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Thursday | 23 March, 2023

რა სარგებლობა მოაქვს ხალხის ძალას მმართველი პარტიისათვის?

ერთი კვლევის თანახმად, პაემანზე უფრო მოეწონებით თუ თან ნაკლებად მომხიბლავ მეგობარს გაიყოლებთ. ანალოგიურად, ხშირად ამომრჩევლის თვალში პარტიაც უფრო კარგად წარმოჩინდება, როდესაც მსგავს, თუმცა, ნაკლებად მიმზიდველ ოპონენტთან პაექრობს.

ეს ბლოგი აჩვენებს თუ როგორ მოქმედებს მსგავსი პრინციპი საქართველოში და როგორ შეუძლია "ქართულ ოცნებას" მხარდაჭერის გაზრდა თავის ფსევდო მეტოქე ხალხის ძალასთან კამათით.

2022 წლის ზაფხულში ქართულ ოცნებას გამოეყო პარლამენტის სამი წევრი, რათა უფრო "თავისუფლად ელაპარაკათ". სინამდვილეში ეს ნიშნავდა დასავლეთის კრიტიკას, პირადად აშშ-ის ელჩის კრიტიკას და განცხადებებს, თითქოს დასავლეთი საქართველოს რუსეთ-უკრაინის ომში ითრევდა.

მოგვიანებით პარლამენტის სამ წევრს სხვებიც შეუერთდნენ და მოძრაობა ხალხის ძალა დააარსეს. თუმცა, მოძრაობის წევრი დეპუტატები საპარლამენტო უმრავლესობაში დარჩნენ. ამან კითხვა გააჩინა: ხალხის ძალა ნამდვილად უპირისპირდებოდა ქართულ ოცნებას თუ უბრალოდ, მისი სატელიტი პარტია იყო ანტიდასავლურად განწყობილი ამომრჩევლის მისამხრობად?

ხალხის ძალის განცხადებებზე მმართველი პარტიის ლიდერების ბუნდოვანმა რეაქციებმა ეს კითხვა კიდევ უფრო გააღრმავა. მაშინ, როცა პარტიის თავმჯდომარე ირაკლი კობახიძემ ხალხის ძალის ანტიდასავლური განცხადებები მეტწილად მოიწონა, პრემიერმა ღარიბაშვილმა მათ მოუწოდა, რადიკალური განცხადებებით არ დაეზიანებინათ ურთიერთობები აშშ-თან.

ასევე მრავლისმთქმელი იყო მხარდაჭერა, რომელიც ქართული ოცნების ლიდერებმა გამოუცხადეს ხალხის ძალის მიერ ინიციირებულ კანონპროექტს უცხოური გავლენის აგენტების შესახებ.

შეიძლება თუ არა, ქართულმა ოცნებამ თავისი რადიკალი განაყოფისგან რაიმე სარგებელი მიიღოს? ამის გასაგებად CRRC-საქართველომ 2022 წლის ნოემბერში საზოგადოებრივი აზრის გამოკითხვის ფარგლებში ექსპერიმენტი ჩაატარა. გამოკითხვისათვის შერჩეული 1 219 რესპონდენტი შემთხვევითი წესით ოთხ ჯგუფში გავანაწილეთ.

პირველ (საკონტროლო) ჯგუფში რესპონდენტებს ვაცნობეთ, რომ ხალხის ძალამ აშშ-ის ელჩი გააკრიტიკა და განაცხადა, რომ აშშ-ს საქართველოს რუსეთ-უკრაინის ომში ჩათრევა უნდოდა.

მეორე ჯგუფში რესპონდენტებს ხალხის ძალის განცხადება გავაცანით, თუმცა, დამატებით ირაკლი კობახიძის კომენტარის შესახებაც ვაცნობეთ, რომელმაც არ უარყო ხალხის ძალის განცხადებები.

მესამე ჯგუფში შემავალ რესპონდენტებს ხალხის ძალის განცხადება გავაცანით, თუმცა, დამატებით ვუთხარით ირაკლი ღარიბაშვილის კომენტარის შესახებაც, რომ მსგავსი განცხადებები აშშ-თან საქართველოს ურთიერთობებს ასუსტებდა.

მეოთხე ჯგუფში რესპონდენტებმა ხალხის ძალის განცხადებასთან ერთად კობახიძის მხარდამჭერი კომენტარიც მოისმინეს და ღარიბაშვილის კრიტიკული შენიშვნაც.

დასასრულს, ოთხივე ჯგუფში რესპონდენტებს ვკითხეთ, ხვალ რომ არჩევნები
ჩატარებულიყო, ქართულ ოცნებას მისცემდნენ ხმას, ხალხის ძალას თუ რომელიმე სხვა პარტიას.

მონაცემთა ანალიზი გვაჩვენებს, რომ ქართული ოცნებისათვის ყველაზე მომგებიანი გამოდგა განცხადება, რომელმაც ის თავისი ფსევდო ოპონენტისაგან ყველაზე მეტად განასხვავა. კერძოდ, პრემიერ ღარიბაშვილის კრიტიკულმა შენიშვნამ, რომელიც ხალხის ძალის ანტიამერიკულ განცხადებას არ დაეთანხმა, მმართველი პარტიის მხარდაჭერა 8 პროცენტული პუნქტით გაზარდა: მხოლოდ ხალხის ძალის ანტიამერიკული განცხადების მოსმენის შემდეგ ოცნებას მხარს ამომრჩევლების 19 პროცენტი დაუჭერდა, მაგრამ როცა რესპონდენტებმა ოცნების ლიდერისაგან ამ განცხადების კრიტიკაც მოისმინეს, მხარდაჭერა 27 პროცენტამდე გაიზარდა.

აღსანიშნავია,რომ სტატისტიკურად მნიშვნელოვანი გავლენა მხოლოდ ღარიბაშვილის მიერ ხალხის ძალის განცხადების კრიტიკას ჰქონდა. კობახიძის კომენტარს ოცნების მხარდაჭერაზე გავლენა არ ჰქონია, ისევე, როგორც კობახიძის მხარდამჭერი და ღარიბაშვილის კრიტიკული კომენტარების ერთად მოსმენას.

