Yerevan/Mediamax/. The Washington Post columnist Anne Applebaum thinks that protest movement in Armenia needs a strategy.

“Demonstrations matter even when they don’t succeed: They cheer people up, spread solidarity, keep people inspired. Every once in a while, they achieve something dramatic. But most of the time, by themselves, it’s important to remember that unless they can institutionalize the demands of the crowd - find ways to make them permanent - they aren’t enough.

The movement has to join or become a political party, the street leaders have to become politicians. In democracies, they need to win elections. In political vacuums, such as the one right now in Armenia, they need a strategy. To convert the desire for change into a more just society is a long project, one which requires people to work for many years, not just to show up for a few hours”, Anne Applebaum writes.

Anne Applebaum is Pulitzer Prize winner and historian with a particular expertise in the history of communist and post-communist Europe. She is also a professor at the London School of Economics.