Address of the Director of “Noravank” Foundation G.Harutyunyan at the international conference on “CSTO and Eurasia’s Security”

We discuss different aspects of Eurasian integration and it is of course good and useful. But sometimes we forget the most important aspect – ideology of Eurasianism. I realize that while using word “ideology” I break a sort of taboo, because after the collapse of the USSR this word is often taken as something unquotable. In this regard the words of one of the Roman emperors who said that it is necessary to show the law to the enemies and to show friends what they want are recalled.

Today almost all the spheres of vital activity are ideologized in the world but demostration of any ideological directives in the post-Soviet republics is given a hostile reception and is either equated to totalitarian atavism or anti-democratic sedition.

A research (which was presented a day before yesterday) was carried out under the direction of Stepan Sulakshin¹ at the Center of Political Thought and Ideology and on its basis the so-called ideological map of the world was drafted. It shows that the segment of post-Soviet civilization is deprived of any ideological project and this is how it differs from other geopolitical subjects – Pax Americana in the USA, Bolivarian socialism in Latin America; the ideology of Europeanism, Islamic caliphate, Turkish neo-Ottomanism, Chinese globalization, Indian neo-Gandhism, Japanese unique identity, etc. can also be mentioned.

It is known that the post-Soviet republics which are possible members of the Eurasian Union, in ideological aspect, represent rather ambiguous and I would even say mixed picture. Under the general ruling liberal economy, which mostly conditions the social and moral attitude of the society, in the ideological aspect, the republics pursue their own national goals, thus tending to preserve the cultural and civilizational values of their own. Of course, all of this should be assessed positively, but from the point of view of Eurasian integration this is not enough.

Besides, different republics have different geopolitical directives (but for Russia where the large-scale geopolitical conceptions have been formed historically and today it restores its, to some extent, lost skills of global geopolitical actor). In this context, in case of superficial, narrow-minded attitude towards this issue it is rather difficult to find some common points between, for example, Central Asia and Belarus. That is, there is a sort of geoideological and geopolitical ambiguity which can grow into confusion and loafing, i.e. the situation is poor and it this aspect something should be figured out and only after that we must attempt to do something.

I would like to present to your attention two theses, which may be worth of your attention, as information to reflect on.

In ideological aspect socialist ideas can become a uniting factor for the Eurasian republics, because socialism, alongside with liberalism, is a universal ideology and besides the sense of collectivism is characteristic for the mentality of the Eurasian nations. It should be mentioned that there are socialist and social-democratic parties in 35 European countries and socialists in general are big political power which, unlike Euro-skeptic conservatives, as a rule supports integration processes in Europe, and we should take this fact seriously.

Another factor, which should especially be taken into consideration is our common relatively recent Soviet past, or, as Sergei Kara-Murza called it, Soviet civilization. It is characteristic that according to numerous sociological studies, the Soviet past is still taken rather positively even by the youth. In this context an important role should be allotted to the objective representation of modern history.

Let us also mention that in accordance with the comparative studies, the “ideological triad” is the most efficient system for state, i.e. when political system is based on liberal, socialist and conservative parties which act on the basis of complementarity. Today China is a perfect example of successful “ideological triad” where the economic is liberal, state management is socialist and in the ideology both socialist directives (which are based not only on Marx’s ideas but also on the ideas of Mozi, great Chinese philosopher who lived in the 6th century BC) and Confucius theses (the national and conservative theses) are strong.

But there is no political system which can function successfully without intellectual resources and their active support. Probably, taking into consideration the Eurasian peculiarities, we should consider not only Anglo-Saxon experience (e.g. there are more than 1800 think tanks in the US) but also achievements in this field of China and Iran where the elements of meritocracy are inherent in the political systems.

Of course this issue should be fundamentally worked out not only in the ideological aspect but also in the aspect of political technologies.

The following thesis is possible in the geopolitical aspect. Thanks to the well-known processes in the Arab countries (the so-called Arab spring), Central Asia (Afghanistan and Pakistan) and Africa international terrorism made a qualitative leap. If before the world community dealt with separate illegal and semi-legal groups, today, as the events in Syria prove, a well-organized, greatly supplied and equipped army of terrorists has been formed which can carry out not only separate actions but also conduct systematic large-scale wars.

This constitutes menace not only to Russia (by the way to Ukraine too), republics of Central Asia and Armenia, but also, in case of some scenarios, to Belarus. Putting global terrorist threat into information turnover can become a uniting idea for the Eurasian Union. I would like to bring an example from the western experience again: the War on Terrorism declared by the US on September 11, 2001 served and, to some extent, still serves as an ideological substantiation for conducting joint NATO operations.

¹http://rusrand.ru/important/predstavljaem-vashemu-vnimaniju-prezentatsiju-tsentra-nauchnoj-politicheskoj-mysli-i-ideologii