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LAST UPDATE | 20 May 2024
GEORGIA IS NO stranger to political tumult and once again the country has endured weeks of mass protests, police brutality and international condemnation triggered by the passage of a deeply polarising law on ‘foreign agents’.
The legislation is controversial, as it would require civil society organisations and media outlets in receipt of funding from outside of Georgia to register as organisations “bearing the interests of a foreign power”, subjecting them to enhanced government oversight and possible sanctions.
Critics have dubbed it “the Russian law” as the Kremlin has in place similar legislation designed to quash NGOs and non-government-controlled media. Given Georgia’s relative poverty and the huge resources at the disposal of the state, NGOs play an important role in promoting human rights, democracy, and the rule of law.
The legislation evokes strong emotions because many see it as consolidating authoritarianism in Georgia and jeopardising the country’s chances of joining the EU, which most Georgians favour. Coming so soon after the EU’s decision to award Georgia candidate status, protesters see this as an existential moment for Georgia’s future, whether it becomes a Russian satellite like Belarus or a fully-fledged member of Euro-Atlantic structures, as the Baltic States have done.
If all this sounds familiar, it’s because the ruling Georgian Dream (GD) party tried to introduce an almost identical bill last year but backed down following huge street demonstrations and international condemnation. The GD government seems more determined this time to push the legislation. Peaceful protesters have been beaten up on the streets. The homes of prominent civil society leaders have been targeted with smearing posters. Those who supported Georgia’s application for EU candidate status – it was conditionally approved last December despite major reservations — now feel betrayed by the GD government.
Post-Soviet politics in Georgia has been dominated by four powerful and divisive leaders. The first two, Zviad Gamsakhurdia and Eduard Shevardnadze, were overthrown while the third, Mikheil Saakashvili is in prison. The fourth and current political heavyweight is Bidzina Ivanishvili, a multi-billionaire who made his fortune in Russia during the 1990s before returning to his native Georgia and becoming prime minister in 2012.
Ivanishvili has drifted in and out of formal positions according to his whim but is generally recognised to be the key figure directing Georgia’s government. His current position — honorary chairman of the ruling GD party – reveals little of his real power or resources.
Despite a steady stream of western diplomats and politicians visiting Georgia to petition for a change of course, Ivanishvili has refused to meet any of them. In an illuminating admission, the Georgian government attributed this boycott to the fact that a staggering two billion dollars of Ivanishvili’s wealth has been frozen in Swiss bank accounts since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Consequently, it seems that Georgia’s geopolitical direction and its interaction with the rest of the world is to be dictated by the interests of its richest man.
Ivanishvili has also sharpened his anti-western rhetoric. In a recent public address, he described his predecessors, who governed Georgia from 2004-2012 as “a foreign appointed revolutionary committee” that “came to power as a result of an NGO-led revolution”. He claimed that NGOs constituted a “pseudo-elite nurtured by a foreign country’ who ‘have no homeland; they do not love their country or their people”. Apparently referring to influential figures in the EU and US, Ivanishvili admonished what he called “the global party of war” which had “forced the confrontation of Georgia with Russia and then put Ukraine in even worse peril”.
How can we reconcile GD’s stated objective of joining the EU with the enactment of policies it knows will sabotage the membership process? While the GD government has been inconsistent in its foreign policy messaging it now appears to have concluded that EU membership, however popular it might be with the electorate, would necessitate undesirable changes in how Georgian politics is conducted.
❗️GD terror showed up at my 77 y. o. father's house, damaged properties, destroyed car and put up these dirty posters..
— Giorgi Tabagari (@Tabagari) May 11, 2024
I don't even live there, haven't lived already for years and yet, that didn't stop them. Irony of it all is that my dad was a GD voter until now.. but clearly… pic.twitter.com/UOnUf8mqyX
If a coherent aim can be identified, it is for GD to emulate the Hungarian government of Victor Orbán which has proved adept at defying EU partners while accepting billions in funds from Brussels. Indeed, Orbán has developed something of a bromance with his GD counterparts, in particular on the promotion of ‘traditional values’ and countering LGBT ‘propaganda’.
But while Hungary is inside the EU camp, the Georgians are on the other side of the tent looking in. For his part, Orbán wants countries like Georgia and Serbia in the EU to help transform it into something more aligned with his illiberal nationalist project. Within the EU, however, Orbán is seen as an unwelcome outlier rather than a model for future members.
Predictably, GD’s decision to push through the controversial law has attracted widespread criticism from its ostensible partners. The EU parliament overwhelmingly passed a stinging resolution condemning the draft law, which it claimed was incompatible with EU values and democratic principles, undermined Georgia’s ambitions for EU membership, and endangered the country’s Euro-Atlantic integration.
Furthermore, it stressed that EU accession negotiations should not be opened as long as the foreign agents law is part of Georgia’s legal order. Only 25 of the parliament’s 705 MEPs voted against the resolution, including Irish MEPs Clare Daly and Mick Wallace. Luke Ming Flanagan was one of thirty MEPs who abstained.
Speaking to the pro-Government Imedi TV channel, Daly urged Georgians to ignore the European Parliament resolution as the elections in June would bring positive change in Brussels. She claimed there were lobbyists within the European Parliament trying to bring Georgia into conflict with Russia “as they did in Ukraine”. Daly described the EU position as “disgraceful”, and said there was ‘nothing undemocratic’ about the foreign agents’ law.
