KeghartZ. S. Andrew Demirdjian, Ph.D., Los Angeles, 25 February 2019
“Power tends to corrupt and
absolute power corrupts absolutely"
Lord Acton (1834 -1902)
On a fateful day in the spring of 2018, the citizens of Armenia stood up and refused to be treated as a flock of sheep anymore. Led by a relatively obscure, but compelling, torchbearer called Nikol Pashinyan, the people declared "enough is 
enough" to the exploitation of the poor and the shrinking of the middle-class by the establishment. Especially the new generation took to the streets en mass. They protested against corruption, nepotism, the monopolies of the ruling party’s oligarchs, and were profuse in praise of Pashinyan, the opposition leader.
Backed by a vociferous popular vote, Pashinyan was elected prime minister in a landslide. Not even one-hundred days in office, he alarmed the Diaspora by declaring his intention to either abolish or merge the Ministry of Diaspora with other ministries to downsize the government. Instead of improving the lukewarm relations with the Diaspora, he seemed to have alienated many living abroad. Pashinyan also made the declaration without consulting the Diaspora. Is this a sign of Pashinyan's style of leadership or has the adulation gone to his head? Is he heading toward building a personality cult? Let’s explore the possible destiny of Pashinyan’s future leadership style.
Z. S. Andrew Demirdjian, Ph.D., Los Angeles, 25 February 2019
“Power tends to corrupt and
absolute power corrupts absolutely"
Lord Acton (1834 -1902)
On a fateful day in the spring of 2018, the citizens of Armenia stood up and refused to be treated as a flock of sheep anymore. Led by a relatively obscure, but compelling, torchbearer called Nikol Pashinyan, the people declared "enough is enough" to the exploitation of the poor and the shrinking of the middle-class by the establishment. Especially the new generation took to the streets en mass. They protested against corruption, nepotism, the monopolies of the ruling party’s oligarchs, and were profuse in praise of Pashinyan, the opposition leader.
Backed by a vociferous popular vote, Pashinyan was elected prime minister in a landslide. Not even one-hundred days in office, he alarmed the Diaspora by declaring his intention to either abolish or merge the Ministry of Diaspora with other ministries to downsize the government. Instead of improving the lukewarm relations with the Diaspora, he seemed to have alienated many living abroad. Pashinyan also made the declaration without consulting the Diaspora. Is this a sign of Pashinyan's style of leadership or has the adulation gone to his head? Is he heading toward building a personality cult? Let’s explore the possible destiny of Pashinyan’s future leadership style.
The prevailing misconception is that if a politician acquires a personality cult he usually becomes a dictator. While in the ‘80s, dictator meant someone like Hitler it also meant a statesman such as Ronald Reagan. It all depends how each functioned as personality cult leader (aka charismatic leader). Here personality cult is not used as a pejorative term implying dictatorship.
To prevent the emergence of a dictator at the expense of democracy, we should first know how personality cults are formed. There should be four major ingredients present: 1. Presence of a Problem (unpopular leadership, rogue establishment, looming enemy) to be addressed. 2. Articulation of an Ideology (goals, vision for solutions) to pursue. 3. Endowment of Charisma (exceptional powers to lead, motivate inspire followers and others to solve national problems and to achieve the goals and vision of the unifying ideology. 4. Loyalty to Country is the crowning characteristic of a leader. The outcome of these four factors would lead to either to the creation of a selfish dictator or a dedicated statesman.
The following are examples of the four salient factors in transforming a politician into a cult personality. The outcome could be either beneficial (advancing society) or detrimental to democracy (producing a dictator):
Presence of a Problem. This type of situation relates often to a current unpopular leadership. A good example would be the Young Turks who lost WWI and consequently ended the Ottoman Empire. Mustapha Kemal rose to the occasion and became a likeable and progressive statesman and finally a ruthless dictator. Pashinyan also rose in political power due to the unpopular leadership of Armenia's former president and his regime. He is now hailed as the maker of "New Armenia". Going against the unpopular, but deeply-entrenched establishment (Serge Sargsyan and his ruling party) is sufficient impetus to make a hero out of an opposition leader. If his followers were to continue to idealize him, he might be headed toward becoming a personality cult leader.
Resonating Ideology. When a politician devises a unifying ideology, people rally around him. Many personality cults have risen from a nationalist surge or the resonating ideology of assumed national superiority. Pashinyan is inadvertently banking on the "ideology" of eradicating corruption, nepotism, and reducing government waste by consolidating ministries and state agencies into smaller units, introducing tax breaks for foreign businesses wanting to invest in Armenia, strengthening ties with European markets and getting rid of monopolies.
