Alec Yenikomshian

See also: The Looming Demographic Catastrophe, the Ruling Regime and the Question of Armenia’s Future Existence – Part III

3. The existing system in real life

After the change in leadership in 1998, it would take about two and one half years for it to be decided which grouping of the upper elite would take over in post-Armenian National Movement (HHSh) Armenia.

In mid-2000, the internal battle was won by the pair Robert Kocharyan-Serzh Sargsyan and since then the controlling system has been directed by the “Karabakh clan”. The substitution of the HHSh clan by the Karabakh one, nevertheless, does not signify two things.

First, it doesn’t mean that the upper echelon of the upper elite was comprised and continues to be comprised of only individuals from Artsakh and that all people from Artsakh take advantage of the existence of that upper echelon (an absurd notion, indeed).

Second, it doesn’t mean that the upper elite completely changed; that the former privileged ones were totally replaced with new ones.

Only a few were removed, the positions of others weakened, new faces came into the picture, some grew much stronger, and some stayed where they were. With the advent of the new clan, nevertheless, a not too subtle change occurred. Provincial types, even “yokels”, came to replace the relatively intellectual types controlling the upper circles, and the semi-criminal role grew in the lower circles.

However, the essential characteristic of the system in the new (post-2000) stage manifested in the quickened rates of the consolidation and monopolization processes and growth of scope in the economic and political-enforcement fields.

Even though the new clan undeniably influenced these processes, nevertheless, the latter were an inseparable part of the internal logic of the system, and, in the case of the existence of another “upper elite”, they were to unavoidably come to the fore, perhaps under a different form. What is presented below is known to all, in large or small part. Here, the attempt is being made to present the situation in the country in an abridged format, with all its different layers.

The Economy

The elite, few in number, created an economic structure that corresponded to its interests but that was extremely destructive and unhealthy in terms of the development of the country and the interests of the populace. The economy of the country revolved basically around the sectors of monopolized imports, the export of again mostly monopolized mined ores, real estate speculation (up till the crisis), and low-quality services.

Decisions regarding important commercial transactions and privileges were made in the offices of the upper circles. By guaranteeing super-profits from the sale of imported goods, this class with exclusive rights never spurred industrial production and even prevented its development. More or less, only those few branches of production are operating that pose no competition to the importers; these branches are also mostly concentrated in the hands of the same class.

Tax Policy

The aim of the tax policies now carried out is not so much to ensure revenue for the national budget, as much as it is to create extreme financial difficulties  for and constant barriers in front of small and medium sized businesses, in order to maintain absolute domination of the privileged class in the economic sphere. National budget revenues mainly stem from the indirect taxes paid by the population and the direct taxes paid by small and mid-sized businesses. Not only does big business easily reap super-profits, but it also pays relatively little in taxes.

This is why the taxes/Gross Domestic Product ratio is always low, in the 16-18% range; depriving the country of an important developmental lever. This number doesn’t fall below 30% in countries considered as developed and even in many developing nations.

Agriculture and Farmers

The up to 50% of the population engaged in agricultural pursuits and the agricultural sector, in general, is in a tragic state. Those working in this sector are in an unequal production and exchange relationship. The inherent cost of agricultural goods is often more than the sale price.

The import of agricultural goods, via tax swindles and other unpleasant means, has basically paralyzed the production of many domestic crops. One gets the impression that policies regarding water irrigation have been specifically crafted to deprive the villager of his livelihood.

The credit-usury policies of the banks have already bankrupted thousands of rural residents, etc. Given such conditions, it is not surprising that this year about 200,000 hectares of agricultural land (more than 40-45% of the total) has not been cultivated. After getting their hands on everything in the country, over the past few years, the privileged class and those under its protection, have gotten their hands on (dare I say stripped) farm land from the villagers at cheap prices.

Socio-Economic Conditions, Labour and Unemployment

Besides failing to provide employment to the citizens, the system subjects most of the employed to harsh exploitation. Despite the exodus of about 1.5 million people in the last two decades, around 30% of the country’s workforce remains unemployed.

The salaries of most workers and employees remain insufficient. The poverty rate in the country remains high despite the financial assistance sent from those working abroad to their relatives back home (such transfers make up about 30% of the GDP) Sharp social polarization has taken place and the conclusions to be drawn are clear.

