Georgia in the Spring of 2024: The law and its aftermaths 

In spring 2024, the Georgian government reinitiated a Russian-styled foreign agent law it had attempted to pass the year prior. The law obligates non-commercial organizations, including NGOs, media outlets, and civil society institutions that receive 20% or more of their funding from outside of Georgia, to be registered as “foreign power agents” and submit financial declarations. The law also enables law enforcement agencies to seize not only organizational equipment, but also personal possessions, like personal laptops or phones, and to legally force organizations to provide information about the personal lives of its members, their relationships with other people, and other private information. Most importantly, this was not the first time that the governing party, Georgian Dream, attempted to pass the law. Initially, the bill was put forward during the spring of 2023, but it was revoked soon after massive protests engulfed Georgia. Nevertheless, once the leader of the Georgian Dream Party, Bidzina Ivanishvili, formally returned to politics, the bill was initiated once again. 

The legislation sparked massive protests in Tbilisi and other cities, where in some cases police used illegal and disproportionate force against protesters. Despite this, since September 16th, the law has been in force and so far dozens of organizations have had no choice other than to pause their operations, while hundreds of others are boycotting the law. 

International reaction

The legislation immediately received harsh and unfavorable reactions from Georgia’s Western partners. Representatives of the EU and its members directly stated that with this law in force, any progress of EU-Georgia relations will be paused. The EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Joseph Borell, said several times that the law is incompatible with EU values, a stance which received unanimous support of all EU foreign ministers. In July, the US Congress also passed the bipartisan MEGOBARI Act (“Megobari” is the word for friend in Georgian), which included financial and visa sanctions against Georgian officials and offered an impressive package of military, trade, and visa liberalization perspectives in exchange for withdrawing the law. Contrary to that, Dimitry Peskov, the press-secretary of Vladimir Putin, and Dimitri Medvedev, the former president of Russia, applauded the Georgian government’s moves, as passing the foreign agent law hindering Georgia’s Euro-Atlantic aspirations, which is something that Russia traditionally has tried to counter. 

Furthermore, an urgent opinion about the legislation was published by the Venice Commission on May 21, 2024. Venice Commission is an advisory body of the Council of Europe created specifically for Eastern European emerging democracies to help them in building the statehood base of the rule of law. The opinion papers  from the Venice Commission have a great political impact on the decision-making process of the Council of Europe. According to the opinion paper of the Venice Commission, the law violates freedom of association, freedom of expression, the right to respect private life, and the right to be free from discrimination. 

The dynamics of EU-Georgia relations before and after the law 

Since 2016, the dynamics of EU-Georgia relations have been gradually deteriorating. The Georgian government tried to maintain ties with Europe and the Transatlantic Alliance, but their narrative has slowly shifted to a populist and blurry political idea of sovereign democracy. In this manner, Georgian Dream’s policy interestingly copies and resembles Viktor Orban’s pattern of political dealings and narratives. It seems that the major goal for the Georgian Dream party and the oligarch-turned-party-boss Bidzina Ivanishvili was maintaining power, progressively oppressing Georgian civil rights and democratic standards. On the other hand, the EU’s political response to Georgia’s democratic backsliding has been quite belated and not clear-cut. Despite the continuous signs of shifting away from a Euro-Atlantic-oriented policy, Georgia still received EU-candidate status in December 2023. This became a major propagandistic weapon in Georgian Dream’s hands, because no matter how opposition and civil society accused them of having a pro-Russian political agenda, they nevertheless received candidate status as alleged-evidence that they successfully advanced EU-integration,maintaining their so-called “policy of dignity”. Since 2024, the EU’s stance has gotten stronger and more unambiguous as EU representatives clearly state their postures and policies regarding the democratic development in Georgia and lowered EU integration chances.

The populist narrative of the government against the West 

But following the West’s disapproval, what strategy did the Georgian Dream government choose to alter the damaging narrative against them? The government principally defended its posture by blaming the West for intervening in Georgia’s internal affairs and for being partial because of “similar laws” active in Europe, and the US, or Canada. The narrative essentially used a supposedly similar American law – FARA (Foreign Agents Registration Act) – while completely ignoring obvious differences in the aim of the law and law enforcement measures. The detailed explanations about technical, legal, and contextual differences between these two laws were even discussed at the special hearings in the US Congress. However, the Georgian Dream’s representatives continued calling the law “American law.” Also, this disinformation campaign used the law about foreign influence adopted by the French Senate in June 2024. Government-affiliated media outlets and political figures repeatedly connected this law with Georgian “foreign agent law” and stated that, by the logic of protesters, even France adopted the “Russian law.” The ambassador of the republic of France in Georgia, Sheraz Gasri, made it clear and analyzed that the French newly adopted law is not the same as Georgian law, and this kind of manipulation cannot be used for justifying the policy that the Georgian government follows. 

Despite these propagandist attempts, it was obvious for the Georgian and international community that the law was actually inspired by Russia’s equivalent legislation, adopted in 2012, that turned thousands of Russian journalists, activists, and artists registered as foreign agents, oppressing their freedoms.

Upcoming elections and impending consequences of the law 

On the 26th of October, parliamentary elections will be held in Georgia. At this crossroads, Georgian society has a chance to change the government and prevent election rigging. This will nonetheless be easier said than done as many civil society organizations and NGOs have serious hardships in observing elections and defending the freedom of their activities under the current government. In most cases, foreign NGOs registered as foreign agents are trying to organize election observation missions. Regarding the future of Georgia in case the Georgian Dream party loses this election, the pro-European president of Georgia, Salome Zourabichvili, put forward a “Georgian Charter”, a jointly-drafted document between opposition parties which states that they will take responsibility for collectively choosing an interim government and appointing free and independent parliamentary elections in 2025. The Charter also includes agreements on abolishing the laws incompatible with EU integration; reforming of the judiciary system; and reducing governments political influence and power over the prosecutor’s office, Security Service, Special Investigation Office, Anti-Corruption Bureau, and National Bank. The great majority of oppositional political parties have already signed the “Georgian Charter.” Just two weeks before the elections, President Zourabichvili declared that she will announce the configuration of the technical government before elections and it will be composed by non-politicians only. This plan divided public opinion, many think that announcing the suggested technical government is not proper before the elections, on the other hand some people see this idea as a guarantee for undecided voters that no party will seize the government after the elections. The next several weeks will tell if the President’s plan will succeed and Georgia will recover its pro-Western geopolitical course.