The launch of “Diasporan Perspectives – The Gulbenkian Initiative on Armenian Issues ” (Սփիւռքեան հեռանկարներ) will take place on Friday 5 December 2025 at 17:30. The event will be available to follow via livestream.

Diasporan Perspectives will commission, publish and disseminate new research in the social sciences focusing on the Armenian Diaspora and Armenia, while acting as a convening space for leaders, policy makers and experts. Two projects supported by the Armenian Communities Department of the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation, The Armenian Diaspora Survey and “Where do we go Next”, have provided the fertile ground for Diasporan Perspective to emerge from, while developments on the ground in Armenia and in the Diaspora have made the creation of such a think tank imperative.

Diasporan Perspectives aims to contextualise the Armenian experience in a wider international setting. Based in the Diaspora, the initiative brings diasporan perspectives on national issues amplifying the outside-in approach as well as giving the Armenian Diaspora possibility to reclaim its own independent thinking on national issues. Its mission is “to foster cutting-edge social science research, analysis and strategic thinking that is transformative, open to the world and Armenian focussed.”

A special roundtable discussion will mark the official launch of Diasporan Perspectives. It will be opened by the President of the Foundation, Professor António Feijó. The panelists will address key questions such as: Why such a think tank now? How will it be different from other such initiatives? What are its goals and objectives? What does a diasporan perspective entail in analysing national issues? Will it be able to reach out to decision makers? These are some of the questions the roundtable will address. The speakers will also take questions from the audience.

The speakers are:

• Razmik Panossian, Director of the Armenian Communities Department of the Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation.
• Vicken Cheterian, Director of the Diasporan Perspectives initiative; professor at the University in Geneva, Switzerland.
• Armine Ishkanian, Professor in the Department of Social Policy at the London School of Economics and Political Science.

The discussion will be in English, without simultaneous translation.

Open item in modal