Despite the mass exodus, the minimum socio-economic conditions needed to ensure the existence and survivability-reproduction of the entire population of Armenia are not guaranteed. The draft bill on reforms to the Labor Code recently presented in the National Assembly is merely an attempt to codify and legalize the already established employer-employee relations that have been built upon a clearly exploitative base. The bill envisages the legalization of the employer-employee verbal work contract , to create “pocket” workers’ unions and to lower the age of those legally eligible for hourly paid employment from the age of 16 to…7.

The system, in essence, is sentencing the workers, by the force of law, to ensuring super-profits for those who control it, without even ensuring the basic conditions needed by the workers to survive.

The new, compulsory “cumulative” social security system, will place enormous sums under the control of a private financial enterprise.  In its present form, this scheme cannot but pursue, through speculative financial investments, the goal of ensuring super-profits to the real owners of that ‘privat’ company, at the cost of putting at great risk the enormous funds belonging to the citizens.

Environment

The territory of Armenia is, slowly but surely, becoming inhospitable for living. Due to the criminal dictates of the Soviet regime and the energy crisis of the 1990’s, the country has already crossed the critical threshold in terms of environmental survivability. Over the past fifteen years, the situation, rather than correcting has worsened, and this process continues. Again, to satisfy the greed of a few, the rape of Armenia’s pitiful forests continues apace.

Valuable trees are being cut down for the commercial interests of the representatives of the elite, and people who have become destitute as a result of their actions are being sold illegally cut wood as fuel.

The forests, which serve as sources of the nation’s water resources and clean air, and a primary component in the fight against soil erosion, are disappearing rather than growing. The country is turning into a desert. The number of fresh water springs in Armenia is dropping. After Sevan, the underground waters of the Ararat valley are being exploited in incalculable amounts, leading to a decrease in water reserves and increased soil salinity and humidity. Mining, in general, and the ways it is carried out, in particular, threatens our tiny country and people with ecological disaster in the not too distant future.

The Control of Political Life and Liberties The elite, to guarantee the continued existence of this situation that nurtures its interests and to rein in probable outburst of rebellion, has put into place an authoritarian regime that is transformed into a dictatorial one whenever the need arises (due to the country’s unique conditions, the need for an open, “in your face” dictatorial regime, isn’t constantly required). In certain regions, local “prince” like rulers have set up a feudal system of subjugation.

The administrative, judicial and enforcement structures governing the country serve the interests of the elite. Laws either directly serve these interests, or are conveniently flouted when they inconvenience the elite; with the active complicity of the legal system. To maintain its domination, the elite relies on the employ of semi-criminal elements and nurtures them, creating “private” punishment forces. The system is fertile ground for corruption. Unabashed injustice permeates the legal, economic, political, civil, basic human rights and other sectors.

Psychological and Moral Consequences

The prolonged appearance of the above-mentioned situation has lead to moral and psychological despair and depression  , as well as to indifference and apathy, in an important segment of the population. The existence of this environment assists in the prolonged survivability of the interests of the political-economic elite. Naturally, the elite nurtures such an environment.

The majority of the population lacks any faith and confidence not only in the leadership but, and this is most tragic of all, in the motherland itself. People, in great numbers, are turning their back on the homeland. The fact that the elite have turned the country into its private estate and has disparaged the concept of the homeland, has given way to feelings of ridicule and an attitude of scorn regarding the notions of the homeland and patriotism within the ranks of the less aware class of the people.

The Resulting System of Values

The above-mentioned system of socio-economic and political relations, itself the result of the avarice of the elite and its evil values, in turn, has spawned and extended a system of values and morals whose pillars are the glorification of material possessions, turning everything possible (even non-material vales) into commodities and subjugating it all to the logic of commerce, superficiality, deceit, fraud, bribe taking and giving, etc. Sadly, this value system has infiltrated a significant segment of the people, leading to a corruption of morality, of cultural and spiritual values.

Culture, Education and Sciences

Given the prevailing objective situation and value system in Armenia, the sciences, culture and education have been greatly demeaned and devalued. They have experienced a significant drop from their once lofty –albeit vulnerable due to dogmatic approaches and administrative directives- heights.