The Kremlin has relished the falling out between GD and the EU. Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov maintained that the Georgian government was merely trying to protect itself from foreign meddling and he admonished the “undisguised interference” in Georgia’s affairs from western states. His assertion that “Russia does not interfere and does not intend to interfere in the future” would excite mirth amongst many Georgians given their history of conflict.
Georgia has been at the brink many times during the last decades. Sometimes it has pulled back at the last moment, other times it has fallen into the abyss. Irrespective of how this episode ends, Georgia’s reputational stock within the EU has plummeted. More importantly, Georgian society is polarised to a dangerous degree. The cycle of relentless upheaval in Georgia and zero-sum politics seems set to continue.
Where does it leave Georgia’s aspirations to join the EU? The GD government confidently predicts the country will join in 2030. The reality is that Georgia’s membership prospects are in the distant future. But while EU membership is not practical politics right now, the aspiration will continue to play a major role within Georgian society. For most Georgians, the only alternative to the European path is the one that leads to Moscow. And they know well from experience and observation how that story goes.
Donnacha Ó Beacháin is Professor of Politics at Dublin City University. For more than two decades he has worked and researched in the post-Soviet region and has been published widely on the subject.
“The legislation is controversial”, no it’s not. Foreign interests funding NGOs to influence a country is a problem.
@Miley Byrne: “The legislation evokes strong emotions because many see it as consolidating authoritarianism in Georgia and jeopardising the country’s chances of joining the EU, which most Georgians favour. Coming so soon after the EU’s decision to award Georgia candidate status, protesters see this as an existential moment for Georgia’s future, whether it becomes a Russian satellite like Belarus or a fully-fledged member of Euro-Atlantic structures, as the Baltic States have done.”
Miley head over and tell the thousands of protestors that they’ve got it wrong.
@honey badger: people protesting does not make NGOs good. Protesters are worried, and maybe rightly so, about EU membership being put in jepoardy. They are not protesting the potential removal of NGOs
@Miley Byrne: Yet you’ve no issue with foreign interference from Russia, interesting.
@Oh Mammy: Yes, they are.
They know what this law is about.
That is why they call it ‘the russian law’, for the same law was used to eliminate opposition voices in russia.
@Miley Byrne: the anti-NGOs (non-government organisations) only want government organisations (GOs)! Started with Russia, who love total control. Can’t be having non-gov organisations. What could go wrong?!!!!!!
@Miley Byrne: the hard of thinking support the Georgian law in the same manner they proclaim salaried Victoria Nuland orchestrated a ‘coup’ against billionaire ‘businessman’ Yanukovych. What in the name of jesus are ye reading that ye swallow Russian propoganda wholesale?
The US and the EU don’t want it known how much they are spending trying to sway public opinion and influence elections in Georgia.
The Georgians have a right to know.
@Nestor: The russians want to shut down independent voices in Georgia, just as they have done in russia.
@Nestor: given a choice, I would rather be under European laws than Russian laws.
I think this law is a good idea. A lot of the referenda over the past decade have to some extent been bankrolled by outside interests. Don’t see why it’s controversial just because Russia has something similar.
@Mario: The russian puppet government of Georgia want this law so that they can do to independent voices in Georgia what they same law was used to do to independent voices in russia.
The Georgian people do not want this law; they know what it means – even if you don’t – and call it ‘the russian law’.
@ItWasLikeThatWhenIGotHere: Fair enough but the law’s requirement for organisations receiving more than 20% of funding from abroad to register as foreign interests isn’t by itself a bad idea. But perhaps there’s more to it than this.
@Mario: Yes, there is far more to it than this.
Those very same laws were used by Putin to eliminate all opposition voices.
And the russian-aligned Georgian government – who are increasingly unpopular – are trying to bring those same laws into Georgia.
With the same intent.
But the Georgian people have become wise to their antics, and vast numbers have been protesting.
It is increasingly important for this Georgian Dream russian-aligned party to get these laws implemented so that they can eliminate opposition voices before the next election, which is in October.
russian propagandists have been told to spread the claim that these laws are the same as implemented in the West – e.g. the US – while ignoring the impact of these laws in russia and elsewhere have been entirely different.
In short, the laws have not resulted in the suppression of media in the west.
These laws have been used to suppress media in russia.
My hubby received graphic photos of the man in crash today…what kind of sub human would take pictures of somebody dead or dying..I’m speechless at the lack of humanity.
@Clare Power: who sent them to your hubby?
@SYaxJ2Ts: hubby is a long haul driver, he was sent them as a way of saying avoid this area….no need for graphic photos….hubby deleted immediately
They conned the Georgian electorate who won’t be conned the next time. So the Kremlin might have won this time but won’t the next.
@gary oconnor: The Kremlin haven;t quite won yet.
Georgia’s president can still veto this law.
@ItWasLikeThatWhenIGotHere: Unfortunatly parliament can still overrule the president no matter what she vetoes or proposes to change in the bill.
@Fr. Fintan Stack: That would still drag the process out, prolonging the resistance movement protests.
And the next parliamentary elections are only 6 months away.
@ItWasLikeThatWhenIGotHere: I thought he did veto it?
@You’re Not Serious: SHE did veto it. Look at the date and time of the original posts…….
Before SHE vetoed it.
have your say