Nagorno-Karabakh is the disputable territory between Armenia and Azerbaijan, and its political destiny is connected with the preservation of ethnonational principles of both sides of the conflict. The investigation focuses on the reasons causing the political and military tension. Understanding the reasons that led to the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and the parties interested in it allows one to articulate claims concerning possible outcomes in this situation. The research question is whether geopolitical and ethnic-legal causes of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict can lead to its escalation from a local to a regional one. It is possible to hypothesize that without mutual respect of the governments for the ethnonational interests of their opponents, the aggravation of political relationships between Armenia and Azerbaijan concerning the territories of Nagorno-Karabakh is inevitable. This political tension led to increased radical opinions among Armenian and Azerbaijan populations concerning the disputable territory. The subsequent polarization of society concerning this issue might cause the dramatic escalation of the military confrontation (Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project 1). Therefore, the Nagorno-Karabakh competition may develop from a local to a regional one, and the escalation of the hostility is inevitable if the geopolitical and national contexts do not change.
The main definitions in the current investigation are ethnonational, geopolitical, and state-legal causes of the conflict between Armenia, Nagorno-Karabakh, and Azerbaijan. The variables that represent the definitions mentioned earlier in the research are the right to self-determination and the state’s territorial integrity. The indicators for these variables that can be measured objectively are the consequences of the collapse of the USSR that led to socio-economic and political disproportions, historical hostility and mutual distrust between the Armenian and Azerbaijani ethnic groups, the negative regional influence of the United States, and Turkey in the Caucasus region, the unbalanced national policy of Azerbaijan (Clark and Yazici 1). Therefore, the concepts of the right to national self-determination and the country’s territorial integrity can be observed, measured, and used in the subsequent investigation using the indicators mentioned above of the variables.
Works Cited
Armed Conflict Location, and Event Data Project. “Civilians Under Fire in Nagorno-Karabakh: September-November 2020.” Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project, 2020, pp. 1-2.
Clark, Mason, and Ezgi Yazici. “Erdogan Seeks to Upend Kremlin-Backed Status Quo in Nagorno-Karabakh.” Institute for the Study of War, 2020, pp. 1-3.