ეს მიგნებები სხვა კვლევების შედეგებთანაც თანხვედრაშია; მათი მიხედვით, როგორც დემოკრატიულ, ისე ნაკლებად დემოკრატიულ ქვეყნებში რადიკალურ პარტიებს ხშირად უფრო მეტი სარგებელი მმართველი პარტიისთვის მოაქვთ, ვიდრე საკუთარი პარტიისთვის.

ჩვენი კვლევის თანახმად, ხალხის ძალას ამომრჩევლის მხოლოდ 3 პროცენტი დაუჭერდა მხარს. ხოლო მმართველი პარტიის მხარდაჭერა მთელი 8 პროცენტული პუნქტით გაიზარდა, როცა მათმა ლიდერმა სტრატეგიული პარტნიორის მიმართ ნაკლებად რადიკალური პოზიცია დაიჭირა.

აღსანიშნავია, რომ ამ ექსპერიმენტში გამოვიყენეთ განცხადებები ქვეყნის დასავლური ორიენტაციის შესახებ, რაც მეტწილად ეროვნული კონსენსუსის საგანია: მოსახლეობის დიდი უმრავლესობა მხარს უჭერს საქართველოს ნატოსა და ევროკავშირში გაწევრიანებას. გასარკვევია, გაზრდის თუ არა მმართველი პარტიის მხარდაჭერას ხალხის ძალასთან ისეთ საკითხზე დისკუსია, რომელზეც საზოგადოებაში ნაკლები თანხმობაა.

ამის პირველი მნიშვნელოვანი ტესტი შესაძლოა, ყოფილიყო ხალხის ძალის საკანონმდებლო ინიციატივა უცხოური გავლენის აგენტების შესახებ, თუმცა მმართველმა პარტიამ თავიდანვე ამ ინიციატივის მხარდაჭერა აირჩია. მომავალში გამოჩნდება მოინდომებს თუ არა ქართული ოცნება თავის რადიკალ განაყოფთან შედარებით პოზიციის უფრო ზომიერად წარმოჩენას.

შენიშვნა: სტატიაში წარმოდგენილი შეხედულებები ეკუთვნის ავტორს და არ წარმოადგენს On.ge-ის პოზიციას. მასალა ქვეყნდება OC Media-სთან პარტნიორობის ფარგლებში, რომლის შედეგად, გამოცემის სტატიები ამიერიდან ოთხ ენაზე გავრცელდება. საქართველოში OC Media-ს პარტნიორი On.ge-ა. სტატია ინგლისურად შეგიძლიათ წაიკითხოთ აქ. ეს სტატია დაწერა CRRC საქართველოს პრეზიდენტმა კობა თურმანიძემ. სტატიაში წარმოდგენილი შეხედულებები არის მხოლოდ ავტორის შეხედულებები და არ წარმოადგენს CRRC საქართველოს ან მასთან დაკავშირებული რომელიმე სუბიექტის შეხედულებებს.

02.08.2015 | Sunday

Citizenship in action in the South Caucasus

Citizenship is a difficult concept to define as its definition changes over time, depending on social, legal, and political contexts. Importantly, it not only encompasses structural (legal and institutional) aspects, but also the everyday practices through which people relate to the state and other citizens. This blog post examines some of the perceptions as to what makes a good citizen across the South Caucasus and the extent to which people’s actions match up with their stated opinions on good citizenship.

16.07.2015 | Thursday

The population of Georgia on the ideal number of children per family

In this blog post, we shall have a look at whether Georgians’ views about the ideal number of children per family meet the reality, and how these views differ according to people’s sex, age and settlement type, using data from CRRC’s Caucasus Barometer survey in 2013.

01.05.2015 | Friday

Ethnic minorities, Georgians, and foreign policy orientation

While Georgia’s closer ties with the EU represent the views and beliefs of a large majority of Georgian citizens, support for the Euro-Atlantic path is notably weaker among the country’s ethnic minority citizens than among the ethnic Georgian population.

13.04.2015 | Monday

The political climate in Georgia, 2012-2014: Increased nihilism or room for new political actors?

This blog post describes the dynamics of attitudes towards GDC and UNM from November 2012 through August 2014 using survey data from the National Democratic Institute (NDI). The data is nationally representative of the adult (18+) Georgian-speaking population in Georgia.

09.03.2015 | Monday

Georgian youth: EU aspirations, but lacking tolerance

Public opinion polls consistently show that the majority of Georgians want to be a part of the European Union. Young people in Georgia are especially pro-Western, often claiming to share the same values as their peers in the West.

06.02.2015 | Friday

Getting to the streets: Who is more inclined to protest in Georgia?

This blog post has shown that those that recently participated in public meetings or rallies, as well as more educated and wealthy Georgians perceive peaceful demonstrations as more efficacious in affecting government decision-making, compared to those who have not recently participated in meetings or rallies, are less educated and are poorer.

08.10.2012 | Monday

Georgian Foreign Policy: Continuity or Change?

The results of the October parliamentary elections in Georgia have raised questions regarding the future trajectory of Georgian foreign policy. One of the priorities of Georgian foreign policy has been European and Euro-Atlantic integration. Will the new Georgian government initiate major changes and redirect Georgia’s foreign policy that has been supported by the National United Movement? Will Ge...

27.09.2012 | Thursday

Youth and Politics in Georgia

Since 2011, CRRC has been involved in the Memory, Youth, Political Legacy, and Civic Engagement (MYPLACE), a four-year project funded by the European Commission. The project aims at exploring young people’s social participation in Georgia influenced by historical contexts of totalitarianism and populism in Europe. Among others, the objectives of the MYPLACE project include (1) conceptualization of...

24.04.2016 | Sunday

How the EU sees Georgia: The Georgian population's perceptions

Over time, the Georgian population thinks that citizens of the EU as well as the EU governments are less inclined towards integrating Georgia into the Union. More clarity and realism concerning Georgia’s potential for EU membership certainly could help to avoid a slow backslide towards less EU support for strong relations between Georgia and the EU in the years to come. The public should be aware that EU membership is a long-term prospect at best rather than an immediate future.

