Georgians have returned to the streets to fight for their country’s future. They refuse to let it slip quietly into the autocracy the ruling party seeks.
By Ghia Nodia
December 2024
On the night of November 28, large-scale protests erupted in Georgia after Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze of the ruling Georgian Dream (GD) party announced that the country would suspend EU-accession talks until 2028 and refuse any financial aid from the EU. Six days have passed and the protests continue, unabated.
Many Georgians and foreign observers see in this moment reflections of the 2013 refusal of then–Ukrainian president Viktor Yanukovych to initiate an association agreement with the European Union in favor of joining the Russia-led Eurasian Union. This decision sparked the massive, months-long Euromaidan protests that resulted in Yanukovych fleeing and Ukraine’s pro-Western forces taking charge. But it also led to the Russian occupation of Crimea and parts of the Donbas region in Ukraine and eventually to Russia’s full-scale invasion in February 2022.
What we are seeing in Georgia today are reflections, but not a mirror image, of that moment. The GD government did not indefinitely suspend the European-integration project and did not openly opt to join the Russian sphere of influence. That would have violated the country’s constitution, which obliges the government to pursue a path to European and Euro-Atlantic integration. Presumably, the government must have also considered the very strong popular support for that path.
Yet the Georgian people, with good reason, saw the move as the last nail in the coffin of the “European Georgia” project. Not only that, but halting the talks also implies that the country will become fully autocratic and its national independence compromised — because without Western support, Georgia will be at the mercy of Russia.
The Run-Up
The government’s announcement and the extremely strong public reaction to it both came unexpectedly. Since the incumbent GD was declared winner of the October 26 parliamentary elections, pro-European Georgians have been despondent and subdued. The election had been unfair in many ways. All four opposition blocs that won seats in Parliament refused to recognize the results or to join Parliament, demanding new elections under international supervision. Western assessments were unusually harsh. The European Parliament called for a rerun of the polls and sanctioning of GD leaders.
The public, however, appeared to have lost hope of wresting any principal concessions from GD, regardless of street protests or Western pressure. The ruling party seemed determined to ignore both. After all, earlier this year, when the so-called Russian law, which declared all civil society and media organizations receiving Western funding agents of hostile foreign forces, set off extremely broad and lengthy public protests, it was to no avail.
The international context only strengthened the defeatist mood. A global trend suggested that autocrats had figured out how to handle mass protests. Belarus in 2020 and Venezuela in mid-2024 were cases in point. The last successful protest movement in Georgia’s neighborhood was the 2018 Velvet Revolution in neighboring Armenia, when vast demonstrations forced its autocratic and corrupt regime to give up power, but this now looks like an exception to the rule.
The GD regime also has a rather scary ally in Russia. Wary of the strong anti-Russian sentiment in Georgia, however, the regime never advertises this alliance. Yet it repeatedly reminds Georgians of what Russia did to Ukraine following the Euromaidan — an effective tactic that has many Georgians fearing their country could one day suffer the same fate.
This pessimistic mood may explain why the postelection protests were low-key, lacking in energy and determination. Quite a few people joined the protests out of a sense of duty or to vent their anger, but most had already lost any hope of victory. Or so it seemed.
The Trigger
Kobakhidze’s November 28 proclamation dramatically changed the mood of the masses. This is a reminder that in politics, symbols are often more powerful than logic. During the last few years, GD had been gradually but very clearly veering away from the pro-Western path. Yet this declaration set off alarm bells.
Why did Bidzina Ivanishvili, founder and effective leader of GD, make this decision? There are several possible explanations. He could have been emboldened by the relatively feeble public response to the disputed election and believed he could get away with anything. He might have wanted to demonstrate to his supporters (or his own ego) that he could now play with the West from a position of strength, even though the statement itself was essentially meaningless, as EU authorities had already made it crystal clear that the accession process was dead for now and aid programs suspended. Perhaps Ivanishvili saw in the kabuki a way to demonstrate his power to the EU: We are refusing you, not vice versa. If so, the former prime minister, dizzy with success, shot himself in the foot. The essentially empty announcement revived the people’s protest energy.
