> From: H-Net Staff <revhelp@mail.h-net.msu.edu>
> Date: November 3, 2009 6:59:29 AM CST
> To: H-Genocide <h-genocide@h-net.msu.edu>
> Subject: H-Net Review Publication: 'Armenian Communities in Lebanon
> and Syria: The Same Origin, Two Different Paths?'
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> Nicola Migliorino.  (Re)constructing Armenia in Lebanon and Syria:
> Ethno-cultural Diversity and the State in the Aftermath of a Refugee
> Crisis.  Forced Migration Series. Oxford  Berghahn Books, 2007.
> Tables. 256 pp.  $75.00 (cloth), ISBN 978-1-84545-352-7.
>
> Reviewed by Ahmet H. Akkaya
> Published on H-Genocide (November, 2009)
> Commissioned by Elisa G. von Joeden-Forgey
>
> Armenian Communities in Lebanon and Syria: The Same Origin, Two
> Different Paths?
>
> In _(Re)constructing Armenia in Lebanon and Syria_, Nicola Migliorino
> provides a comprehensive narrative of the formation of Armenian
> communities in Lebanon and Syria (the Levant) while tracing the
> political development of these two intertwined colonies during the
> Mandate period. Migliorino situates these narratives within a broader
> analytical framework that deals with the question of cultural
> diversity and incorporation, particularly the various options that
> immigrants may have aside from simple assimilation and exclusion.
> Migliorino asks, "Does the case of the Armenians in Lebanon and Syria
> tell us a different story, of how a community of 'different' people
> can successfully 'find its place' in the contemporary Middle East
> without being either assimilated or excluded?" (p. 4).
>
> Migliorino explores this question from three main perspectives. The
> first focuses on the historical background of the formation of
> Armenian communities in the Levant, which Migliorino calls a "refugee
> story" (p. 2). The second discusses the different dimensions and
> meanings of the presence of those communities, namely, "nationalism
> in exile" and "diasporic transnationalism" (p. 3). As part of this
> diasporic perspective, Migliorino compares the host states, Syria and
> Lebanon, in terms of their approach to ethno-cultural diversity. Up
> to this point, he notes, diversity in the Middle East generally has
> been analyzed "with the tools of ethno-politics and ethnic conflict
> theory, and mostly from the perspective of the state, the political
> system, or the regime" (p. 3). Migliorino points out that the
> Armenian communities in the Levant present an interesting case in
> that they are neither a threat to nor a primary strategic resource
> for those states. At this point, he proposes a different
> ethno-political approach as a third perspective. His new approach
> entails the study of the Armenian communities in the Levant on the
> basis of their distinctive cultural identity and their interaction
> with the broader social, political, and cultural structure of the
> host societies.
>
> Within this framework, this book is composed of five main chapters in
> addition to an introduction and conclusion. The first chapter
> discusses mainly the historical background of the origins of Armenian
> presence in the Levant. The Armenian community grew rapidly during
> the First World War, when there was a mass exodus of Armenians to
> Syria and Lebanon brought about by the genocide in the Ottoman
> Empire. Nevertheless, Migliorino notes that "the migration and
> displacements seem to be a distinctive feature of Armenian history
> from old to modern times" (p. 9). As a direct consequence of the
> ongoing waves of Armenian refugees after the genocide of 1915-16, the
> modern Armenian community in the Levant was formed. Migliorino
> discusses this process rather briefly and does not go into any
> details about the genocide and its impacts on the refugees.
>
> In the subsequent four chapters of the book, he traces the
> development of the Armenian community in the Levant in conjunction
> with the political history of Lebanon and Syria, that is, from the
> years of the French Mandate to the present. Migliorino's
> periodization marks the common turning points of both Lebanese and
> Syrian societies, namely, the French Mandate (1920-46); the
> postindependence phase until the end of the 1960s (1946-67); the
> period between 1967 and 1989; and lastly the period since the 1990s.
> A chapter is devoted to each period, allowing Migliorino to discuss
> continuities and changes in community-state relationships between the
> Armenians and government authorities by analyzing six dimensions of
> these relationships. These include "religion and the religious policy
> of the state; the Armenian participation in public life; the
> production and diffusion of Armenian culture and cultural policy of
> the state; Armenian education in the context of national education;
> Armenian associations and the state policy on the civil society; and
> the economic and class dimensions of the Armenian presence" (p. 5).
> In each chapter, Migliorino evaluates the Armenian communities on the
> basis of these six dimensions. It is interesting to note that in each
> chapter he changes their ordering according to the importance of the
> role that dimension played in that period. In this sense, in terms of
> the formation and preservation of a distinct community identity, the
> religion/church and the political structure have played the most
> decisive roles in each period. Among them, he notes that the
> political bodies, namely, Armenian political parties, have gradually
> surpassed the church, which, however, has maintained its traditional
> position as the representative of the Armenian people. Armenian
> educational institutions and associations that have been tied either
> to the church or to political parties have also played a very
> important role in consolidating Armenian communities in the Levant.