12.05.2016 | Thursday

Public support for Democracy is on the decline in Georgia

Following the first ever peaceful transition of power in Georgia’s 2012 parliamentary elections, the country improved its position in the Freedom House and Polity IV democracy rankings. Results from the latest polls, however, show that public support for democracy in Georgia has declined over the past few years.

22.05.2016 | Sunday

The Fury Before the Storm

The blog analyzes if the special precinct really mattered for the Sagarejo by-elections or wether it was the ethnic voting patterns, which explain the differences.

06.06.2016 | Monday

Attitudes Towards Public Opinion Polls in Georgia (Part 2)

Increasing knowledge of and trust in polls are clear challenges for pollsters in Georgia. Even though public opinion polls are regularly criticized, there is still a public demand for them. A majority of Georgians believe that they don't have a proper understanding of how public opinion polls are conducted, but they agree that polls help everyone to better understand the society they live in.

25.01.2014 | Saturday

Positive Public Attitudes in Georgia

In November 2013, CRRC conducted a survey on public attitudes in Georgia for the National Democratic Institute (NDI), with funding from the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA). The survey shows that Georgians are generally positive about the direction in which their country is going, the state of democracy in Georgia, and the current ruling coalition.

10.03.2014 | Monday

Can’t get no satisfaction. Who doesn’t want to join the EU?

On December 30, 2013 Davit Usupashivili, Chairman of the Parliament of Georgia, declared that Georgia’s top priority for the year was the signing of an Association Agreement with the EU. If signed, the association agreement will enable closer ties between Georgia and the EU.

25.01.2016 | Monday

The Georgian public’s awareness of visa liberalisation with the EU: Facts and expectations

The visa liberalisation agreement between Georgia and the EU is expected to enter in force in Summer 2016, allowing Georgian citizens holding biometric passports to enter and stay in Schengen area countries without a visa for up to 90 days in a 180-day period.

14.01.2015 | Wednesday

How to buy votes when you can’t buy votes

Today, less than democratic regimes face a serious dilemma – how do you buy votes to win an election without becoming an international pariah. Unfortunately for a society and fortunately for an autocrat, the wheels of power and administrative resources an incumbent regime wields provide ample opportunity to manipulate electoral outcomes through what are otherwise legitimate activities related to state spending and coercion.

22.02.2013 | Friday

Before and After the Elections: Shifting Public Opinion in Georgia

The Georgian parliamentary elections in October 2012 attracted much international interest and ushered in an important turn in Georgian politics. In 2012 CRRC conducted four waves of a Survey on Political Attitudes in Georgia for the National Democratic Institute (NDI) (funded by the Swedish International development Cooperation Agency-SIDA) in order to track changes in public opinion associated with these major political events.

03.04.2014 | Thursday

Alternating Pasts, Changing Futures

Note: This blog is re-posted from the MYPLACE project's blog. The original MYPLACE blog can be found here.

Claims to 2000 or even 3000 years of nationhood are not difficult to find in Georgia as has been amply documented (see Pelkmans 2006, Suny 1994, Rayfield 2013). The former president Mikheil Saakashvili was even fond of using the earliest human skulls found outside of Africa, in Dmansi in Southern Georgia, as proof that Georgians were “ancient Europeans.”

16.06.2014 | Monday

Electoral Notes- Municipal Elections, 2014

Dustin Gilbreath, a Research Consultant at CRRC-Georgia, has written electoral notes on yesterday's municipal elections which were published on the web-magazine Liberali.The notes discuss the results of the elections, background and significance, changes to electoral legislation, the pre-electoral environment, capital candidates and campaigns, and outlook for the Georgian Dream Coalition and United National Movement. To read the electoral notes, please click here.

23.06.2014 | Monday

Trust in local government in Georgia

On June 15th Georgian voters headed to the polls in local elections. There were problems leading up to the elections as detailed in last week's electoral notes. At present, results show a significant portion of positions in local government going to Georgian Dream Coalition (GD) candidates, though a number of races will go into second rounds.

18.07.2014 | Friday

Expectations and the EU Association Agreement

Today's blog post is published in collaboration with civil.ge. One may also read the post on civil.ge here.

On June 27, 2014 Georgia, Moldova, and Ukraine signed EU Association Agreements. In Georgia, the signing has been celebrated as a step towards Euro-Atlantic integration, and a number of events were held in Tbilisi to celebrate the signing. The Association Agreement (AA) itself is wide ranging with some portions pertaining to human rights and the main focus on economic cooperation between the EU and Georgia.

21.07.2014 | Monday

Friends and Enemies in the South Caucasus

On 1 April, 2014 the International School of Economics at Tbilisi State University (ISET) published a blog which described a future Transcaucasian Confederation agreement signed by the three South Caucasian states. Despite the fact that the blog was an April Fool’s Day joke, it provoked significant interest and reader response.

08.08.2016 | Monday

Trends in the Data: Public support for democracy is slowly waning in Georgia (Part 2)

This blog post describes a number of tendencies that might be related to the declining public support for democracy in Georgia, using the CRRC’s Caucasus Barometer (CB) survey data.

04.08.2014 | Monday

A look at (in)Justice in Georgia as charges are brought against ex-President Saakashvili

On July 28, 2014 charges were announced against the former Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili concerning the abuse of power. These charges make Saakashvili the highest public official from the former UNM government to be summoned by the prosecutor’s office to date.

18.08.2014 | Monday

One step forward, two steps back? European integration in Georgia after the Association Agreement

So far, 2014 is shaping up to be the year that Georgia might begin to reap the benefits of its pro-EU and pro-NATO foreign policy. In June, Georgia signed the EU Association Agreement despite fears over Russian agitation. NATO has indicated its readiness to discuss a “substantive package” for Georgia, if not a Membership Action Plan. However, despite these gestures towards closer cooperation, some elements of the decision to sign the Agreement have caused friction.

01.09.2014 | Monday

A Tangled Path to Europe: A review of Bittersweet Europe

Since independence, Georgia has been on what has often looked like a quixotic quest towards joining the EU. Multiple wars, a resurgent Russia, breakaway territories and a consistently difficult economic situation which has gone through hyper-inflation and has had consistently high unemployment and underemployment over the last 25 years must, at the minimum, make prospects for EU integration seem distant at best to many in Brussels.

