Good Morning everyone and welcome to the last session of the Conference.
This morning we will discuss the topic: “Armenian Diaspora in the year 2020”.
What a great opportunity to imagine the future and inform the present!
I am honored to start this session with introductory comments and then invite the 4 speakers to speak for 10-15 minute each about the subject. Then I will invite discussants to join and I hope that we will have a very productive discussion.
Today, I would like to start from where my speech ended at the plenary, opening session. I mentioned then the historic chance we are given today to envision and discuss our future in concrete terms; something on ancestors could rarely do openly without consequence.
The future of Armenia, the state, has been the focus of activities for our “Armenia 2020” Project during the past four years. Today we should start to project the future of Armenia - the nation, that is, to start including in our discussions the future of the Armenian Diaspora.
Previously, I also mentioned that we all are participants in the current chapter of building the Armenian nation that started 15 years ago. In this regard we are talking about issues that relate to our national identity, something that often means “historic identity”, built heavily on our past.
I closed my last speech by inviting everyone to start thinking about our national identity in futuristic terms, not just in historic ones. In this way I propose we can reach a balance where our past experience and future potential together define our current identity.
Our session today focuses on the future, and on the Diaspora. Our challenge is to come up with new ideas and approaches that can elevate us from the status quo of our current communities and institutions, our apprehensions and to date our modest impact towards building of Armenia.
Let me present you some ideas and start our discussion.

I mentioned on Monday that the “Armenia 2020” Project had conducted sociological surveys to gauge the attitudes, mindsets and ambitions of the population in Armenia and in the Diaspora, in 2003 and again in 2005. While these don’t exactly inform us about the year 2020, they do form a framework for reference. Allow me to mention only a couple of findings from the sociological research.
We asked in Armenia and in the Diaspora, to over 1500 people, what characterizes “being Armenian”. The top answer we received was: “someone who believes in the future of Armenia”. Second - was “someone who participates actively in the Armenian community”, and finally “someone who has Armenian Ancestors”. Living in Armenia, speaking the language, embracing the culture and food, practicing Christian faith, and many other factors were not rated highly.
Another noteworthy finding, which was mentioned several times in previous sessions of this conference, has to do with trust. Our research found very low levels of trust. Trust among Armenians in Armenia, among the citizens and the government, and among Armenians in the Diaspora and in Armenia. While there are many reasons we can find for such distrust, it certainly affects what may be possible to envision about the year 2020.
I would also like to remind you that our project developed, into more detailed treatments, out of dozens of possible scenarios for the year 2020, only four. In each case the relationship with the Diaspora and Armenia was incorporated into the scenario description in some detail. As you might expect, this transnational relationship, (now that I have learned that word) was quite different in the case of EU integration, Russification, Status quo, and Independent Prosperity. I will not discuss this more here due to the limited time but urge you to read more in our published scenario book.
Absent a healthy dialogue and more detailed research, things that are absent so far, it is difficult to envision the Armenian Diaspora in 2020. So I will limit my comments to frameworks for such a vision.
As it relates to the various models that the Diaspora-Homeland might take in the year 2020,
I would like to propose a network model is more realistic. This involves densely and sparsely tied nodes, with varying strength of ties, from weak to strong. The network exists within the Diaspora and within Armenia, and more and more between them.
Such networks are found in biology and the internet, among many other settings, and have to be treated quite differently than hub and spoke, hierarchical or other types of interaction models. Being tied into a social network is something we are all familiar with. When we associate with others because they are Armenian, or work on matters related to Armenia broadly, and then we are effectively part of a network of common affinity.
The driving forces to join a network or to stay in it, can be quite varied and poorly understood.
They can be habitual, they can be obligation based, they can be opportunity based, etc.
We are all part of various social networks, through our interests, our schools, our workplace, our interests in culture, the church, etc.
In defining who an Armenian is, one has to take into account this fact, that we all maintain multiple social networks at once. So the more varied our environments, the more varied will be what other networks we connect to, and how different we seem as nodes of the Armenian network.

