In July, I had the opportunity to take part in a conference and training on Gandhian nonviolence and social movement peace building convened by Ekta Parishad of India, the Jai Jagat 2020 International Steering Committee, and the newly formed Gandhi Institute at the Georgian-American University in Tbilisi and the Gandhi Foundation in Armenia. The convening took place in Tblisi, Georgia, and all throughout my time there, I heard an important call for unity of the dispossessed across borders in the Caucuses, and with those in Asia and Europe, and across the world.
I must begin by saying how little I knew about the politics, culture and economics of the Southern Caucuses before visiting. The region is comprised of Azerbaijan, Armenia and Georgia – three countries at a crossroads nearly 25 years after each has won its independence/statehood. It stands between North and South, East and West. Its countries are in conflict and political/economic transition, suffering from high unemployment rates and deep inequality, but full of natural resources and rich and beautiful land and people. Each of the countries is allied with different global and regional powers: in simple terms, Georgia with the US and the EU, Armenia with Russia (and to some extent Iran), Azerbaijan with Turkey. These alliances and the overall politics of divide and conquer make it hard for leaders from civil society and social movements to work together across the region to build a peaceful and thriving society. But people are coming together!
These societies like others have great, great inequality, conflict, and poverty, all made worse by the economic downturn. In Tbilisi, Georgia there are 150,000 families facing eviction currently. In Yerevan, the capital city of Armenia, thousands of people have been on the streets protesting utilities hikes and a host of other related issues for a couple of weeks now. The leaders there are trying to figure out how to develop leadership and build organization to help channel this social motion in a positive direction and link up with people all over the world to work towards a global struggle.
At the convening and training leaders from the Southern Caucuses critiqued nationalism, based on the ways it has caused and heightened tensions and violence in the region: there is open conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan, between the provinces of Ossetia and Abkhazia and the State of Georgia, and between Kurds and Turks all throughout the region and in neighboring countries. Each of those conflicts has deep roots, but leaders argued that people who are fighting to survive in the current system need to come together to find solutions. Many pointed out the negative role that charities and NGOs have played in managing conflict but never abolishing it or creating peace and justice in their region.
[aesop_image img=”https://kairoscenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/IMG_89801.jpg” alt=”Poverty and Hope in the South Caucuses” align=”center” lightbox=”off” caption=”Leaders from the gathering on nonviolence, peace building, and social movements in Tblisi, Georgia.” captionposition=”left”]
After the conference in Tbilisi, Georgia, I had the chance to travel to Armenia with my sister. It has been a lifelong dream to visit Armenia. My mother is 100% Armenian, her parents, aunts, uncles, friends all fled Western Armenia (currently Turkey) leading up to and during the Armenian Genocide. I grew up with stories of my grandfather’s desire to take the land that was once theirs back (and to take the airport that is currently in Adana, Turkey, his hometown); my family spoke with great pride about how Armenia was the first Christian nation, how our mountain and national symbol “Mount Ararat” (also currently in Turkey) was where Noah’s Ark first landed after the flood; I heard bits and pieces of stories of dispossession, survival and death marches – genocide; I was raised with just enough “nationalism” that I was proud to wave the Armenian flag when it became an independent nation in 1991 and my brother and I made plans to join the Armenian bobsledding team in the 1992 Winter Olympics.
My sister met me in Tbilisi and we drove the 5 hours across the Georgian border to the capital of Armenia, Yerevan. On the drive from Tbilisi to Yerevan, we passed copper and aluminum mines where women are unable to have children because of being poisoned by them; we saw deindustrialized cities and towns who have lost huge numbers of their population because people went to find work in the bigger cities or Russia or elsewhere; we saw towns where ethnic minorities live in danger for their lives; we saw mansions and summer homes built by global elites (mostly from the Armenian Diaspora but also rich Armenians still living in Armenia) close to towns with deep, deep poverty.
Yerevan is a place of great disparity. According to local leaders, both there and in Tbilisi 80% of the population is unemployed. Armenia is one of the poorest countries in the world and relies on remittances, which mostly come from Armenians going to Russia and other places to find whatever jobs they can. Those remittances make up 20% of the entire economy. Right next to all this poverty and struggle, the center of the city is one of the fanciest places I have ever visited in my life: multi-national luxury brands and stores are everywhere, and high fashion and indulgent restaurants. There are many expressions of extravagance: mist machines at the restaurants on the streets, a two hour light and fountain show in the central square every night in the summer, and new construction for tourism. There were nearly no beggars in the fancy parts of town but deep poverty and deprivation all throughout the peripheries.
Since the 1990s homelessness has emerged as a serious problem, and there are constant struggles over resources like energy and water even though these countries supply them to the world. The disappearance of industry from the region is being accompanied by intensified resource extraction, and the further consolidation of wealth and power in the hands of the few.
The rich control politics and the economy. Some of this was described in terms of corruption, but the main message was that the wealthy and powerful just line their own pockets and don’t consider the needs of the people: it’s understood as a structural problem and part of the whole broken system, and not just as individual cases of greed (although there’s plenty of that as well).
Amidst this abandonment and exclusion, there is a great tradition and culture of sharing and hospitality. Georgians, Armenians, and Azerbaijans are intent to feed, welcome, and care for everyone. I found this beautiful and refreshing. It was an affirmation of the abundance we live in, abundance that everyone should experience. It was an expression of profound values, the basis for a different society that we’ll have to win and build through struggle, and very far from a justification of making due with less, or embracing scarcity.
The romanticization of the West is very prevalent in the South Caucuses – it is a dream to meet Americans and to visit, go to school or even move to the U.S. People were shocked to hear that poverty and want exist in the United States. The myths about universal prosperity in the West serve to uphold hegemonic notions about “relative poverty” (notions that support divisions between the poor of places like India, Georgia, Armenia, etc., and places like the US and Western Europe), about the end of history and the triumph of capitalism (many people would say things like “although things are bad now perhaps in 20 more years they will improve as the economy develops.”), and individual rather than collective action.
In the recent evictions of 150,000 families in Tbilisi, I heard there was little effort to come together to make demands on society. Instead, individual families have petitioned the banks for debt forgiveness, to very little avail. In the utilities protests in Yerevan, the collective efforts of those directly impacted subsided as the authorities stepped in to make a new utilities arrangement with Russia (who currently control the utilities company in Armenia despite Armenia having their own power plants and energy sources). The conversation on what can be done now about the high cost of utilities (rates were raised 17% virtually over night) was that the people “just have to wait and see what will happen.”
The potential to break down these myths and assumptions, especially by building the unity of the dispossessed among the poor of the “Global North” and “Global South,” can help support the emergence and the growth of the “new and unsettling force” in the Caucuses, a force that could connect to struggles across the globe. There is much to learn from the histories and cultures of these nations. There is a willingness to find solutions that actually address the needs of the people and finally establish justice and peace.
All of this makes me believe even more in the work we are doing. There is no hope for these countries, for any of our countries, without saving the whole world. I returned very hopeful. In the words taught to me by my friends and comrades in India – “Jai Jagat” or “Victory/Blessing to the World!”