22.09.2014 | Monday

Russia as a threat: the Ukraine crisis and changing public opinion in Georgia

Following 2012 parliamentary elections, attitudes toward Russia in Georgia shifted. While in 2011 51% of the population considered Russia the main enemy of the country, in 2012 only 35% reported the same. Moreover, the share of Georgians who named Russia as Georgia’s main friend increased by 5%. In a post on the CRRC-Georgia blog, this change was explained by a so-called “spiral of silence”.

29.09.2014 | Monday

Georgians Have High Hopes but Little Information about the Association Agreement with the EU

Optimism abounds with regards to the recently signed Georgia-European Union Association Agreement (AA). Most Georgians, however, lack information about the EU and its relation to the country, including the details of the agreement which directly concern the future of Georgia’s economy. The AA covers many areas including national security, migration, human rights and the rule of law but is primarily a free trade agreement with potentially major implications for employment.

13.11.2013 | Wednesday

Perceptions of Court System Fairness in the South Caucasus

Ann Bennett Lockwood, an American attorney, politician and author once said that, “If nations could only depend upon fair and impartial judgments in a world court of law, they would abandon the senseless, savage practice of war”. For many, the credibility of a government is judged by the fairness of itsjudicial system. For instance, Michel Rosenfeld (2001) argued that a fair justice system creates respect and faith in government by saying that, “If a citizen implicitly or explicitly endorses a law or legal regime, the latter can be considered subjectively fair.”

20.10.2014 | Monday

Do Armenians Still View Integration with the EU as Part of a Positive-Sum Game?

On September 3rd 2013 Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan surprised many observers, including some in his own government, when he announced that Armenia would sign an agreement with Russia to join the Eurasian Customs Union (ECU) and spurn a long-negotiated Association Agreement (AA) with the European Union. The move has been dubbed a “U-Turn” as well as a “sudden shift in policy,” although it was predated by landmark Armenian-Russian agreements in 1997 and 2006.

22.12.2014 | Monday

Does public opinion accurately gauge government performance in the South Caucasus?

Robert Putnam’s 1993 work Making Democracy Work: Civic Traditions in Modern Italy marked a seminal moment in the development of institutionalism. Putnam’s exhaustive study of the relationship between the governed and governing in the Italian regions contained the discovery that public opinion provides an accurate picture of actual government performance: “The Italians’ gradually increasing satisfaction with the regional governments … corresponded to real differences in performance,” and in each region Putnam’s measurement of performance was “remarkably consistent with the appraisals offered by the regional attentive public and by the electorate as a whole.”

02.11.2015 | Monday

Nine things politicians should know about Georgian voters

When discussing political competition in Georgia, some politicians bemoan Georgian voters: they describe the majority of voters as socially conservative and economically short-sighted. Therefore, parties have few options to campaign on, beyond promising immediate benefits or subsidies, while keeping silent about liberal values and an open economy.

25.11.2015 | Wednesday

2015 EU survey report: Major trends and recommendations

The Knowledge of and Attitudes towards the European Union in Georgia 2015 survey report was presented today by Eurasia Partnership Foundation (EPF) in Tbilisi.

27.11.2015 | Friday

Awareness of the EU-Georgia Association Agreement in Georgia, one year on

The June 27, 2014 initialing of the EU-Georgia Association Agreement, a wide reaching, largely economic treaty, was marked with celebration in Tbilisi as the fruit of a long running diplomatic effort to tighten ties with the European Union over the course of three Georgian administrations.

29.11.2015 | Sunday

Public opinion on Georgia’s EU membership prospects in 2015

If a referendum were held tomorrow, a majority of the Georgian population (61%) would vote for the country’s membership in the European Union, according to the fourth wave of the Knowledge and Attitudes towards the EU survey carried out by CRRC-Georgia for the Eurasia Partnership Foundation in May of 2015. But anyone familiar with the situation in Georgia and the politics of EU enlargement understands that EU membership is, at best, a long term prospect for Georgia.

16.12.2015 | Wednesday

What We Know About Volunteering in Georgia

[This post originally appeared in investor.ge]

By Nino Zubashvili

Following the June 13, 2015 flood in Tbilisi, hundreds of volunteers helped to clean the disaster-affected zones of the city, which stirred the hope that volunteerism is on the rise in Georgia. In the past, studies on volunteering in Georgia conducted by non-governmental organizations (such as Helping Hand and the Civil Society Institute) claimed that volunteerism had not taken root in Georgian society, and CRRC-Georgia surveys have consistently shown a mismatch between attitudes and actions regarding volunteering in Georgia.

22.12.2015 | Tuesday

No, Putin is not winning Georgia away from Europe. Here are the facts.

[Editor's Note: This post was originally published on the Washington Post's Monkey Cage on Monday, December 21, 2015. The original post is available here. The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of CRRC-Georgia or any of the sponsors of the survey which this article is based on. The data on which this article is based is available here.]

By Dustin Gilbreath

Last Friday, after years of diplomatic wrangling over the course of two administrations, the Republic of Georgia received a report from the EU green lighting visa free travel within the European Union in the near future. Yet, media accounts from earlier this year suggested that Georgia was undergoing a “Russian turn”.

12.01.2012 | Thursday

Democracy in Georgia

In the wake of Russian protests for free and fair elections— one of the hallmarks of democracy— the international community has again turned its attention on democratization in the post-Soviet region. Democracy, in its various forms, represents something different to everyone. So what does it mean for Georgians? Do Georgians consider Georgia to be a democratic state in its present form? What are their perceptions of democracy?

18.01.2012 | Wednesday

EU Survey Report Released: Knowledge and Attitudes towards the European Union in Georgia

On January 16, 2012 the Eurasia Partnership Foundation and CRRC presented a report entitled “Knowledge and Attitudes toward the European Union in Georgia” based on nationwide surveys conducted in Georgia by CRRC in 2009 and 2011. The 2009 survey was the first comprehensive study of Georgian attitudes towards the European Union. Koba Turmanidze, Country Director of CRRC-Georgia presented the report.

15.02.2012 | Wednesday

Fatalism and Political Perceptions in Georgia

Widespread apathy and a general disbelief that good can come from joint effort is a major factor hindering social capital in Georgia. One indicator of apathy can be fatalism, meaning the belief that all events are predetermined and therefore inevitable. This blog explores the level of political fatalism in Georgia and how it is connected to Georgians’ perceptions of the country’s current political course and democracy.