During the protests of 2018, Pashinyan used a populist rhetoric, rallying against the corrupt elites-oligarchs and advocating social justice by upholding meritocracy and egalitarianism. For his "ideology" of purifying Armenia of the parasites plundering the nation, he has established a large following. Pashinyan's main ideology seems to be the eradication of the "dragon or the demon" of corruption. The resulting admiration makes Pashinyan a solid candidate for a personality cult.
Charismatic Leadership. Charismatic leadership is a result of perceived attractive and unique personality. Endowed with exceptional powers or qualities, he or she is able to lead and to encourage particular behaviors in others through eloquent communication, persuasion and force of personality. Charismatic leaders are able to motivate followers to get things done by conjuring up eagerness in others to achieve a stated goal or vision. Reagan was a great communicator who used humor and wit to engage the population and gain their trust and respect.
Leaders with charisma often exhibit certain characteristics including vision, taking personal risk, being sensitive to follower needs, and unconventional behavior. Reagan had a vision for the country. He was also able to set himself apart from the establishment and provide solutions to problems ranging from foreign policy to runaway inflation.
Reagan was a successful leader because he avoided one of the negative effects of the cult of personality: becoming a dictator. Cults of personality or charismatic leaders sometimes do not act in the best interest of their organizations as was the case with Hitler. Yet, in Reagan’s case, he always put the country first.
During the span of several months, Pashinyan not only thwarted the country’s two-term president from becoming a perpetual prime minister, he had also proven that politics is the art of the possible. He became Armenia’s latest "Savior" with sufficient charisma to control thousands of eager followers who wanted to see fundamental changes in the government. Those who knew him before the "Velvet Revolution" indicate that Pashinyan has not changed: he has remained a "charismatic leader" with boundless energy, righteousness, and readiness to make things operate in fairness.
Pashinyan seems to derive his charisma from his past reputation as well as during his leadership of the organized protests against the ruling political party. Some of Pashinyan's university classmates remember him as being always for the truth. He believed he was right in his judgments for he had the "intellect" to back his position. Those who helped Pashinyan to found the Civil Contract Party expressed their conviction that Pashinyan "…Stands for fundamental human values, meritocracy, [and] egalitarianism". In many ways he has the trappings of a charismatic leader who exhibits certain characteristics including vision, acting at personal risk, sensitivity to his followers' needs, and the ability to listen to people.
Loyalty to Country. A great example of a leader who could inspire loyalty in his followers is Alexander the Great (356–323 BC). At a young age, Alexander emerged as one of the greatest military leaders of all time. By the age of thirty, he had created an empire which stretched from his Macedonian homeland to the Himalayan Mountains. Loyalty is the state or quality of being faithful to someone (to a leader) or something (ones country). The morale of Alexander's army remained high due to his ability to motivate them to face the battlefield and win the war.
"I love my people; I am proud of my people; I shall always protect my people" would recur in Pashinyan’s speech frequently. This repetition drives home the realization that the leader is unequivocally loyal to his country.
As we can see, the input elements to our Model of Cult of Personality Formation are Problem, Ideology, Charisma, and Loyalty. The process consists of interaction between Pashinyan and his followers and his opponents; the output is Cult of Personality; the outcome could be one of two things: statesman or dictator.
The Crystal Ball, Please!
Here is the analogy to wrap our minds around: Pashinyan may become an unstoppable diesel locomotive with four wheels in his fervor to move forward (i.e., problem, ideology, charisma, and loyalty) to pull Armenia into a higher level of success. He does things outside the box. For example, his protest started on foot from Gyumri to Yerevan. By the time he reached the capital, he had become a political celebrity with thousands of loyal followers chanting his name.
"I love my country, I am proud of my people; I shall always stand up and fight for the rights of my people” resonated throughout his speeches. He is a dynamic politician who is able to inspire people.
Furthermore, Pashinyan seems to understand the needs of the Armenian people and he is prepared to lead. He protested against unpopular leadership and articulated an ideology (vision) to pursue. He has used his charisma to motivate followers to achieve the ideology, and exhibited loyalty to the country. Above all, he valued people who had remained loyal to Armenia by staying in the country. All these factors are converging for the formation of a cult of personality, but what will the outcome is subject to speculation.
