“Do global politics play an important role in shaping your everyday life?”

By Namaz Kerimov

Most people around us think that politics are not related to our everyday life. In some opinions it is related only to politicians, businesses, political parties and government institutions. But unfortunately sometimes we do not understand that it is about life and it affects all of us.

Society changes according to politics. It is hard to know sometimes how our life has changed until we stop for a moment and look at how different it is from ten or even five years ago. Think of our country today and 15 years ago. We’ve all heard a reference to how women never used to wear short dresses or have cell phones or even that so many bars were open to the public. Local people have changed in correlation with the government changing and new European values bringing new styles to our society. These values are imposed on us, especially the generation now that knows nothing but this. Politics has shaped us and changed us, not as individuals but as a society.

Right now I live near to the conflict zone of Nagorno Karabakh. This area is under global geopolitical conflict. More than 25 years people have lived here under risk. They always are face to face with the fear of death. Almost every day there is fighting here and many soldiers are killed. People cannot walk in streets, children cannot play in a yard, and there are high walls in front of houses. Most people work only during the night, because working in the open is dangerous. You can be shouted anytime by your neighbours. I think working towards a resolve of this is a real example to show how global politics can effect our lives every day.

When one lives life aware of the importance of politics, aware that every decision has an impact on an entire population, aware that your individual behaviour is not the result of just you and those immediately around you, but it is also a result of governance, one can acknowledge why it’s worth fighting for. The way forward is to acknowledge this, accept it, and finally put it into practice. I believe that a better government is not one that only improves infrastructure here and there and resolves our economic woes, but one that will also actively contribute to our everyday life for the better – maybe then we can decide that politics is something worth fighting for. Because we should be able to democratically elect how we live our lives.

More about Namaz:

Namaz Karimov was born in Barda region. In 2014 graduated from Baku State University.  It is almost 5 years working in social sector in different position. Since 2011 works with local and international organizations like International Eurasian Press Fund, UNICEF, Azerbaijan Youth Foundation, Peace Corps, American Bar Association – ABA CELLI and so on.  He participated more than 100 local and international trainings and as a freelance facilitator facilitated many trainings in different topics.

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