Armenia Flexes Its Smart Power

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Armenia took center stage internationally this week by hosting the European Political Community (EPC) Summit, a gathering of heads of state from Europe, Eurasia and Canada, thus turning Yerevan into the epicenter of diplomacy, geopolitical discourse, and the state-of-play in the international political system. In the domain of accruing prestige, diplomatic capital, and soft power capacity, especially for a small state that only three years ago was primarily in survival mode, it is a testimony to the observable success of Armenia’s multi-alignment doctrine and its foreign policy of diversification. This concentration of Europe’s political elite in Armenia’s capital was designed to strategically spillover into the Yerevan Dialogue, as most senior officials and diplomats accompanying their leaders to Yerevan became participants in the conference, with French President Emmanuel Macron’s keynote address drawing significant global attention. Collectively, the EPC and this year’s Yerevan Dialogue were not generic forums casually organized because they are annual gatherings, but strategically curated platforms designed to display Armenia’s growing relevance as a regional hub, a space of immense interest for Europe and its partners, and a clear demonstration of Yerevan’s growing importance as a small state displaying “smart power”.  

In the confluence of these factors, Armenia’s publicity of representation and strategic display of smart power achieves three important objectives: 1) it enhances Yerevan’s international prestige, thus strengthening Armenia’s relevance within multilateral engagements, while also giving Yerevan the relative gravitas to cultivate deeper bilateral relations with diverse number of states; 2) it structurally contributes to the normalization process with Azerbaijan, thus reinforcing de facto peace and stability in the region, as Armenia’s enhanced status adds another layer of soft deterrence, while also incentivizing Baku to prefer constructive engagement; and 3) in the domain of neutralizing subversive activities by foreign actors and strengthening its de-hybridization capabilities, Armenia’s use of smart power becomes an important resiliency instrument (one of several) against Russia’s use of “sharp power”. 

As a small state that has traditionally found itself surrounded by predatory neighbors, a regional authoritarian orbit, and systemic geopolitical fracture, Armenia also suffered from a shortcoming more acute than that of its neighbors: diplomatic deficiency. Whereas Georgia and Azerbaijan vigorously expanded their diplomatic capabilities over the last 25 years, with the former anchoring its growth on deeper Western engagement and guidance, and the latter through shrewd petro-transactionalism and caviar diplomacy, Armenia largely remained a subservient extension of Russia’s diplomatic network. This structural and institutional underdevelopment not only relegated Armenia’s regional and geopolitical capabilities to the domain of underperformance, but more so, exponentially diminished Armenia’s capacity to attain international diplomatic capital, relative prestige, or political relevance. Armenia not only struggled to matter internationally, worse than that, it was only able to matter either when deemed a Russian satellite or a post-Soviet state engulfed in regional conflict. In essence, Armenia had neither hard power (fully reliant on Russia’s unreliable security guarantees), soft power, normative power, or smart power. It collectively lacked international prestige and standing.

The development of smart power, the enhancement in Armenia’s international prestige and standing, the immense diplomatic capital accrued, and the country’s growing relevance to the international community, are the primary prisms through which the events of this week, and further ahead, upcoming gatherings such as COP17 in few months, should be viewed through. These are not isolated or one-off events, but part of a broader systemic integration of Yerevan into the complex arteries of the international system. Armenia’s preferred conceptual mechanism of undertaking this integration is the strategic application of smart power.

Smart power is defined as the capacity of an actor to combine elements of hard power and soft power in ways that are mutually reinforcing in advancing its objectives effectively and efficiently. In this context, advancing smart power is qualified as a national security imperative, as it is driven by both long-term structural changes in regional and international conditions as well as short-term developments within an actor’s neighborhood. As such, the structural changes in the South Caucasus, from a Russian orbit to one of geopolitical pluralism, and from a Russian hegemonic system to a non-hegemonic system dominated by U.S. and Western interests, have altered the “rules of the game” in such a way that has allowed Armenia to develop and amplify its smart power capabilities. This strategic approach is crucial for Armenia because the emerging global system is becoming more complex, interconnected and interdependent, while simultaneously more volatile, transactional and interest-seeking. 

