Reclaiming Nationalism, Rejecting Chauvinism, Building Socialism

On May 28th, Independence Day (the OG one, of course, not the September 21 re-independence of 1991), I finished Houri Berberian’s latest book “Roving Revolutionaries” (well worth reading if you can make the time). Some of the issues she describes in the book that occupied our national leadership’s collective mind at the turn of the previous century are also timely today and little discussed. Inspired by the day and the book, I thought a quick look at three concepts relevant to our new, Yerevan-centered state-building effort would be worthwhile.

Let’s first dispense with the negative one of the concepts, that which no one should want guiding or informing how our state institutions evolve and solidify: chauvinism. In English, this term is relatively little heard in recent times, and perhaps most often only in the phrase “male chauvinism.” Chauvinism is an attitude of superiority held by a person about the group s/he belongs to relative to some other group. Unfortunately, we see it among our compatriots more often than I care to admit. The sense that Armenians are better than (fill in a group) must go. It can only breed the same mentality in response, leading inevitably to conflict. It must be whittled out of our national consciousness. It should be enough that chauvinism is the same diseased mindset which led to the Young Turks organizing the Genocide. Happily, Paruyr Sevag’s oft-recited poem’s first, second and final lines say it all and must serve as our beacon in this respect: