I remember being quite “envious” of Georgia, thinking “why couldn’t that have happened in Armenia?” I guess I was wrong because it was not really the Georgian citizens who advocated this but more the USA.

It is quite sad that a dictatorial form of power seems the best thing for Armenia at the moment, but I am tempted to agree. At this immediate moment people’s needs are food, water, employment - It could be argued that only a legitimately elected government would feel the responsibilty to ensure these “priveleges” to the people who elected it into power- or there is the other angle , that if stability can be maintained , and a gradual increase in living standards is achieved, then the people will warm to the dictatorial style of rule, which in my opinion will commit Armenia to becoming something of a Russian outpost, which again, is not necessarily a bad thing. I guess it all depends on where you see Armenia’s position in the world, which is often a personal viewpoint. One thing I do think however is that all the sacrifices made for Armenia’s independence, should not be forgotten for the sake of temporary gain.

As to the point Harmic made:

that if stability can be maintained , and a gradual increase in living standards is achieved, then the people will warm to the dictatorial style of rule, which in my opinion will commit Armenia to becoming something of a Russian outpost

I think, that when living standards are achieved, people will have enough things to loose, and they will become more intersted in having democratic government, which will consider public opinions before making decisions which could hurt peoples property rights, wealth and well being. I think in every country Democracy is possible only when you have a degree of well being and a fair amount of middle class, because Democracy as it is now, is the rule of the middle class, and when you don’t have middle class, you can’t expect to have democracy.

Returning to Frieda’s point - about “Since when to become Democracy one needs help from the outside” - I want to remind you, that the “Democratic countries” we have now have all BECOME democratic in the course of at least 50 years, or they have BECOME democratic (e.g. Germany) as a result of direct outside intervention. Hence, if we are expecting Armenia to become democratic overnight, we should also ask for and expect foreign/outside involvement in the process. The thing is - because we don’t have a middle class, who would go on protecting its interest, we need an intermediate situation, in which someone else is generating that interest and protecting it. And at the moment the only force everybody is pointing to - is the international community, which however, does not seem very much interested in pursuing change in Armenia actively. (but they are doing it and rather successfully through the ENP, CoE Resolutions, OSCE, UN, MCA activities).