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DOI: 10.24234/wisdom.v24i4.951
THE PROBLEM AND METHODOLOGY OF STUDYING THE DIASPORA ARMENIANS' ENTREPRENEURSHIP MOTIVES IN HOMELAND
Ruben KARAPETYAN 1 © Arman ANDRIKYAN 1 © | Lusine TANAJYAN 1 *
1 Institute of Archaeology and Ethnography NAS RA; Department of Diaspora Studies, Yerevan, Armenia
* Correspondence Lusine TANAJYAN, apt. 3/22, 1st street, Nor Kharberd, 0817, Armenia E-mail: [email protected]
Abstract: The paper is devoted to the problem of studying the entrepreneurship motives of Diaspora Armenians in their homeland. This term in the article refers to investment activities of Diaspora Armenians in Armenia, which are aimed at creating conditions for the resource provision of employment for the population and its social growth. Particular attention is paid to the ethnic component of the diaspora representatives' investment activities in Armenia. The tasks set in the paper are based on the analytical materials of sociological studies in Armenia, conducted in 1980, 1993, 2007 and 2021-2022, as well as the results of the studies of ten Armenian diaspora communities in different countries during 2012-20211. The research was carried out by the method of stand-ardized interviews, indepth interviews with experts and case studies of entrepreneurs
Economic ties stand out among the multilateral ties of the Motherland and the Diaspora for their strength and long-term nature. In particular, among the peoples with a larger quantity of dias-poras outside their ethnic homeland, the features of these ties are more pronounced. A diaspora with a significant potential and great investment opportunities can create favorable conditions for diasporic business circles to carry out entrepreneurial activities in the ethnic homeland.
Keywords: entrepreneurship, diaspora, homeland, motives, economy, ethnicity, investments.
Introduction
Armenia still possesses a serious financial and business resource of the new and old Armenian
1 The work was supported by the Science Committee of RA, in the frames of the research project № 21T-5B168.
diasporas, a high intellectual level and rich experience in managing the social elite, and a diversity of labor skills and abilities of an active and enterprising population. Therefore, the timely and appropriate use of this potential is a most serious problem facing the country. So, no matter
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how "objective," i.e., mainly economic, this problem might seem, it clearly has an ethno-social basis due to the social and ethno-cultural peculiarities of the Armenian ethnos. This explains the fact that more than thirty years after having declared independence in Armenia, in the Armenian diaspora as well, there is an interest of the most qualified representatives of their modern elites to identify ways of developing business activities in the homeland. In this connection, the study of the motives for the diaspora representatives' economic activities in their homeland, and identification of the role of specific demographic, social, and ethno-cultural features in their formation acquire particular importance. The identification and subsequent comprehension of these factors can provide a scientific basis to find new incentives for the dynamic development of the country (Newland & Patrick, 2004).
Numerous examples of entrepreneurship of the diaspora Armenians in Armenia clearly demonstrate the special connection between the motives of this activity of an ethnic nature with its economic expediency. The systematization of knowledge about the ethnic component of the diaspora representatives' investment activity in their homeland acquires special meaning in this context. It is relevant to examine the mechanisms of this activity in the factors that determine it, taking into consideration the growing role of modern diasporas in the world processes, which explains the scientific community's interest in this issue (Loshkaryov, 2015). It is especially important for Armenia, considering the significant social-spiritual and economic potential of the Armenian diaspora on the one hand, and the necessity of its involving in the republic's economy on the other. Stating the fact that the "70% of all foreign investments implemented in the country during the independence years is connected with the diaspora" (Ignatov, 2017, p. 117) reinforces this argument.
The analysis should begin with the fact that the reasons for such activities of the diaspora Armenians in Armenia are usually caused by some factors of a general and specific nature. The first of them, factors of a general nature, are located in a binary opposition, in which one pole is the place of entry, and the second is the exit of the investment resource. The first member of this opposition is the country that receives this resource. It is characterized by its political and
economic state, its place in the regional economic system, the ethno-social features and value system of the population, etc. The second pole is the country from which this resource comes. It is classified by the size of its territory and population, its level of economic development, its geographic location, and the nature of its historical ties with the homeland of the ethnic diasporas located there.