Other scenarios presume a more devious plan: Ivanishvili was intentionally radicalizing his opponents to create the pretext for a quick crackdown. In the lead-up to the election, he had advertised his intention to outlaw the opposition — which, for Ivanishvili, includes civil society, independent media, and some universities. Radical protests, which could be painted as a coup attempt, would serve the purpose. If this was true, it was a risky gamble.
Still others speculate that Ivanishvili had followed instructions from Moscow. This version is impossible to prove or disprove, though it is not beyond reason. It is evident that Ivanishvili is keen to appease Russia. Vladimir Putin sees the billionaire as his man in Tbilisi and was quick to praise the Georgian government for the November 28 announcement, pleased by Georgia’s break with the West. Regardless of whether Moscow played a direct role, however, Ivanishvili will always have one overriding objective, which is to keep Georgia under his personal rule.
The Protests
For the last thirty years, Georgians have failed to create working democratic institutions based on checks and balances or a system of stable political parties. But the country does have a strong culture of public protest. Since 2012, when GD first came to power, there have been many protests; on some occasions, the party was forced to make concessions. The last time was in the spring of 2023, when the government withdrew the first version of the Russian law after huge and lengthy protests.
What’s happening now is different. The stakes are higher than ever: Effectively, the protesters are trying to unseat the government — this is what the demand to rerun the elections implies, and everybody understands that. The government has little room for maneuver. It either wins or goes. Its only tool is repression, which includes mass arrests, severe beatings of randomly chosen protesters, and excessive use of tear gas.
So far, however, the repression has been ineffective. For the last week, the protests have been continuous, and they aren’t subsiding. And unlike past protests, these have spread to many locations beyond the capital. Several Georgian ambassadors have resigned, and civil servants, businesses, educational institutions, and others who had supported GD or never dared to criticize it publicly have distanced themselves from the authorities’ actions.
The obvious reference point in Georgia’s recent history is the 2003 Rose Revolution, when protests caused by rigged elections led to a change in government. There are two crucial differences, though. In 2003, there was a clear leader of the movement, Mikheil Saakashvili, who was eventually propelled to the presidency. This time, however, the protests are leaderless and entirely spontaneous. Saakashvili is now in prison on a plethora of charges, but even if he were out, he would be unacceptable to a large share of the protesters. Opposition political parties are not playing much of a part in the protests, nor are they very trusted. The experience of the recent years’ activism has shown that, for whatever reason, “horizontal management” of the protests is more effective at this stage.
Most important, this time state capacity — including for repression — is much higher than it was 21 years ago. In 2003, the government that could not pay salaries to its police forces was much easier to unseat. Now, GD has a well-equipped and fairly loyal repressive apparatus.
The Scenarios
It is impossible to predict how this moment will end. Both sides are aiming to wear the other out. Morale, grit, and persistence will be decisive. The protesters maintain the “we shall overcome” mood, but the government has considerable resources to allow it to continue on. It also has the option of escalating repression to an even higher level by announcing a state of emergency. So far, the government has been reluctant to do so, preferring instead to keep some semblance of business as usual.
There has been speculation that the Russian military could get involved — as happened in Kazakhstan in January 2022, when the government requested forces from the Russia-led Collective Security Treaty Organization to quell peaceful protests over fuel prices. It is most often supporters of the GD government who raise this prospect, hoping to instill fear in the opposition. Given the intensity of anti-Russian sentiment in Georgia, however, the regime will probably try to avoid bringing in the Russian military unless absolutely necessary and has, so far, been extremely careful to deny any linkages to its northern neighbor.
If the opposition succeeds in pressing for new elections, the current government could be forced to appoint a transitional technical government that is acceptable to the public, which would prepare for the new vote, preferably with some international oversight. But there are no signs yet that GD is ready for such a concession, as it would likely lead to the end of the party’s reign.
The nature of Georgian Dream’s rule is that everything depends on the will of one very secretive and paranoid man, Ivanishvili, and the instruments of repression at his disposal. As for the protesters, they have the will of hundreds of thousands of Georgians. Whichever side prevails, it will be a momentous change for the country.
Ghia Nodia is professor of political science at Ilia State University and director of the Caucasus Institute for Peace, Democracy, and Development in Tbilisi, Georgia. He is a member of the Editorial Board of the Journal of Democracy.
Copyright © 2024 National Endowment for Democracy
Image credit: Giorgi Arjevanidze/AFP via Getty Images
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