But…tightly or loosely connected, I suggest we are all tied in…the many millions of us.
The question for the future becomes how do we navigate this network, how do we manage it if at all? How can we establish connections between far away nodes that may share additional common affinities such as culture, science, professional, etc?
How does it function when part of the network is within certain control of a governing force,
(so that the rules of interaction are potentially different) and others are not?
Can we think in such a model about “organizing the Diaspora”?
What draws some nodes closer to each other and others further away?
I don’t have answers to all of these questions, but I do want to emphasize one idea.
I contend that a powerful way to add to a network, and strengthen the interaction between nodes, is to provide the network with a task (whether by incentive or threat).
We all know intuitively, that the transnational Armenian network has historically been strongest at the time of threat or need by some of its nodes, whether it be due to the earthquake, the Karabagh conflict, or the socio-economic crisis during the first years of independence.
Also, the genocide issue occupies a small part of the network intensely, and the rest of us by our shared interest in this injustice. That too has kept the network together.
So there are many ways that have historically worked to strengthen and preserve our network, mostly driven by obligation.
One of the important realizations of our “Armenia 2020” Project is that there is another, more positive, incentive to join or strengthen a network, and that is the feeling of opportunity.
If one derives a benefit from a network whether financial, social, or professional, and when the benefit justifies the cost of being in the network, and here I don’t mean financial cost only, they will likely engage. Sometimes, the opportunity is not personal but rather collective, that is, the whole network benefits, and you as a member gain too.
Motivated to join and interconnect out of a sense of obligation or opportunity, I think the job of explicitly building a strong Armenian transnational network is upon us.
What I am suggesting is that such a network should have a clear set of tasks and priorities, and should combine the forces of obligation and opportunity to attract involvement.
The ultimate task for the network can be building our state and our nation! As we all know, such tasks are never completed but they surely keep the network busy for a long time.
Just consider the outstanding example of Israel and Jews worldwide!
With a clear strategy coming from the state of how it will proceed over the next decade or two, I strongly believe the currently loose Armenian network will grow, strengthen, and contribute mightily.
While we may all describe it differently, I strongly suspect this is why so many of us are here this week.
Let me make one additional point about networks before moving on...

If you believe in this network model, one of your other realizations will be that each node perceives the network somewhat differently based on its participation in other networks, how many nodes connect to it, who they are closely connected to in the Armenian network, etc.
So I suggest there has to be a concept of “My Armenia”, for those of you who can relate to this, like a part of “my space”. This will be part individual and part collective. As was mentioned earlier, a hybrid that is part same…part different.
Hence the difficulty in defining who gets to join the network. Also hence the sometimes difficult interactions between nodes of the same network when they are connected for the first time.
Just because you are part of the same network of affinity, does not mean you will trust or resemble each other. This can be seen by the typically strained interaction and stereotypes we often observe between those in the Diaspora, those in Armenia, and those foreigners “odars” who are not by ancestry “Armenian” but are in our network by marriage, by profession, friendship, etc.
Given this formulation, the need and role of a Diaspora-focused part of the Armenian government, whether council or ministry, become much more about network management.
As most large corporations know well as it relates to their supply chains or their customers,
managing large complex networks is a very tough job. Such a ministry probably would probably have a harder job than that of most other ministries in a government. Who in their right mind would want that job?
As we contemplate the Diaspora in 2020, we will have to ask many questions?
What assumptions will we make about what Armenia will be like? What will be the role of the political parties that operate outside of the homeland from which they are not in exile?
Will there be an organized central governing body for Diasporan Armenians?
Will Diasporans have a say in governance in Armenia?
What role will the church play the future of the Diaspora?
And then of course there will necessarily be a strong influence of the country within which a given sub-Diaspora is living which must be taken into account in foreseeing the future.
Now you can see why our project started with the much simpler job of envisioning the future of Armenia and not Armenians in the Diaspora!
Let me end my comments by coming back to my theme of networks. One thing many have mentioned during this conference is that the fates of the Diaspora and Armenia are inextricably linked.
They are threats and assets to each other!
As in any two pre-formed networks, when they try to merge, many nodes that were essential to each previous networks functioning lose their importance as new nodes from the partner network begin to fulfill those functions. New nodes, or pre-connected networks, (such as institutions, organizations), need to be added to allow the proper functioning of the combined network.
I believe this is the dynamic that awaits us over the next decade or more.
I wonder whether the status quo in the Diaspora is ready for it.
I wonder whether the churches and other institutions are ready for it.

During my plenary speech, I read words written 60 years ago…
Today, I would like to end by reading words written 70 years ago in 1936…
Specifically let me remind you all of one of the most famous lines written by Diasporan Armenian author, William Saroyan…
He wrote a piece titled “Who Am I”…something quite related to what we have been discussing during the conference…”who are we?”
At the end of the piece he says about Armenians… “For, when two of them meet anywhere in the world, see if they will not create a New Armenia!”
It turns out it takes two to tango, and apparently two to create a new Armenia.
What did he mean by this?
We all repeat these lines…but what do they really mean?
I must say, I am quite impressed because it looks to me that Saroyan had it right long, long ago.
If the nation of Armenia is to be thought of as a network, the precondition is that there be at least two nodes connected, by definition.
I think he was saying that no matter which parts of our network are cut off, we regenerate and grow again, and with at least the two nodes connected, we can preserve and rebuild the whole network. I am awed by his foresight!
Now in case you think he was referring to something else, let me read to you a few more words in the piece “Inhale Exhale” written in 1936 to expose how he, William Saroyan, was thinking about what we are discussing here today 70 years later.
He says: “There is a small area of land in Asia Minor that is called Armenia, but it is not so. It is not Armenia. It is a place…There are only Armenians, and they inhabit the earth, not Armenia, since there is no Armenia…There is no America and there is no England, and no France, and no Italy. There is only the earth…”
My interpretation…nations are networks of people…nations transcend states…especially in a globalizing world!

Noubar Afeyan