14.03.2012 | Wednesday

Georgia and the EU’s Economic Woes

Why hasn’t the economic crisis in Europe deterred Georgia’s desire to join the European Union? The majority of Georgians (and the Georgian government) want to join the EU despite crisis in the Eurozone. Yet, the continued crisis, including the Eurogroup’s recent (and second) rescue of Greece’s economy and Hungary’s harsh austerity measures, illustrates that the crisis is not isolated to the Eurozone.

24.02.2011 | Thursday

Sex, Lies and EU Red Tape

The internal workings of the European Union (EU) are notoriously yawnsome matters. However, in a survey from 2008, CRRC aimed to give an overview of Georgians’ understanding of and attitudes to the EU - including some hot topics concerning orientations towards such activities as sex before marriage, infidelity, dishonesty, and tax-paying.

19.03.2011 | Saturday

Spreading the News: File Sharing through Mobile Phones in Armenia

How do multimedia phones affect the way media is consumed and circulated? Katy Pearce lays out interesting findings for the case of Armenia in the International Journal of Communication (5, 2011, pp. 511-528).

23.03.2011 | Wednesday

E-transparency in Georgia: A key to faith in democracy?

Can more available public information on Georgian governmental websites promote institutional trust and enhance faith in democracy in Georgia? This is the topic of a recent book called “Electronic Transparency in Georgia” by the Institute for Freedom of Information (IDFI).

05.04.2011 | Tuesday

Presentation Summary | Georgian-Abkhaz ‘Dialogue through Research’

On March, 30 2011 Archil Gegeshidze and Ivlian Haindrava presented findings on the politics of non-recognition as well as results from a forthcoming study on the de-isolation of Abkhazia. Abkhaz and Georgian researchers compiled their findings after conducting interviews and focus groups analyzing the perceptions of each side.

21.06.2011 | Tuesday

Seminar Report: Perceptions about Georgia: Leading or Loosing the Struggle for Democracy

A joint seminar on May 10th by Clingendael Institute and the Eurasian Partnership Foundation (EPF), and co-sponsored by the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs, debated the state of the rule of law and democracy in Georgia, and the possible application of a “Georgian model” in the wider region.

23.06.2011 | Thursday

Foreign Policy Perceptions in Turkey | new TESEV report

TESEV’s Foreign Policy Programme recently published a report entitled ‘Foreign Policy Perceptions in Turkey’, which analyses Turkish attitudes towards international relations with several countries, including Armenia. The main finding of their survey regarding attitudes towards Armenia is that Turks are more supportive of undergoing various kinds of rapprochement with Armenia than they are of fully re-establishing diplomatic relations and opening the border.

01.07.2011 | Friday

Caucasus Barometer: Unpacking Public Trust in the President

In the spring of 2011, CRRC ran the Caucasus Barometer Report Writing competition and now we have an opportunity to present some of the results to you. The first report is written by one of the competition winners, Keti Khachidze, and addresses trust in the Georgian president. Here is a quick summary of her findings and analysis.

07.07.2011 | Thursday

MyPlace Website is up!

We have previously mentioned our participation in MyPlace, a collaborative research project covering 16 countries, and financed by the EU under Framework Program 7. Their website is now up! What is it all about? To quote from the MyPlace website:

29.08.2011 | Monday

Georgia's EU aspirations

CRRC has just completed a second wave of the survey entitled “Knowledge and Attitudes toward the European Union (EU) in Georgia” (2011). Just over half of the Georgian population thinks that Georgia will actually join the EU at some point in the future and they have high expectations from EU membership. Many Georgians also support membership in the European Union (EU) despite uncertainty over whether or not European citizens share the same views about Georgian accession. This new survey also lets us compare data with the first survey conducted in 2009.

12.09.2011 | Monday

Does Refusal to Recognize Elections in Abkhazia Reduce Prospects for Resolution?

A recent New York Times article argues that the failure of Western governments to recognize the latest presidential elections in Abkhazia on August 26, 2011 may hamper conflict resolution. According to the authors, Cooley and Mitchell, Western governments have a “counterproductive disdain” of developments in Abkhazia and isolating Sukhumi will reduce prospects for conflict resolution.

25.01.2010 | Monday

Obstacles for Civil Society Development in the South Caucasus

What are the reasons for low public engagement in the South Caucasus? Why, despite the large number of non-government organizations, civil society remains weak in all three countries?

31.05.2012 | Thursday

Counting Crowds & Crowds Counting | Jacobs' Method

During the last 25 years Georgian capital has experienced a diverse history of political meetings in its central areas including peaceful demonstrations, rallies with radical political demands, “tent towns” and so forth. The higher the attendance, the more legitimate the protests are often seen to be. As a result, the figures themselves usually are contested, sometimes in significant controversy.

15.05.2012 | Tuesday

Public Opinion about Women in Parliament in Georgia

Since Georgia’s independence in 1991, the participation of women in Georgian politics has been very low. The number of women in government has diminished since 2004 and currently women comprise only 6% of the Georgian parliament. The reasons behind such statistics can vary from cultural to institutional factors.

01.05.2012 | Tuesday

Ethnic versus European Identity: The Case of Georgia

As Georgia seeks a course of European integration and eventual membership in the European Union (EU), it is important to examine the Georgian population’s understanding of its own identity. CRRC data from a 2011 survey entitled Knowledge and Attitudes toward the EU in Georgia shows that a majority of Georgians (88%) think Georgia should be in the EU.

02.07.2010 | Friday

Post-Soviet States’ Democratic Decline: Results from Freedom House Report

Freedom House has just released its Nations in Transit report for the year 2010. The report attempts to quantify democratic development in Central European and Eurasian states by observing 8 separate factors – for instance, Electoral Process and National Democratic Governance - which affect the level of democracy in a given country. Each category is graded on a score of 1 to 7, with 1 representing the highest level of democratic progress, and 7 representing the lowest. Much of the media attention has typically focused on Russia.