Differences in the history of education and quantitative parameters, types of settlement (ethnically compact or ethnically dispersed and characteristic features gravitating towards each of them) of the Armenians of the Diaspora, their demographic and social composition, economic potential, ethnic self-consciousness, the presence of traditions and other parameters condition the factors of a specific nature. Besides that, the specificity can obviously be expressed by the situation that has developed in the old and new diaspora groups, which can be reflected in personal and group characteristics of consciousness and behavior, based on demographic, social, and subcultural differences. Thus, the interaction of these factors manifests itself at the output and inputs of the resource movement, which are revealed in the content of the evaluations, judgments, and characters of behavior of the bearers of these resources and the spheres of their economic activity and current social practices in the homeland. In this regard, it is worth pointing out that this process can unfold in the very broad context of established relations between the diaspora and homeland.
The high level of ethnic identity, operating community organizations, strong blood ties, and other characteristics of modern Armenian diaspora define the fairly rich contents of its connections with the homeland. One of the real and concrete manifestations of these ties is the economic activity of its individual representatives in Armenia. It is obvious that the key drivers of such activity are revealed in the motives, the examination of which should be conducted "through a person included in the ethnic group" (Arut-yunyan et al., 1999, p. 7).
In the given case, besides economic expediency, it is an indispensable condition (Yerznkyan et al., 2015, p. 106); the ethnic component of en-trepreneurship lies in the aspiration to help their historic homeland, and in some cases to live and work in their ethnic milieu. The study of the mo-
tivation of such a behavior in the context of cause-and-effect relations will allow understanding the realities of homeland-diaspora economic interconnections. Proceeding from this, the paper discusses the range of problems and methodology of studying the diaspora Armenians' entre-preneurship motives in their homeland in economic and extra-economic factors underlying them.
In the context of the above-said, of special importance is the systemic understanding of the processes taking place, which is impossible without the search for new knowledge. It is also important that this knowledge is based on concrete empirical materials, which can be obtained through the development and implementation of special sociological research, as well as the use of available statistical data, narratives in the media, documents of organizations and other sources of necessary information. They are designed to identify and study the ethno-social components of the motives for economic activity, highlight the projections of these motives in the system of value orientations of different ethnic groups in Armenia and the Diaspora, and find the best ways to apply the mechanisms of encouraging Diaspora Armenians to invest in the country.
Study Overview
The growth of diasporas, their increasing role in internal and interstate relations largely determine the prospects for modern processes in the world (Cohen, 2008). This requires systemic elaborations close to life realities, which allow obtaining knowledge necessary for theoretical generalizations, and practical activities.
The idea that in many ways, if not in all, any activity (including economic ones) is based on cultural foundations gives grounds to pose the problem of studying the role of ethno-social factors in motivating the economic activities of diaspora Armenians in their homeland. Among them, firstly, are the symbolic-value entities that underlie both the process of socialization (acculturation) of a person, and each act of his self-manifestation. Notions, attitudes, evaluations, value orientations, goal setting and life plans (programs) of various groups of the Armenians living in different countries, mainly determined by the ethno-social environment and their socio-
demographic and subcultural parameters, are the most important premises in the analysis of the situation and constituent elements of economic forecasting the country's development in the perspective.
The main counterparty of the economic interrelations between Armenia and Diaspora are the representatives of business circles of diaspora Armenians, maintaining ties with their motherland and oriented to the economic activity in Armenia. It seems that the emotional attachment to the homeland by the representatives of individual groups of the Armenian ethnic community living in another country is mostly connected to the sense of homeland, memory, identity with the ethnicity as a whole. It appears that the emotional attachment to the homeland by the representatives of certain groups of the Armenian ethnic community living in another country is largely anchored on the feeling of kinship, memory, identity with the ethnic group as a whole. This circumstance imposes a noticeable imprint on the relations between the countries that give this resource and the country that receives it. In this case, one country acts as the investor, and the other as the object to which this investment has been addressed. The latter may be different in form, content and frequency, starting from single or short-term financial aid from the diaspora, and ending with long-term investment of the funds, resources, and technologies in their native country and direct participation in the capitalization of its various fields of economy. In this regard, it should be taken into consideration that if for donor countries this investment flow can very likely be of little significance, for Armenia it works as one of the important stimuli for its economic development. It is obvious that during the movement of these resources, certain collisions may appear both at the exit and entry points of a given resource flow. To resolve these contradictions, it is necessary to rethink the role of the diasporas in the relationship between the countries and in the exchange of resources between them.