On the surface, Pashinyan claims to be in post-ideological phase. Despite that, he has been advocating a number of important ideological promises. For example, he wants to get rid of corruption.
He does not seem to be an enigma or a disingenuous person. I was there during the Velvet Revolution. I heard and read most of his speeches. His speeches were always confidence building and crowd drawing. Rivers of people walked, chanted, some carried the Armenian flag heading to Ketron (Downtown) to hear Pashinyan speak. The atmosphere became electric whenever he appeared.
There are questions about Pashinyan's leadership style. For the time being, he is a revolutionary rather than a statesman. We should ask questions about his way of handling issues such as the Ministry of the Diaspora, but we should not be overly skeptical about his motives. Right now he is seen as a "Savior". He indicates to have a genuine desire to rid Armenia of debilitating practices. Let us hope power will not "corrupt" him. This will be a big transition to make from a revolutionary to a statesman in a nation known to be hard to please.
Evaluating Pashinyan's political saga against the Cult of Personality Formation Model I presented earlier in this commentary, he seems to be a most likely candidate to become a personality cult leader, if he has not already become one. This is an uncharted territory for Pashinyan. Whether the cult of personality will make him a statesman or a benevolent dictator only time will tell.
During the "Velvet Revolution" I witnessed many facets of the protests and heard the speeches Pashinyan made. My take is that history will enshrine him for ushering in a bloodless change in the government and for being a statesman. I can conclude with a comfortable level of certainty that he has the potential to become a personality cult leader who will not desecrate the spirit of democracy. Rather, he will be a fair, objective and a humane charismatic leader with a compassionate style of governing the mistreated Armenian people who are ready to immigrate if neglected.
Keghart
Keghart
10 comments
Praising Reagan???
Praising Reagan???
The writer has my respect for his analysis, however, praising Reagan (kind of ) who gave rise to what the world is suffering from today, makes his analysis less credible.
You Socialist Canadians never
You Socialist Canadians never understood Reagan. Reagan is one of the greatest leaders America has. Both he an the Polish Pope brought down Communism. That was a great event in world history.
Socialist Canadians?
The writer of the article, which praised Ronald Reagan, is a California Armenian. There's no indication in the article as to whether he has been to "socialist" Canada.
Proudly Canadian Socialist
Whilst "Canadian Socialist" has a pejorative connotation in the United States where even a mild form of liberalism is frowned upon, many progressive democracies and jurisdictions in Europe, however, have been successful in implementing many aspects of Socialism thus resulting in better education, single-payer health care systems and decent pensions upon retirement for their citizens — a far cry from the American model where any mention of state-sponsored social programs is met with disdain and rebuke and could strike the death knell for any politician seeking public office. Poor Bernie Sanders was leading a lone crusade for a state-run single payer health care system which unfortunately fell on deaf ears and sabotaged his candidacy for the Democratic nomination against Hillary Clinton. We Canadians, on the other hand, are proud of our egalitarian Medicare system which leaves no one behind whenever the need arises for any medical intervention or procedure regardless of the person's status, financial or otherwise.
Contrary to popular belief — or misconception — Communism was not brought down by the efforts of President Reagan and Pope John Paul II alone. They might have been somewhat instrumental in hastening the demise of an already corrupt and bankrupt system which really collapsed under its own weight after 70 years of an untenable form of rule. The President's charm could have only contributed, perhaps a smidgen, in the greater scheme of things, but no more than that. It's worth noting here that Communism and Socialism cannot be used interchangeably — as some demagogues often do. In reality, Communism is failed Socialism — that is, Socialism gone bad, or exploited by blood-thirsty despots like Stalin for their own ends.
It is interesting to note, thirty years after the collapse of Communism and the disintegration of the Soviet Union, what has come about in its wake. It is evident that not too much has changed in Russia from the bad old days of Communism where an oligarchic rule has now taken hold, run by a former KGB agent in the person of Vladimir Putin whose rule has no semblance of any form of democracy. He conducts assassinations not only within his own country but in jurisdictions outside of its borders. He is even alleged to have interfered in the last U.S. presidential election whereby an ill-equipped candidate like Donald Trump whose lack of experience, limited intelligence amongst other shortcomings was the perfect candidate for Russia to expand its sinister designs beyond its sphere of influence.
Finally, what would Reagan the great emancipator say if he were to witness what has become of his beloved country today. Surely, he must be turning in his grave!