05.08.2010 | Thursday

The Public's View of Constitutional Reform in Georgia

The 2010 Georgian Constitutional Reform in the Eyes of the Public report is now available. As a product of the study commissioned by the Netherlands Institute for Multiparty Democracy (NIMD) and carried out by CRRC-Georgia, it presents the results of the opinion survey on constitutional and governance processes and their development in Georgia.

12.04.2012 | Thursday

Georgian get-togethers: Private Problems versus Politics

In September 2011, CRRC on behalf of Eurasia Partnership Foundation and EWMI G-PAC conducted a nationally representative survey on Volunteerism and Civic Participation in Georgia. Georgians were asked how often they get together and discuss private problems and politics with their friends and relatives (who do not live in their houses).

07.12.2009 | Monday

The "Attitudes Towards European Integration" Survey

Georgia's government openly seeks greater cooperation and, eventually, convergence with the EU. The CRRC and the EPF have recently released the results of their "Attitudes Towards European Integration" survey, along with its summary report. The results show that Georgia's population seemingly strongly supports its government's drive toward Europe.

19.11.2010 | Friday

Ambassador Dieter Boden Speaks at Europe House

Ambassador Dieter Boden, a distinguished German diplomat who has served both as German Ambassador to the OSCE as well as UN Special Representative to the Secretary General, spoke at the Europe House about conflict resolution in the disputed territories of Abkhazia and South Ossetia.

01.02.2008 | Friday

Alpha Version of CRRC Data Initiative now online!!!

The alpha version of our Data Initiative data set, broad household data, covering lots of household data, but also political attitudes, social development, some health, education, migration, and social capital questions (and more) is online now. We interviewed more than 8000 people, so this really is the single largest dataset that is available on developments across the South Caucasus.

10.03.2008 | Monday

USAID Political Party Assessment of Europe and Eurasia

Admittedly we forgot to post this earlier, but we believe it is even more important with the upcoming elections in Georgia.

02.05.2008 | Friday

Georgian Party Archive: extraordinary Soviet History

Quite some time ago, Georgia has opened up the party archive of the Soviet period to researchers. This is a pretty unique resource for researchers. Georgia deserves particular praise for making that history accessible. Few countries of the CIS have made this important step.

03.05.2008 | Saturday

Exit Polls | Take Two

Readers may recall that we voiced some concern with regards to exit polls. Here is a fascinating account, first-hand, by a reputed pollster having what they describe as an "Adventure in Baku".

21.05.2008 | Wednesday

Parliamentary Elections in Georgia | ODIHR Observation

With today's elections in Georgia, various themes come to mind. Certainly, elections have come a long way: by now, the Georgian government employs a series of highly qualified consultants, including Greenberg Quinlan Rosner of Clinton-fame, plus a Brussels-based PR firm, as well as working with experienced teams from the Baltics. This, then, is no longer the game of the 1990s, or 2003. Election observers know that they in turn will be observed, and maybe that's how it should be.

12.06.2008 | Thursday

Georgia post-Election Phone Survey | Quick Review

Yet another survey has been sent around as a PDF in Georgia. The survey attempted to measure the postelection mood in Tbilisi. According to the information provided in the PDF, 503 respondents have been selected randomly and interviewed by telephone. According to the results 46.92% of respondents say they "fully disagree with the announced results of the 2008 parliamentary elections". 25,65% say they totally agree with the announced results. We have been asked to comment, and some of the things we have to say will sound pretty obvious.

04.08.2008 | Monday

Georgia: Women's Participation in Politics

Women’s participation at all levels of elections in Georgia is diminishing. As the Caucasus Women’s Network (CWN)reports, women inGeorgia were less represented in terms of candidates in the last parliamentary elections than in any previous parliamentary elections inGeorgia’s democratic history. On the other hand, women’s low political participation in elected bodies belies women’s activeness in civil society institutions, where females appear to be very active.

05.09.2008 | Friday

Georgia Post-Conflict Phone Survey | may be a first glance?

Georgian IPResearch (first time we heard of them, actually) conducted a phone poll between Aug.25 and Sept.2. 450 respondents were questioned countrywide. While we have our strong reservations about these telephone polls (they are biased towards people with phones, picking up calls from strangers, and bored enough to chat), they may serve as a preliminary indication.

18.12.2007 | Tuesday

Pre-Election Polls | what would be needed

With the election in Georgia approaching fast, polls are beginning to appear every week. Unfortunately, many of these polls are taken at face value. The reality is that at this point there is not a single pre-election poll that has demonstrated credibility. This does not ...

20.10.2008 | Monday

Comparing Civic Participation: Caucasus Data 2007

What's the level of engagement in the three countries of the South Caucasus? Are people involved? Are they staying abreast of what goes on? Again, our Data Initiative provides insight, since we asked people whether they had engaged in various activities over the last six months

27.10.2008 | Monday

World Press Freedom | Caucasus does badly!

Yet another index, and one with little happy news. How does world press freedom look? Reporters Without Borders, an advocacy group founded in 1985 ("investigate, expose, support"), has just released an international ranking. A total of 173 countries are ranked, and the Caucasus is in the bottom third.

29.10.2008 | Wednesday

Public Opinion on the Parliament in Georgia

Earlier this year CRRC-Georgia conducted a survey “Public Opinion on the Parliament in Georgia” for Transparency International. CRRC used a random walk methodology for the household selection and Kish table for the individual respondents with the sample size of 1895 respondents (1538 completed interviews; 19% non-response).

08.11.2008 | Saturday

World Public Opinion: Azerbaijan in Focus

World Public Opinion is the initiative of the Program on International Policy Attitudes (PIPA) of the University of Maryland that explores public opinion on a variety of topics in 25 countries across the globe, including Azerbaijan, the only South Caucasus country represented in the survey. Russia and Ukraine are the other two former USSR countries that the project includes.

28.11.2008 | Friday

Weak State Institutions | Weak Social Capital?

What's the balance sheet of the Rose Revolution so far? There is agreement that there has been tremendous progress in some fields. The economy has grown, street-level corruption has evaporated, and in many other instances the state functions for the people.