Acquaintance with the given problems and experience of its analytical elaborations in Armenia shows that, with few exceptions the study of the diaspora Armenians' real motives of behavior in homeland is an auxiliary and attendant element. And this is in the case, when a motive in many situations becomes its principal factor, requiring a profound and comprehensive analy-
sis. The research experience in this sphere is based on the description and analysis of classical interrelations between the ethnic homeland and the diaspora in the countries with different characteristic features of culture, economic organization and social structure. This is connected with the fact that in modern Armenia, we deal with a country, which has passed, rather is still passing, a transformation stage in the social and political systems, from the non-fixed functioning economic regime to static economy (Avetisyan, 2013, p. 72). For the Armenians, whose stereotypes of the mentality and behavior took shape in another system and ethnic-religious surrounding (accordingly, in a different social, cultural, and institutional environment), Armenia embodies a national statehood, which should be supporte2. Consequently, the structure of motives, conditioned by this desire, can be both general and situational in nature, requiring specific knowledge. That is why the tasks set in the paper are based on the analytical materials of Armenia's sociological studies, conducted in 1980, 1993, 2007 and 2021, as well as the results of studies of ten diasporic Armenian communities in seven countries in 2012-2021.
The research was conducted by the method of standardized interviews, in-depth interviews of experts from Armenia, USA, Iran, Cyprus, France, Georgia, and Lebanon3, and case studies of entrepreneurs from these countries.
Besides multiple tasks in this research, the problem of studying the diasporic Armenians' motivation for investment activity in the homeland, and receiving information on the system of values of the individuals with the skills of business organization, and financial and technological resources were set forth. These activities are based on some non-economic factors, with economic reasons layered on top of them to a greater
2 Field research archive, Expert interview N 5, Department of Diaspora Studies, NAS RA, 2022. The data was collected in the framework of the research project № 21T-5B168, "Ethno-social factors of entrepreneurial activity in the context of RA-Diaspora relations".
3 Field research archive, Department of Diaspora Studies, NAS RA 2013-2020), The ethno-sociological research was carried out within the framework of the state target program,"The main directions of comparative studies of the Armenians in their own and foreign environments: problems and perspectives of the study" (2013-2020). This article is part of a broader study. The full comprehensive study was included in the author's dissertation.
or lesser extent. Non-economic factors are formed in several contexts.
The first context is the interstate relations, which stimulate the entrepreneurship of the diaspora Armenians in the homeland. These include the relations that have developed between the donor state and the recipient state: between France, the United States and the Russian Federation, on the one hand, and Armenia, on the other. The second context emerges from the diaspora's appropriate reaction to the situations in the homeland. The latter context is due to the tradition of consanguinity between spatially separated relatives. Let's consider them in more detail.
The Context of Interstate Relations
The absence of common borders with those countries, where large Armenian communities exist and the semi-blockade state of the Republic of Armenia for three decades (Davtyan, 2015, pp. 129-130) are a serious obstacle to attract resources from the diaspora, due to which Armenia's economic ties with the countries of high economic potential of the Armenians (Russia, The United States, Canada, France, Lebanon, and others) become complicated.
For this reason, investment programs coming from outside and their areas of application become somewhat peculiar. So Armenia, at one time a country with a developed industry, lost this potential due to the problems associated with logistics and reforms.
In this situation, in the public consciousness of the population of Armenia and its governing bodies and the public, as well as the main figures of diaspora organizations, a firm conviction was formed in the need to attract the economic resources of the diaspora to the country's economy. Thus, in 2011, in an interview given to Telecom CNN commentators, Tigran Sargsyan, the head of the government of Armenia, noted that: "The Armenian diaspora is the first source of investments for Armenia," and investments and private transfers from the Diaspora amount to 60 -70% of Armenia's GDP (Grigoryan & Kara-petyan, 2013, p. 67). Statistical data on the dynamics of change of the volume of investments between 2000 and 2022 show the periods of the highest and lowest activity of foreign investments in the Armenian economy (see Fig. 1).
The periods of recession in terms of the volume of investments in the country's economy fell in 2000-2003, although during this period it was accompanied by their gradual growth, after which it increased more than four times already
in 2008. Subsequently, there was a decline in these indicators, which in 2017 decreased by more than four times. Then, in 2021 and 2022, the volume of foreign investments increased by more than eight times as compared with 2017.
