, organizations and spheres under the same roof and elaboration of the institutional and non-institutional mechanisms directed to the establishment and strengthening of the ties and connections between them and academic and expert community of Armenia in different formats.

It should be mentioned that in the Armenian reality some researches directed to the assessment of the Armenian intellectual potential abroad has been carried out. E.g. the research of “Noravank” Foundation on “The Issues of Self-Organization of the Armenian Communities in the South Russia” (2010) is remarkable. Hence there has been no comprehensive research carried out till now.

Unlike many researches directed to the exposure and “inventorying” of the Armenians involved in academic circles, the intellectual potential of the Armenian expert community has not yet been studied. There are no mechanisms which would allow to use this potential for the good of the Armenia and Armeniancy with maximum efficiency.

The goals of the potential assessment

The solution of this issue implies:

  • Revelation of the academic and expert resources of the Diaspora. The goal of this sphere is to reveal the Armenian specialists involved in the academic and analytical structures abroad in the sphere of humanities – political scientists, sociologists, economists, lawyers, historians, etc.
  • Assessment of the academic and analytical potential of the Diaspora in the sphere of humanities. This implies creation of a database of the Armenian specialists, their classification in accordance with their academic degrees, countries, fields, academic and analytical organizations, etc.

Organizational issues

Since its establishment (in 1918) the Republic of Armenia has carried out the policy of consolidation of the intellectual potential of the Armeniancy and placed it in a service of the national interests. With this purpose in both first and second republics the programmes on the “repatriation” of the representatives of the intellectual, military and other circles of the Armenians from abroad had been initiated. For example, initiated by A. Myasnikyan repatriation of a part of the intellectual resources of the Armenians from abroad to a newly formed Soviet Armenia and his great contribution to the development of the republic is one of the vivid examples of such policy.

Modern world realities imply supplementing the traditional forms and ways of consolidation of the potential of the Armeniancy by the new ones. The growing role of the network structures in the social life, conditioned by the development of means of information and communication, obliges the appropriate bodies of the third Republic of Armenia to implement appropriate mechanisms of consolidation and efficient usage of the potential of the Diaspora. This task demands serious studies and detailed analyses, but in this regard some preliminary observations can be made.

To place the intellectual potential of the Armenians from abroad in service of the Armeniancy, it is necessary to take into account a number of realities which are inherent in modern conditions:

  • The Armenians who attained high place in the intellectual sphere are rent from the community life and at the same time they are fully and directly integrated in the societies of these counties. The results of their intellectual activity are completely placed in service of the national interests and state and political bodies of these countries;
  • Their mass repatriation (returning and residence) in Armenia is unrealistic, taking into consideration on the one hand their deep integration into the life of their countries and on the other hand not very conductive environment in Armenia.

Taking into consideration the aforementioned realities it is reasonable to lay emphasis on the remote operation with the Armenian academics and experts from abroad and this process can be manifested in the following ways:

  • Commission of the individual studies. High-quality researches on the subjects interesting for Armenia and Armeniancy can be commissioned to the Armenian experts from Diaspora.
  • Commission of collective researches. The collective researches, in which the experts and academics from Diaspora will be involved, on the same subjects can also be commissioned. In other words working groups of Armenian experts from the Diaspora will be formed.
  • Organization of the meetings and discussions in different formats. Meetings and discussions (academic and research conferences, seminars, round tables, etc.) with the participation of the Armenian academics and experts from Armenia and Diaspora on definite issues (Nagorno-Karabakh issue, Armenian-Turkish relations, strategy of development of Armenia, etc.) can be held from time to time.

It should be mentioned that the All-Armenian forum of the political scientists and experts in international relations1 organized in November 2012 by the Ministry of Diaspora of Armenia, YSU and “Noravank” Foundation was the first step taken in this direction. The subject of the forum was “Challenges of the 21st Century and the Issues of Security of Armenia” which was natural for the first such forum. But while organizing such forums it is more reasonable to concentrate on more specific questions.

Simplification and improvement of the effectiveness of the remote operation with the Armenian academics and expert community from abroad also inevitably implies creation of the institutional structures which should be of network character. It is also reasonable to establish in the status of NGOs the associations of the Armenian experts in different countries (U.S., Russia, France, etc.). It is obvious that working with such organizations can be more efficient than the activity of separate experts. The network structure implies consolidation of the Armenian experts from separate countries with regional and all-Armenian associations. Organization of the intellectual potential of the Diaspora in this case will take a shape of a network structure; the number of the nationwide structures will increase by one unit and the work with them will make the cooperation between Armenia and Diaspora even more efficient.

The Armenian Research Network Institute (the first Armenian research network in Armenia) established in 2012, can be considered as the first step in this direction.

1 See, e.g. http://tert.am/am/news/2012/11/19/21-dari-martahraver-hamajoghov/.

“Globus” analytical journal, #2, 2013

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