782
Ramiz
Mehdiyev
Towards to
democracy:
reflecting on
heritage
Surely, democratization successfully is carried out in places
where experience of democratic establishment exists, however,
this judgment, under no circumstances jeopardizes the
possibility of achieving democracy in societies undergoing
transition. Nevertheless, democratic transition requires more
prudent, balanced as well as deeply thought-out approach.
Export of ideas and views may not be effective, unless they
comply with the traditional structure of communism, that is, to
the system of social views. Imported models are not always
ready to adhere to the conditions in transformative societies,
because success of the future transformation, to certain extent is
predetermined by political, economic and socio-cultural
willingness of society. Therefore, regardless of the established
location, democracy is to be evolutionary and sovereign, that
will promote complex and stable development of civil society,
promotion of effective political structures, and formation of
compatible economy and application of functional mechanism
impact on regional processes. This is exactly the main direction
of national strategic development of Azerbaijan in the 21
st
century.
It must be underlined that, problem concerning the
expansion of “stripes of democratic states” remains actual even
from the “clash of civilizations” standpoint, whereupon two
worlds – West and non-west – offer their own perception on tra-
jectory of the development of universe: some assert that,
foundation of stability is the homogenous order based on certain
hierarchy of the values, and the others prefer to exist according
to their own models, thus, rejecting Western interference to
internal affairs. Problem becomes severe with the confrontation
of democratic Christian world with less democratic, in other
words, authoritarian and non-western one. Without doubt, all
these demagogic definitions changed perception of democracy
from the stance of the theory of peoples’ power into
geopolitical theory of establishment of new world order.
Apparently, democracy in transitional societies requires
step-by-step acknowledgement of foreign stereotypes and
behavior norms. Every similar step conditions the shift from
public awareness into the course of new psychological and
social determinants. As a result, different sociopolitical
783
Summary
environment is formed. In other words, English writer Gilbert
Keith Chesterton (1874-1936) quoted: “It is not necessary to
have a revolution to reach democracy. It is necessary to have
democracy to cause revolution”.
It is necessary to take into account that, 21
st
century was
marked not only with the new geopolitical division of sphere of
influence, but also substantially changed the relation of leading
powers towards global transformation and democratic
processes. When previous years of neoconservative wing in the
USA (first presidential term of Bush Jr.) were marked with new
geostrategic “march to east”, second presidential term of
George Bush Jr. was the period of more active advancement of
democracy in Eastern Europe, central Asia and other regions of
the world. The United States of America, as expressed by
H.Kissinger – “torch of freedom and democracy” stand on top
of the new democratic changes, which shocked the whole post-
soviet space and changed the perception about “guaranteed
safety” of the existing regimes.
New “democratic wave” became basis for revolutionary
changes in Serbia, Georgia, Ukraine, and to some extent in
Moldova and Kyrgyzstan. It shook the unsteady systems that
even stronger, and outlined contours of new world order
targeting establishment of democratic administration in all its’
subjects. Besides, it became fundamental theme of discussion of
prominent politicians and economists, journalists, as well as
analysts.
Thesis, advocating the idea of “democracies do not fight
against each other”, turned out to be solid ground for the
establishment of safety stripes and expansion of “democratic
zones” up to Afghanistan, Iraq and number of post-soviet
countries. There are countries that can be seen on the horizon of
fledgling transformation which belong to the non-democratic
category by the USA.
Meantime, the wider the expansion of democratic zone and
larger the space of new westernization, the faster the preference
of globalized projects changes, which subsequently affects the
vectors of advancement in the latest world history; including
military-political and economic impact and sociocultural
784
Ramiz
Mehdiyev
Towards to
democracy:
reflecting on
heritage
disposition. It is very clear that, in the new world order, military
might, internal consensus and foreign political factors don’t
play the key role in determining the new priorities in the
Eastern hemisphere countries. Contemporary politics is mostly
oriented on sociocultural aspects of impact on mass cognition –
fundamental element of making political decisions in the
postindustrial and information technology world. New epoch
affected considerably not only economy and social development
of the society, but also political acknowledgement on signi-
ficant level. Max Weber once asserted that rational bureaucracy
within industrial society is the essence of its’ life, we know that,
today, in informational society neither governments nor corpo-
rations rely exceptionally on formal and bureaucratic regula-
tions in order to organize people, whom they have power over.
Revolution of young officers, which started more than 30
years ago in Portugal with the overthrow of dictator Salazar,
marked the “third democratic wave” which engulfed new states
and continents with intermittent success. Impact of this wave,
almost like “butterfly effect”, affected Central and Eastern
Europe, Southern America and South – Eastern Asia, and
approximately twenty years later it reached Soviet Union which
was based on autocratic system.
After the events in Serbia and overthrow of Slobodan
Milosevic from the power, “orange” revolution in Georgia in
2004 that sent to the resignation long-lived politician, Eduard
Shevardnadze, laid the foundation of expansion of the
“reconstruction” tendencies throughout the CIS. A less than a
year elapsed and wave of changes reached Ukraine–the most
important geopolitical country on the border of Russia.
Throughout the entire history of the CIS, it was the last time
where election in one of the ally countries was expected to be
held according to the established traditions. However, following
development of the events evinced the erroneousness of such
approach. Leonid Kuchma, assuming stable and moreover–
inheriting transit of power into the hands of Prime Minister
V.Yanukovich, was not ready for the completely unexpected
turnover of events. As a consequence of massive rallies that
lasted more than a month on Liberty Square, political era of
Leonid Kuchma was left in the past.
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