02.12.2008 | Tuesday

Exploring Azerbaijani Views on Alternative Energy

We have written previously about the World Public Opinion project of the Program on International Policy Attitudes at the University of Maryland. The project has recently released interesting data on energy issues based on the poll conducted in 21 countries. According to the WorldPublicOpinion.org publication, the majority of Azerbaijanis favor alternative energy development. 64% (compared to 77% average of 21 world countries) think that solar and wind power should be promoted more strongly in the country. Increasing the energy efficiency of buildings is also favored, while opinions split on the expansion of coal/oil-fired and nuclear power plants.

05.12.2008 | Friday

Freedom House Report | Democracy in the Caucasus

In June Freedom House released its 2008 annual Nations in Transit Report covering January 1, 2007 through December 31, 2007. The Nations in Transit Report covers the democratic performance of the former Soviet Union, the former Soviet satellite states and the former Yugoslavia.

02.11.2006 | Thursday

Caucasus Election Programs in the 1990s

Nani Chkhaidze compared the 1990s election programs of parties that won the elections in the South Caucasus.

03.12.2007 | Monday

Exit Polls | a good idea?

With upcoming elections in Georgia, the attention is back on a theme that otherwise often gets neglected: what does the Georgian electorate want?

19.11.2007 | Monday

Georgia's Performance? | Millenium Challenge Corporation's Meta-Index

With all the attention on Georgia, it may be interesting to revisit Georgia's most recent performance as seen by international organizations. As it happens, the Millennium Challenge Corporation offers a such an assessment through its annual scorecard, just released last week. This scorecard is a meta-index, drawing on data from the World Bank Institute, Freedom House, IFC, WHO, UNESCO and a few other organizations.

11.11.2007 | Sunday

Political Events in Georgia | Source of Dissatisfaction?

We normally leave political analysis to the many other qualified commentators. However, given current events, it is interesting to see that our Data Initiative shows that ever since 2004 there was a powerful trend of disenchantment in Georgia. Below, see the responses we received when asking "Do you think that things in our country are moving in the right direction?" Blue is positive, yellow negative. The data is for Tbilisi.

21.11.2016 | Monday

Georgian parliamentary elections 2016 - Gender and ethnic minority representation on party lists

The results of the 2016 Parliamentary elections in Georgia reveal some interesting patterns about the representation of women and ethnic minorities in Georgian politics.

19.06.2017 | Monday

Back to the USSR? How poverty makes people nostalgic for the Soviet Union

A recent CRRC/NDI survey asked whether the dissolution of the Soviet Union was a good or bad thing for Georgia. People’s responses were split almost evenly: 48% reported that the dissolution was a good thing, whereas 42% said it was a bad thing for the country. Such a close split raised questions in the media about why people took one view or another.

15.08.2017 | Tuesday

Who makes political decisions in Georgia: What people think

Bidzina Ivanishvili resigned from the post of prime minister of Georgia on November 20th 2013, and in his own words, “left politics“. Speculation about his continued informal participation in the political decision-making process began even before he resigned and still continues. Some politicians think that Ivanishvili gives orders to the Georgian Dream party from behind-the-scenes, while others believe that he actually distanced himself from politics. Politicians, journalists and experts continue to discuss the situation. Meanwhile, a majority of Georgia’s population thinks that Bidzina Ivanishvili is still involved in the governing process and that his informal participation is unacceptable.

09.10.2017 | Monday

Prioritizing the personal: People talk more about personal issues than political events

In general people are primarily interested in their own lives, rather than in social or political events. In other words, social and political events will, most probably, be overshadowed by events in one’s personal life. CRRC’s 2015 Caucasus Barometer (CB) survey data provides more detailed insights on this. In this blog post, we compare answers to two CB questions: “When you get together with your close relatives and friends, how often do you discuss each other’s private problems?” and “When you get together with your friends and close relatives, how often do you discuss politics / current affairs?” in Armenia and Georgia.

16.10.2017 | Monday

Visa liberalization: How much do people in Georgia know about the conditions of visa-free travel to the EU?

CRRC’s previous blog posts have shown that the population of Georgia had rather moderate expectations of the recent visa liberalization with the Schengen zone countries, especially when it comes to the question of how much ordinary people will benefit from it. Europe Foundation’s latest survey on Knowledge of and Attitudes towards the European Union in Georgia, conducted in May 2017, provides a more nuanced understanding on how people in Georgia feel about this process and to what extent they are familiar with the conditions of visa liberalization.

30.10.2017 | Monday

Georgian public increasingly unaware of what the European Union Monitoring Mission does

As much as 81% of the population of Georgia doesn’t know what the European Union Monitoring Mission (EUMM) does, according to the 2017 Knowledge of and Attitudes towards the European Union in Georgia survey funded by Europe Foundation and implemented by CRRC-Georgia. This lack of knowledge has increased over time, as has the prevalence of incorrect information about the EUMM’s mission. This represents a missed opportunity for the EU’s communications in Georgia.

06.11.2017 | Monday

Taking partly free voters seriously: autocratic response to voter preferences in Armenia and Georgia

Do voters in less than democratic contexts matter or are elections simply facades used to create a veneer of democratic accountability for domestic and international actors? Within the Autocratic Response to Voter Preferences in Armenia and Georgia project, funded by Academic Swiss Caucasus Net, CRRC-Georgia and CRRC-Armenia aimed to help answer this question, at least for Georgia and Armenia. On October 27, Caucasus Survey published the results of the project in a special issue, available here.

13.11.2017 | Monday

Who should own land in Georgia? How attitudes changed between 2015 and 2017

Georgian parliament recently adopted constitutional amendments. Among the many changes were those regulating the sale of agricultural land. According to the amendments, “Agricultural land, as a resource of special importance, can only be owned by the state, a self-governing entity, a citizen of Georgia, or a union of Georgian citizens.” While the constitution allows for exceptions, which should be regulated by a law yet to be written, it is expected that foreigners will not be allowed to buy agricultural land in Georgia as freely as Georgian citizens. This blog post looks at public opinion about foreigners owning land in Georgia.

20.11.2017 | Monday

Was the population informed about the constitutional reform in Georgia?