>
> Throughout these chapters, Migliorino makes an argument concerning
> the divergent approaches of Lebanon and Syria to this culturally
> distinct Armenian community. In this sense, he discusses the
> political development of both countries, which diverges especially in
> the postindependence period. Since the 1950s, Syria has followed a
> much more authoritarian statist path, while Lebanon has adopted a
> "power-sharing, consociational political model" (p. 4). This
> divergence has led to two different paths of development for Armenian
> communities in each country. On the one hand, the Armenian community
> in Lebanon has flourished on many counts, including all dimensions
> that Migliorino analyzed in this book. In his words, "from an
> Armenian point of view, Lebanon could be undoubtedly regarded as a
> success story" (p. 147). On the other hand, the Syrian case presents
> a different and much more disadvantageous path for the Armenian
> community, namely, the virtual disappearance of Armenians from public
> life in Syria. These two paths changed the development of the
> character of the Armenian community within each society as well as
> between them. In the immediate postindependence period we see the
> beginnings of a migration wave from Syria to Lebanon. After the
> 1970s, however, the direction was reversed: the achievements of
> Armenians in Lebanon were significantly damaged due to the civil war,
> which resulted in the exodus of almost half of the Armenian
> population "to the countries of the Western world," whereas the
> Armenian community in Syria has enjoyed a relatively stable period
> since then (p. 165). As the title of the fifth chapter summarizes,
> the Armenian communities in both countries has faced a "difficult
> recovery and uncertain future" since the 1990s (p. 179).
>
> In sum, Migliorino gives a detailed picture of the experience of the
> Armenian communities in Lebanon and Syria from the 1920s to the
> present. In doing this, he answered his main question, posed at the
> beginning of the book, in the following way: "The Armenians appear to
> have successfully maintained, for more than eight decades since their
> mass-resettlement in the Levant, a distinct identity as an
> ethno-culturally diverse group, in spite of being a relatively small
> minority within a very different, mostly Arab environment" (p. 221).
> At the same time, he offers a vivid analysis of the evolution of two
> post-Mandate states, Lebanon and Syria, concerning primarily their
> approaches toward ethno-cultural diversity wherein he sees the main
> possible deadlock for the future of Armenian communities in the
> Levant. In his words, "this book suggests that neither in Lebanon nor
> in Syria does a sustainable or consistent model for the accommodation
> of ethno-cultural diversity appear to be in place" (p. 222). In light
> of this, Migliorino argues that it is mainly within the framework of
> such concepts as "cultural rights" or "rights to diversity" that a
> sustainable approach can be genuine.
>
> Migliorino's book includes numerous detailed tables pointing to
> various aspects of the Armenian presence in the Levant, ranging from
> the number of refugees, to the number and location of schools,
> churches, Armenian members of Parliament, associations, journals,
> etc. These tables make it possible to trace changes in Armenian life
> in both countries over time. Such socioeconomic data are also
> complemented by the "impressionistic and anecdotal material collected
> through interviews and personal visits" (p. 198). Migliorino also
> consulted a broad literature on Armenians as well on Lebanon and
> Syria, in English, French, Arabic, and Armenian. However, he would
> have done well to translate the French quotations into English.
>
> The main criticism I have of Migliorino's book lies in the author's
> "conceptual analysis," which proves unconvincing in a sense that it
> is very much confined to an analysis of the political history of the
> host countries. Regarding the development of the Armenian communities
> in those countries, the book lacks any rigorous conceptual tools.
> This is surprising, since the concept of diaspora as an analytical
> tool has been developed quite intensely in the humanities and social
> science disciplines over the last decade. It has been used for a much
> longer time with reference to traumatic experiences of Jews and
> African slaves. Later on, new cases of genocide and expulsion, like
> Armenians during World War I, and the waves of millions of other
> people displaced by forced and voluntary migration, have increased
> the number of diasporas. It has been argued that "the term [diaspora]
> has lost its stigmatic connotation and on the contrary it turned out
> to be a resource for identity politics."[1] The Armenian case has
> occupied a critical role within diaspora studies, first as an example
> of "Victim Diaspora" and then as a resource of identity. Therefore,
> the experiences of the Armenian community in the Levant would have
> been an interesting case for the studies of diaspora and
> transnationalism. Although Migliorino makes some references to the
> study of Khachig Tölölyan, a prominent scholar of diaspora studies,
> and discusses the shift of the Armenian community's self-perception
> from a "nation in exile" to a "permanent transnational diaspora," he
> does not employ these concepts in detail (pp. 124, 180). This main
> deficit also weakens his claim to be studying the Armenian identity
> as a distinct identity in the Levant.
>
> Nevertheless, in spite of these critical remarks, this book makes
> useful reading for those who are interested in Armenian communities
> dispersed around the world and in the Levant specifically. It would
> be my hope that Migliorino and other interested scholars will
> continue to follow through on the important themes addressed by this
> book.
>
> Note
>
> [1]. Rainer Münz and Rainer Ohliger, eds., _Diaspora and Ethnic
> Migrants: Germany, Israel and Post-Soviet Successor States in
> Comparative Perspective_ (London: Frank Cass, 2003), 3.
>
> Citation: Ahmet H. Akkaya. Review of Migliorino, Nicola,
> _(Re)constructing Armenia in Lebanon and Syria: Ethno-cultural
> Diversity and the State in the Aftermath of a Refugee Crisis_.
> H-Genocide, H-Net Reviews. November, 2009.
> URL: http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=25031
>
> This work is licensed under a Creative Commons
> Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States
> License.
>
>

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