In the run-up to the 2026 parliamentary elections, Armenian people and the country’s government have increasingly found themselves in the vortex of geopolitical intrigues and great powers’ competition. September asked a socialist scholar from Armenia for an insider perspective on the economic and political situation in the country as the Civil Contract party and its leader, Nikol Pashinyan, fight for reelection amid rising internal and external pressure.

September invited Vlad and Nikolai* — left-wing social researchers from Russia and Ukraine, respectively — to reflect on how leftists on both sides initially responded when the full-scale invasion began. Together, they examine what that early analysis got right and where it fell short, trace how Ukrainian and Russian societies have been reshaped by years of war, and explore the particular challenges facing left-wing researchers on each side of the front line. *Names have been changed to protect the participants’ safety.

Murad Gattal on the causes and prerequisites for a new escalation in the Armenian-Azerbaijani conflict and the transformations that it caused in Azerbaijani society.