ABSTRACT
Modern Armenian political consciousness evolved as a reaction against the suffocating effects of medieval Ottoman and Persian imperialism in the process of disintegration and as a response to new but problematic opportunities for liberation offered by increasing Western and Russian interests in the area. Russian expansion to the Caucasus occurred when modern Western imperialism was becoming the most pervasive force in international relations, and when technologically backward states such as the Ottoman and Persian realms were being integrated into the world market system. Unusual manifestations of Armenian nationalism were in part reactions against these overtures to the traditional antagonist. In 1975 many Armenians were ousted from the Communist Party in Karabakh or imprisoned on charges of nationalist agitation contrary to "the principles of Leninist friendship of peoples and proletarian internationalism". Soviet Armenian nationalism embodied an unwillingness to accept the injustices of the past as well as resentment of Soviet oppression.