2500
2000
1500
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20002001200220032004200520062007200820092010201120122013201420152016201720182019202020212022
Figure 1. Dynamics of the Total Volume of Ineestments in the Republic of Armenia from Foreign Countries in the Period Between 2000 and 2022 (in million USD). The graph was compiled by the authors, based on the statistics of the RA Statistical Office for 2000-2022 (Source: RA Statistical Office -www.Armstat.aml.
Against the background of data on the dynamics of changes in the volume of investments, statistics allowed to clarify the structure of donor countries. In terms of the financial contribution of each state to the economy of Armenia, a remarkable picture has developed in just four years (2009-2012). It gives, somewhat indirect, but still an idea of the role of diasporas in the composition of the countries, participating in the economic development of Armenia. There is a clear correlation between the presence of a large and organized community of Armenians in each of the countries, listed in Table 1 and the level of investment contribution. Thus, the Russian Federation, France, the United States, Argentina and Lebanon are among the top five countries with the largest volumes of investment. It is obvious. First of all, ethnic Armenians are most numerous
in the Russian Federation, where they constitute 2.5 million people, in the USA - about 2 million, France - by different estimates from 500 to 700 thousand, in Lebanon - about 200 thousand, in Argentina 70 thousand. At this, the social parameters of Armenians in the mentioned countries are most complex, with a very wide range of professions and economically active categories of the Armenian population. In addition to this, there is a significant contingent of natives of Armenia who have not lost their family and community ties with their homeland in these countries. This circumstance leads to their active participation in the fate of their homeland, not only through remittances and donations for various projects, but also through their direct involvement in the economic life of Armenia.
Table l.
First Ten Countries - Investors of Armenia 2009-2012 (in million US dollars) Direct Foreign Investments DFI (by years) (https://armstat.am/en/?nid=82&id=291)
2009 2010 2011 2012
RF 3S4 195 394 123
France 197 147 100 230
USA 13 б 44 15
Great Britain 0.09 4 34 3
Canada - 0.1 32 0.1
FRG 19 22 25 48
Argentina 48 30 19 55
Switzerland - 10 18 45
Cyprus 7 12 18 7
Lebanon 14 11 14 13
Total 732 482 81б 752
At the present stage, the structure of its economy is mainly limited to extractive and light industries, agriculture and services. This circumstance allows large diasporic Armenian entrepreneurs to invest in those large investment projects that provide funding for social and infrastructural (including medical) projects.
Both in the diaspora and in the home country, the public resonance, regarding the role of diaspora representatives in economic relations with donor countries, is a significant indicator of developing these processes. It is determined by a multitude of constitutive elements. The first of them is represented by the response of different segments of the societies in many countries (in particular, Armenian diaspora figures) to the established relations between their countries and Armenia. As evidence of one such response, the two-day international conference "Alternative Investments in Armenia" held in Yerevan on November 8, 2022, attended by more than 150 representatives from Armenia, the United States, Great Britain, and Curacao, is a case in point.
Such responses that we managed to record during our sociological research in the Russian Federation, the United States, Lebanon, Iran, France, and Armenian communities in other countries contain a description of the state of economic relations between Armenia and the Diaspora in the past, present, and future: the essence of problems, arising during the development and evaluation of certain events connected with the relations between their countries and Armenia. The second element includes the information resource, presented in the media, the influence of which on public opinion is obvious.
The flow of stories constituting ideological clichés, myths, stereotypes, etc. in this information, contain the charge (positive or negative), which should influence the quality and intensity of interstate relations and determine the public sympathies. The third element comprises personalities as bearers of information, whose authority largely determines the content of expectations, value orientations of different layers of society and, ultimately, influences the decision-makers. Most of the Armenian and Diaspora ex-persons interviewed during our study believe that the Diaspora, being a part of the Armenian nation, has its interests that are directly related to Armenia, which cannot be ignored. But the extent of participation in the economic development of the country, in their general opinion, directly depends on the chosen strategy for the development of Armenia. They generally note that it is necessary to build such relations, which will bring benefits for the Diaspora to be interested in the RA external economic processes itself. According to experts, there is also a psychological reason for this, which is a very significant problem.