The implementation of the ideology and policies of neo-liberalism, the rejection of the government to play a primary role in those sectors, as well as the shift of the dominant sphere of economic activity from the manufacturing sector based on the sciences to the trade sector, have dealt a serious blow to the fields of science, culture and education. In the newly created conditions, being educated was not a prerequisite to “making money”. For the elite, essentially engaged in trade and speculation, culture, science and education were of no interest.

The attractiveness of these sectors for important segments of society also lessened, as a result of the influence on wide segments of the population that the example of the mentionned people and those like them has left, the fetishism of material belongings, widespread graft and bribery, the new values system and similar factors. The education system has become an environment for receiving bribes and for receiving diplomas via bribery. High value culture, in general, and genuine national culture, in particular, somehow resists due to the obstinate efforts of a dedicated few. Given the dominant environment and the general conditions of the system, the current prime minister’s “vision” of a “knowledge based economy” sounds like a bad joke.

Changes to the “Language Law and “Public Education Law” that have created such ruckus and concern during the last few months, also serve the interests of the elite; by allowing foreign language education, the elite provides the next in a line of services to a foreign government, with the aim to preserve its position. Moreover, since the ruling elite has no aim of creating a healthy education system for all (something that is impossible under the current conditions even if the desire existed), the elite is establishing a foreign language school system with the aim of providing their “kiddies” with a springboard which should help them reach a “bright future”.

Foreign Environment and Foreign Policy

Armenia today, just like it has frequently happened in the course of history, finds itself in an unfavorable foreign environment. This situation could have become not particularly dangerous had the country, as a result of the factors cited above, not been sick and vulnerable, and had the government employed its foreign links to improve the welfare and prosperity of the country and not to preserve and strengthen its own positions.

For example, the vulnerability of the country on the one hand, a result of the policies implemented, and, on the other, the conduct displayed by the ruling elite, are the essential reason why the national economic strategic sectors have been handed over to foreign forces. The Armenian nation state, nominally independent, is today, to a large degree, dependent on other states.

Artsakh and Historic Issues

After about 1,000 years of losing territories, the Armenian people, at the end of the 20th century, liberated a small piece of the homeland, Artsakh, thanks to the ultimate sacrifice of its sons.

The destiny of this victory, which has a great historic and spiritual significance, as well as the destiny of the liberated territories, which have a great significance for the whole of present day Armenia from the strategic and security points of view,  remain, however, threatened not only from external pressures but, first and foremost, due to the defeatist policies conducted by the Armenian authorities.

The same authorities, using the argument of conducting pragmatic politics, are rushing to surrender, in the name of Armenia and the Armenian people, to the consequences of the Genocide perpetrated by the turkish Ottoman Empire. At the base of this line of conduct by the authorities lay the expectation of commercial benefits after the opening of the country’s western and eastern borders.

On the other hand, the country has become much weeker because of all the mentionned policies followed by the authorities, and, as a result of this, more vulnerable to foreign pressure. Consequently, the authorities readiness for a conceding attitude towards the country’s eastern and western neighbours also stems from its concerns   about preserving its own positions with regard to the foreign pressures exerted in this respect.

All the while, if these policies regarding the liberated territories and the consequences of the Genocide ever reach their logical conclusion, Armenia will be deprived of all security and a deadly blow will be delivered to the Armenian spirit.

This, then is the situation in Armenia; the result of the unquenchable desire of one group of people to control all material and financial resources, and of the system set up for the realization of this desire. Each component of this reality, taken individually and regardless of other considerations, is inhuman, immoral and destructive for the nation and the state, and thus totally to be rejected. In addition, however, this situation is also the cause for the nearly untreatable sickness of Armenia, including the demographic catastrophe – the continuing exodus, the low level natural growth rate and the absence of any real repatriation from the diaspora.

A country which finds itself under these objective and subjective conditions, these tendencies and demographic trends cannot survive long. The system that created this situation present in Armenia today and the group of people who nurture it, are leading the nation to its demise.

They will be the executioners of Armenia and the Armenian nation if things do not change. This is not a call to populism, nor an outpouring of rhetoric or emotion. Rather, it is a conclusion based on a rational and objective observation of the situation. If the Armenian people don’t wish to die off it must rid itself of this system; and quickly. It must build a system that sees to the needs of the entire people.

This is the directive that can no longer be put off. Otherwise, in the words of an deadly play on words made by Monte Melkonian in 1987 – “Rather than self-determination, such "independence" would amount to national self-termination.”

to be continued