Future Bureau-preneurs?

According to the Armenian Public Radio, Minister of Economy Mr. Nersess Yeritsian went head hunting at Yerevan State University yesterday, 11 February 2009. In his meeting with a group of graduating students majoring in Economics and Sociology, Mr. Yeritsian declared that there are currently more than 40 vacant positions at the Ministry of Economy.

The Minister proposed that the students consider public service as career option, and invited them to take part in the upcoming recruitment competitions. “The competition is going to be open. We need individuals who come forth with new initiatives. We will help them accomplish those initiatives,” he said.

Low level of salaries and widespread corruption are factors that usually discourage ambitious and competent young graduates from taking jobs at public administration.

According to the Minister, the first phase of economic reforms in Armenia has been completed while the government’s plan to build a science-intensive economy remains high on the agenda.

The Minister added that the science-intensive economy implies emphasis on research, education and financial infrastructure. “If these fields are integrated and constitute a critical share in a country’s GDP, the country can be said to have a science-intensive economy,” the Minister explained.
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Religion in Azerbaijani Schools

Hanover-based German review Internationale Schulbuchforschung, issue number 30 (2008), contains an article entitled “Presentations of Islam in Secondary Secular Schools in Contemporary Azerbaijan” by Ms. Sevil Guseynova.

As a country with a Shiite majority, it is doubtful if Azerbaijan can maintain its strict secular system, a heritage from the Soviet era, for a long time. Primary and secondary education can play some role in this regard (proved insufficient in Iran and Iraq), and the continued research on the topic is certainly much needed.

Ms. Guseynova is a PhD candidate at Institute of Philosophy, Legal and Political Research of the National Academy of Sciences of Azerbaijan, and a research fellow at Novator Independent Social Research Center, Baku.

The Article’s abstract is as follows:

Ideas about Islam (its versions, origins, social and cultural significance, etc.) have long been present in school history courses, and also in the "Man and Society" course. The "Man and Society" course was launched in the early 1990s in secondary schools in grades 9, 10 and 11 after Azerbaijan had left the USSR.

This was certainly an act of innovation. It was claimed that this course would be new in terms of its content and thus would have little in common with the "Social Science" course launched in the Soviet times.

It was quite natural to expect that the religion of the majority of the population, Islam, would in any case be mentioned in the textbooks for the course, which aimed at forming the "correct" citizens. Azerbaijani nationalism referred to Islam as one of the most important foundations of the identity of Azerbaijanis, along with the Azerbaijani language.

Representations of Islam in school have gone through noticeable changes in the post-Soviet situation. At the same time, the system of secular education is not aimed at focusing on teaching religious rules, norms and rituals. Rather it is a question of symbolic identity – the declarative ascription of Azerbaijanis to Islam as one of the most significant bases of their identity. In this context Islam, for the time being, remains only one of the component parts of ethnicity ("our" religion), though a significant one.
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To download the article in PDF (6.13 MB) from Heinrich Boell Foundation website (South Caucasus Regional Office), please click here.

I thank Onnik Krikorian for sending me the information.
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