Garo Tashdjian
Ronald Reagan gets undue
Ronald Reagan gets undue credit for bringing down the Soviet Union. In addition to 70 years of decay, corruption, incompetence, and impracticality, the Soviet Union could no longer afford the expensive arms race with the US. The arms race wasn't Reagan's invention: it started right after WWII. Reagan had to luck of being president at the time the cumulative financial burden of the arms race broke the back of the Soviet Union, in addition to the other challenges cited in my second sentence. Reagan, sleep-walked through his presidency. That is when he was not so busy consulting his wife's astrologer or dabbing rouge to his face.
Pashinian-Give him time
I am not going to argue with the points made by Dr. Demirdjian. He is entitled to his opinions.
I just wish to underline three points:
1- It is premature to pass any judgment yet. The cabinet was just formed and the parliament recently started its sessions and deliberations. Time will tell if promises are kept and real progress is achieved. We have to give him reasonable time. i.e. three months or 100 days to assess.
2- A concern is that he has surrounded himself with inexperienced people. Governing is a major and challenging task which needs experience and know-how. We have to see how the cabinet members are going to perform.
3- The administration is spending too much prosecuting members of the previous administrations. I admit that there were failures, mismanagement, stagnant economy and rampant corruption. But what purpose does it serve ? Who gains?
It is much preferable and productive if political calm prevails and the efforts are focused on the future.
At the present time we all wish that he is successful and a good leader.
Vart Adjemian
A Cult of Personality
A cult of personality is when an individual – uses the techniques of mass media, propaganda, the big lie, patriotism, and organized demonstrations and rallies to create an idealized, heroic, and worshipful image of a leader.,.example is Stalin, Mao or other dictators․․․
Մեր Հայ ընթերցողին հիշցնեմ որ այս հոդվածը գրված է արևմտյան մտայնությամբ։ Հոդվածի հեղինակը ընդանրապես անտեսել է կամ էլ անտեղյակ այդ տարածաշրջանի ժողովրդի կենցաղից և մասնավորապես մեր ժողովրդի հոգեբանությունից այդ իսկ պատճառով մեր համաժողովրդական Զարթոնքը Փաշինյանին գլխավորությամբ արանց որևէ հիմնավորման Cult of Personality է անվանում։
The cult of personality
Real and genuine leaders are distiguished primarily by their clear and well studied ideological/pragmatic vision, by their long standing, credibly valuable personal experience and recognizable achievement in statemanship, creativity or related endeavors, by their avoidance of undelivrable promises, by their ability to articulate a comprhensive and well studied course of action in a possibly forceful but not cheaply emotional, certainly not divisive verbal delivery. All that promise of the positive and of success often comes across through an unspoken body image too.
Masses can have justified real grievances but a true and successful leader cannot lead and build primarily in terms of negatives correction. Take Jesus Christ, Martin Luther, George Washington, Mahatma Gandhi, Napoleon Bonaparte, Martin Luther King, Ronald Reagan, and some more I can add, as examples. They were loved and revered leaders, never needed nor created a personality cult to achieve what they achieved for the people, neither did the people ever cared for one. Because there is always something forced and an implied unreal in it. Actually, attempting, even establishing such a cult betrays an underlying insecurity and self doubt, to compensate for the lack of a solid foundation personal sense it indeed is prevalent in cults and it may well lead to ultimate failure, even disaster.
Title vs Test, a disconnect
Generally it is accepted that cult has a negative connotation as it implies personal agrandization at the expense of the general good.
It appears that the text does not support that general understanding of cult one may associate with the word at first glance after reading the title, as Z. S. Andrew Demirdjian, Ph.D, ends his analysis by concluding that he believes that Pashinyan will be an instrument for the general good. I quote his concluding statement: “I can conclude with a comfortable level of certainty that he has the potential to become a personality cult leader who will not desecrate the spirit of democracy. Rather, he will be a fair, objective and a humane charismatic leader with a compassionate style of governing the mistreated Armenian people who are ready to immigrate if neglected."
People of Armenia want
People of Armenia want a "leader". The mentality is such that they want a central figure to believe in, trust and follow. He is always seen as the savior. Look at their political parties that are centered around a figure, a person or the founder. Even most democratic parties such as "Lousavor Hayasdan" has a central figure (Maroukian) who has the last say in critical issues.
I am not saying this is good or bad. Of course this has got many disadvatages as RA citizens try to build institutions, just establishments which work on systems and merit rather than personalities and charisma.
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