It is related to the differences in the cultural environment in Armenia and the countries where the investment activity comes from.
The majority of experts agree in the opinion that to activate the Armenian Diaspora on the territory of the Republic of Armenia, the specific political organizations and the actions of individual people should play a role. The existing digital organizations do not yet give the desired result that we would like to fix. Here, to a greater extent, personal initiative acts, which is due both to the conditions, prevailing in this particular envi-
ronment (informational, political, etc.), and the presence of effective interpersonal ties in the common space of the homeland and the country of residence.
In the field of small business, diaspora Armenians occupy niches in the services sector, shoe-making, jewelry production and others; what is noteworthy, their activities are developing on the sites of former enterprises (Karapetyan & Ner-sisyan, 2013, pp. 216-217). The expediency of such an "entry" into the RA economy is due to the presence of a certain infrastructure for this type of production (premises, equipment, etc.), and to the entrepreneurs' preserved former ties and availability of sales markets in Armenia and Russia. Despite the small capacity of the market, the logistics costs, Armenia's weak participation in the region's economy, the diaspora business circles prefer to "do business" in medium and small businesses of the Republic. At this, most of the entrepreneurs of this caliber, interviewed in 2020-2022, motivate their activity in Armenia by the desire to live and work in the homeland, in their national environment. However, they emphasize that they are also attracted by the guaranteed investment, the cheapness of life and labor in their homeland.
The Context of Traditional Homeland-Diaspora Interrelations
According to the sociological studies in Armenia, in the structure of entrepreneurs from abroad, of great significance is the level of the Armenians' settlement compactness in the diaspora. As a rule, there are more representatives from the compact zones among them. It is quite essential to understand the ethnic-social grounds of the aspirations to work in their ethnic homeland. Thus, the materials of the studies in the places of settlement of the ethnic groups in the diaspora, particularly, in Tehran and Beirut, Los Angeles and Paris, Tbilisi and Moscow, show that the Armenians from ethnically compact settlement zones to a greater extent expressed desire to live in their homeland4. This indicates that the
4 Field research archive, Department of Diaspora Studies, NAS RA 2013-2020), The ethno-sociological research was carried out within the framework of the state target program,"The main directions of comparative studies of the Armenians in their own and foreign environments:
main motive for such behavior is not in the least part due to the ethnic identity, the preservation degree of which is higher in ethnically compact zones of settlement. Community organizations are active there, internal ethnic interconnections are intense, and the ties with the homeland are systemic there, etc. The real confirmation of this in Armenia itself was the fact that most of the diaspora Armenian businessmen included in the republican selection were mainly from ethnically compact zones (Lebanon and Iran), and only one third of them were from the countries with an ethnically dispersed type of settlement.
Thus, in the presented context, the non-economic component of the diaspora Armenians' entrepreneurial motives in the homeland is due to multiple features that can be conditionally grouped into three categories. The first category of signs is associated with the nature of forming each specific diasporic community of Armenians, the second category is determined by the conditions of their life, and the third - by the composition characteristics of each concrete ethnic group.
It is worth beginning with a significant fact that after summarizing the results of our studies which were aimed at revealing the motives of Armenian businessmen from the Diaspora, depending on the areas of their capabilities (financial, professional, organizational, etc.), as well as their experience in Armenia, we can make one general conclusion. For the entrepreneurs from the Diaspora their need to develop economic activity in their native land, apart from significant economic purposefulness, has an emotional motivation. The matter is that beyond their native land, ethnic groups have actualized ethnic self-consciousness and based on it, there forms a need to realize their investment projects in their ethnic homeland. Usually these entrepreneurs are professionals: shoemakers, winemakers, jewellers, restaurateurs, technicians, and other representatives of medium and small businesses. For the establishment of their business, they used the existing base in their home country - inactive enterprises, vacant premises, etc. For example, some of them use the premises of former shoe factories, confectionery factories, bakeries, etc.
problems and perspectives of the study" (2013-2015). This article is part of a broader study. The full comprehensive study was included in the author's dissertation.