The traditional attention on the singular enhancement of hard power capabilities no longer suffices, while persistent reliance on soft power, or even its more contemporary iteration of normative power, struggles to address the complexities faced by small states, particularly emerging democratic ones. In the contemporary international system, power increasingly relies on a state’s capacity to create, advance, and even shape knowledge and information. The capacity for creativity and innovation are becoming more sophisticated instruments in advancing the national interests than mere reliance on military capabilities (hard power) or cultural and ideational attributes (soft power). To borrow the words of a prominent political scientist, “Armies and militaries remain important, but their role has changed radically” because the “world of warfare has become more digital, networked, and flexible.” And it is for this reason that “sophisticated nations have everything from smart bombs to smart phones to smart blogs.” 

DigiTech, Yerevan Dialogue, EU-Armenia Summit, COP17, and the EPC, among the most prominent, though certainly not the only ones, with more expected to follow, are examples of Armenia articulating a model of smart power that garners positive international attention, takes the country from being an irrelevant Russian satellite to a potentially relevant regional hub, and positions Armenia as a country where important global actors can be incentivized to have a vested interest in. The United States now has a vested interest in Armenia because of TRIPP, the European political domain has a vested interest in Armenia as displayed with the EPC, and the EU has a vested interest due to the strategic partnership agenda and deepening of cooperation following the EU-Armenia Summit. 

This strategic approach is also creating the fertile environment for Armenia to advance and deepen bilateral relations, as evidenced by the growing number of strategic partnerships it has signed from North America to the Far East, and recently at the EPC Summit, with the United Kingdom and Bulgaria. This is not simply an exercise in soft power, because it entails substantive, concrete and interest-driven engagements; nor is it simply a case of hard power, such as its expanding ability to procure military technology from France, the United States, Poland, and numerous other partners. Rather, it is a combination of both forms of power, but conceptualized through a smart power initiative, and this week’s EPC was a reflection and a centerpiece of this innovative foreign policy approach being instrumentalized by Armenia. 

This does not mean that Armenia, by virtue of hosting large numbers of international leaders, signing numerous strategic partnerships, or continuing to enhance its international and diplomatic prestige, is out of the woods. It is not, and no one has illusions about that. But what Armenia is doing is creating for itself a distinct set of toolkits, a new vision of statecraft that it has never had, and more to the point, it is escaping the myopism of the last thirty years that has suffocated growth, development, and constructive use of power. 

Indeed, Armenia is nowhere close to being out of the woods: peace with Azerbaijan has not yet been finalized, economic diversification is still in its early stages, energy security and autonomy is a work in progress, and persistent hybrid threats and attacks are part of daily life. Armenia is not out of the woods because it is being consistently subjected to the “sharp power” of its neighbors. Sharp power is the expansive use of hybrid and cognitive warfare to “pierce, penetrate, or perforate” the political and information environments of typically “vulnerable democracies.” It is very straightforward what this entails for Armenia and the level, scope, and complexity of the new security situation that it faces. 

Now, while the hard power threat that existed prior to the Washington Accords has diminished (though not alleviated), the sharp power threat from numerous neighbors, however, remains, and in the case of Russia, continues to intensify and expand. It is within the nexus of these security dynamics that the notion of smart power offers Armenia the toolkit to navigate risk-mitigation, engage in de-hybridization, and integrate the vested interests of partner countries as stakeholders in regional stability, and by extension, Armenia’s security. In essence, for Armenia to be able to develop an institutionalized “immune system” to these multi-pronged threats, it is strategically amplifying its smart power portfolio. 

Armenia is not yet, by any measure, a “sophisticated nation,” as defined by the scholarship on smart power and states that have articulated smart power capabilities. However, it is working diligently to become one: it is transitioning from a highly militarized, hard power-driven paradigm to a comprehensive security-driven paradigm of developing smart power; it is transitioning from policies that trapped Yerevan in regional fracture to articulating innovative policy by initiating and stewarding regional interconnectivity. Smart power requires artfully combining conceptual, institutional, and political elements into a reform movement capable of sustaining foreign policy innovation. This is precisely what Armenia has sought to do with its policy of diversification and doctrine of multi-alignment: formulate a reform movement—one which escapes dependency, conflict-persistence, and regional isolation—into sustainable foreign policy innovation: more partners, more strategic partnerships, more foreign markets, more international visibility, more interconnectivity…more smart power.               

Statecraft & Governance