Here, of course, a specific personal motive, determined by a desire to increase the competitiveness of Armenia on the one hand, introducing new technologies and advanced management, opening new jobs, involving some of their relatives, and fellow countrymen (villagers), etc., and on the other hand, to make their projects economically purposeful and profitable acquires a special meaning. It is obvious that the latter takes second place and is achieved only after the first problem is resolved. That is why, from the viewpoint of the business community, this kind of activity in the country is not so attractive; besides, Armenia does not have the necessary conditions for business. But still, for diaspora investors, Armenia is of particular interest due to the following reasons. Investors open business in their native country in the spheres, in which they have achieved success outside their native country. Trying to bring their experience, the latest technological developments and management, the representatives of the diaspora are often forced to make unnecessary expenses here, as on this way, there are plenty of problems most often due to non-compatibility of the profile of their economic activities in the diaspora with the local needs. That is why most often in their home country, they face the necessity to diversify their activity, spend more money than they have planned and expect fewer dividends. Therefore, it is obvious that the main reason to continue their activities in the home country is the emotional component of their motivation.
The Context of Kinship Network Relations
It is worth paying attention to one significant factor that determines the emotional content of the motives for the participation of the Armenian diaspora in the economic relations between donor and recipient countries. It is mainly connected with the institute of blood kinship, which by virtue of the tradition of the big family, "ger-dastan", is present in the value system of family and kinship relations. It seems to be in the context of these values that the social network, in which an intensive informational exchange, and the tradition of cooperation take place. That is why it is necessary to consider the role of traditional values in the formation of social networks between spatially dispersed relatives. The new
social networks are the basis for the study of ethnic-social constituent of the economic relations of the diaspora and homeland.
The vast majority of Armenian residents and diaspora members perceive the existence of spatially diffuse social networks, based on kinship ties, the nature of their functioning, and their potentialities. It manifested itself during sociological research (archive) when we recorded the striking awareness of respondents about the lives of former residents of a given settlement living elsewhere, in the capital and outside the republic, as well as the awareness of emigrants about their relatives, neighbours, and fellow countrymen, who remained in their homeland. In the person of their relatives, and fellow countrymen, they form an image of a real social network, which has a serious resource to secure their interests both in their settlement and beyond its borders. And in respondents' perceptions this network has spatial extent, strength of ties and potential of opportunities.
For members of kinship groups, space acts, in one case, only as an obstacle and cause of costs (related to crossing borders, obtaining citizenship, arranging housing, etc.) in achieving their goals, and in the other, as a field of activity, which, depending on the content of interconnections within networks, can expand or, conversely, narrow. In both cases, they see space as a certain abstract phenomenon, while the social network, members of which they imagine being, is quite real. The degree of kinship, spatial localization, occupation, position in society, income, etc. are the criteria, from which the resource capabilities of the members of this community are drawn.
According to sociological research data, carried out by the authors in Armenia, already in 2005, 40% of all urban residents of the Republic had close relatives and 20% had distant relatives, living abroad. Today, it seems that besides the economic, social, and psychological factors of reproduction of the relationship between the diaspora and homeland, the important role is played by the institute of blood kinship, attachment to neighbours and fellow countrymen, which become a condition for the functioning of social networks that connect representatives of the Armenian ethnic group in their own and foreign environments.
Table 2.
Existence of Close and Distant Relatives Living Outside the RA and the Degree of Kinship in %, According to the Sociological Survey of the Population of Armenia in 2005-2007.
city village
Host country RF 83 85
Countries of the ex-USSR 9 5
European countries 9 8
CUSA and Canada 18 5
Kinship degree Close relatives 49 55
Uncles, aunts, etc. 17 75
Distant rlatives 27 56
No relatives 34 7
It should be noted that in addition to the historically established diaspora in the countries of Europe, America, and the post-Soviet space, a new contingent has formed, consisting of people from Armenia and the CIS countries. In this new diaspora, kinship relations are of particular importance, which, with the spatial dispersion of relatives, acquire a network texture. The overwhelming majority of the Armenians, interviewed in the diaspora and Armenia, is aware of these networks, the character of their functioning, and their potentialities. Moreover, each type of the RA settlement has its own network potential of family ties, in compliance with which you can explore possible attendant or proceeding from this process further movements, financial flows, exchange of technologies, economic changes, and so on. Among the five cities in Armenia, Gyumri is distinguished by the largest number of people who have close relatives living outside the republic - more than half of the respondents (55%), which is understandable. Part of the Gyumri people, survivors of the disastrous earthquake, actively emigrated to Russia, and some groups emigrated to the countries of Europe and America. And as usually, due to the emigration of the youngest generation, this process led to the separation of families. According to the data, the closest to Gyumri is Gavar, which, together with the surrounding villages, differed from other regions in long- standing traditions of economic (labour) connections with Russia. Then comes Kapan, which lived through the difficult years of bombardment, and the collapse of industrial production. Ijevan and Yerevan had the lowest indices (Karapetyan, 2014). As for rural settlements, the pattern is as follows:
the larger the settlement, the higher it is located in the area; the closer to large cities, the higher the data on the presence of relatives and friends outside the Republic (Karapetyan, 2014).
What connects these people with the homeland besides their relatives and dears? Apparently, the property they left in Armenia - real estate, enterprise, or business. The presence or absence of these signs of communication may indicate, on the one hand, a full detachment from the place they left (decision not to return), or on the contrary, keeping when leaving Armenia "just in case" a spare airdrome if they failed at a new place. On the other hand, the existing property shows the desire of an emigrant to have real estate, production, a business in the homeland, where his relatives can guarantee the safety of this property, manage a business, etc. The latter, in all appearances, is a kind of help to the close relatives and dears, who remained at home, in the motherland. It is no coincidence that the first ones make up two thirds among the people who left their property in Armenia, and the second ones are only a few, comprising one tenth part. It is not accidental either that people from Armenia living in Russia have more property in the homeland (over two-thirds of the respondent relatives of the emigrants) than those living in Europe, the former Soviet Union, the United States, and Canada. The factor of distance, transparency of borders (possibilities of border crossing), and historical closeness of Armenia with these countries act here.
Interconnections between the homeland and the diaspora function this way, in the context of social relations, formed on the base of the institute of blood ties in the Armenian ethnicity. At
this, the economic component of these interrelations, in addition to the simple help of close relatives and nears can be determined by the activity profile, and the social and demographic composition of the emigrants themselves.
Numerous examples of mutual assistance between consanguineous relatives, diffused in many countries, testify to the strength of the kinship tradition. One of this examples is here, when the respondent first worked in Vladivostok last year, then trying to find some job, he went to Bashkiria to his uncle, who was working as an asphalt pavement worker (for 7-8 months a year). Then he went to Volgograd to his sister (she had been living there with her family for several years), and afterwards he went to Sochi to another sister (she had a house with her family, and had settled down in this city). Our respondent stayed in Sochi for three or four months, worked there at a construction site and finally, in November, he came back to his village in Armenia. During his trip to Russia his relatives actively found a job for him in every city, and he chose the one he liked. At this, his relatives living in Russia helped him and his family to get Russian citizenship. In the same village, a relative living in the USA bought a rural supermarket for one of the village residents, repaired it and gave it to him to support his family. A relative from France bought the premises of a former enterprise for another resident of the same village, and gave him a chance to earn money on euro-packages.
Another villager who had to undergo an expensive heart operation, he received financial support from his relative living in France. This is only one village, and many such instances can illustrate mutual help and strong emotional connection among the consanguineous relatives, separated by the borders of different countries.
Conclusion
The motives of economic activity of diaspora representatives in their home country depend on numerous factors of general and specific nature. General factors are determined by the state of donor and recipient countries - historical development, place in the regional or world system of economic relations, ethnic-social parameters of the population, system of values, etc. Factors of a
specific nature are conditioned by personal and group features of consciousness and activity, which are based on demographic, social, and cultural differences, structures of economic activity. It should be pointed out that the study of the motives of entrepreneurial activity of representatives of the diaspora in the homeland has not only economic aspects, but significant emotional aspect as well. This requires a profound study of psychological, and socio-normative approaches to comprehend the nature of forming the motives for such behaviour.
The investment activity of the diaspora Armenians in their homeland is determined by the complex interrelations of economic and non-economic motives. The expediency of an entrepreneur's economic activity is dictated by the real conditions conducive to achieving success, that has certain limitations in Armenia. Therefore, the system of values formed in an ethnically marked environment, with all its components, can be present in the motives of economic activity in the homeland. It can be assumed that the ethnic-social factor of motives is the main factor in the disposition of representatives of a part of the diaspora to establish and develop economic activity in their homeland. Therefore, the scope of the problem itself and the methodology of its study require multifaceted empirical research aimed at achieving knowledge from such an important source as the witness and participant in the events.
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