After 10 months of discussions, the parliament of Georgia adopted amendments to the constitution of the country on September 29th and overrode the president’s veto on October 13th, 2017. The most widely discussed amendments are about rules for electing the president, self-governance principles, the definition of marriage, the sale of agricultural land to foreigners, the minimum age of judges and the country’s foreign policy orientation. Because of the importance of the amendments, one would expect a high level of awareness among the population. However, despite the public meetings held and media coverage of the issue, according to the CRRC/NDI survey from June 2017, a majority of the population of Georgia was not aware of the constitutional reform process.

25.12.2017 | Monday

Gender (in)equality on TV

Stereotypes are an inseparable part of every society, and present in many parts of everyday life. Georgian society is no exception in this regard. For example, some professions like teaching are stereotypically thought of as “women’s professions” while others like being a soldier are considered “men’s professions”. The media is considered one of the strongest means through which stereotypes are strengthened or broken. In Georgia, TV is the most important media, given that according to CRRC/NDI data, 73% of the population of the country name television as their primary source of the information. In order to understand the dynamics around gender-based stereotypes on TV, CRRC-Georgia monitored the main evening news releases and political talk shows broadcast during prime time (from 18:00 to 00:00) on five national and three regional channels from September 11 to November 12, 2017 (Channel One of the Public Broadcaster, Adjara, Rustavi 2, Imedi, Maestro, Trialeti, Gurjaani, Odishi) with the support of the UN Joint Program for Gender Equality with support from UNDP Georgia and the Swedish government.

08.01.2018 | Monday

Visa liberalization: Which groups in Georgia are expected to benefit most from it?

The introduction of visa free travel to the Schengen zone countries for Georgian citizens was one of the most prominent news stories in Georgia in 2017. It was also highly publicized and presented by the country’s government as a significant achievement on the way to European integration. Do people in Georgia agree with this assessment? And which groups of the population does the public think will actually benefit from the opportunity? CRRC’s 2017 Caucasus Barometer (CB) survey results shed some light on these questions.

05.02.2018 | Monday

Who in Georgia wants to study abroad?

Studying abroad can offer students the opportunity to learn new languages, travel, experience different cultures, and form relationships in addition to studying. The Knowledge of and Attitudes towards the European Union survey (EU Survey) implemented by CRRC-Georgia for Europe Foundation provides information about what share of the population in Georgia would like to go abroad to study, and the demographic characteristics of those who would like to.

20.02.2018 | Tuesday

As many Georgians think the West spreads propaganda as Russia

On 13 February, the United States released its Worldwide Threat Assessment of the US Intelligence Community. In it, the significance of Russian influence operations in Georgia were highlighted. Just eight days earlier, on 5 February, a coalition of Georgia’s leading non-governmental organisations made an official offer to support the Government of Georgia, the EU, and NATO in their efforts to counter anti-Western propaganda.

05.03.2018 | Monday

Partisanship and Trust in TV in Georgia

One of the outcomes of the stark polarization of news media sources globally is that people tend to align to the media outlets which resonate most with their ideological beliefs. In most cases, consumption of a particular ideological media source can only reinforce one’s beliefs, which might lead to an even further polarization of the audience. These patterns can be characteristic of mass media in contexts as different as, for instance, the United States and Lebanon. As the data from the December 2017 wave of CRRC/NDI survey shows, people in Georgia also appear to be selective in trusting media that aligns with their political beliefs as well.

16.04.2018 | Monday

Changes in public opinion between 2011 and 2017

A lot changed in Georgia between 2011 and 2017, including the government. New promises and new regulations have been made and new priorities set by politicians. A visa free regime with the Schengen zone countries came into force. An ultranationalist ‘Georgian March’ was organized. A Georgian priest was charged with conspiracy to murder the Secretary of the Patriarch of the Georgian Orthodox Church, the most trusted institution in Georgia. This list is by no means exhaustive, but it does raise questions about whether and how public opinion has changed against the backdrop of these and other events.

18.06.2018 | Monday

The EU, USA or Russia: Who is believed to be able to support Georgia best?

In recent years, Georgia has benefited from EU and US assistance, with around €400 million indicatively allocated for the EU’s projects in Georgia in 2017-2020, and the US government increasing assistance to Georgia in the 2018 Spending Bill. In contrast, Georgia’s relationships with Russia are tense, with diplomatic relations terminated in 2008.

21.01.2019 | Monday

Budget priorities are similar to people's spending priorities

Georgia’s state budget amounted to GEL 12.5 billion in 2018. The Ministry of Labor, Health and Social Affairs; Ministry of Regional Development and Infrastructure; and Ministry of Education and Science had the largest appropriations at 28.2% (GEL 3.528 billion), 14.5% (GEL 1.815 billion), and 9.5% (GEL 1.186 billion) of the budget, respectively. In the 2018 June CRRC/NDI survey, respondents were asked, “What are your top three priorities for spending, understanding it means cutting elsewhere?” Respondents were provided with a show card and allowed to name up to three answers. This blog post looks at whether responses match up with actual spending, and how priorities vary among different demographic groups.

11.02.2019 | Monday

NGOs in Georgia: Low trust, high expectations? (Part 1)

Over the last decade, people in Georgia have reported rather low levels of trust toward NGOs. At the same time, when asked during surveys to assess specific aspects of NGO activities, the answers have usually been positive. This blog post is based on the findings of a survey on attitudes toward NGOs collected by CRRC-Georgia in fall, 2017 for the Georgian Civil Society Sustainability Initiative (CSSIGE). The first part of this blog post looks at the most up-to-date data on knowledge of NGOs in Georgia and reported levels of trust toward them. The second part explores the inconsistency between low trust toward NGOs in Georgia, on the one hand, and quite positive assessments of their activities, on the other hand.

18.02.2019 | Monday

NGOs in Georgia: Low trust, high expectations? (Part 2)

As discussed in the first part of this blog post, the results of CRRC-Georgia’s survey conducted for the Georgian Civil Society Sustainability Initiative (CSSIGE) project in fall 2017 confirmed that both knowledge about NGOs and trust toward them is quite low in Georgia. This blog post looks at the inconsistency between low trust toward NGOs, on the one hand, and quite positive assessments of their activities, on the other hand.

21.02.2019 | Thursday

Selection of Supreme Court judges: The public’s knowledge and attitudes about the process

On December 24th, 2018, High Council of Justice (HCoJ) of Georgia nominated ten candidates to the country’s Supreme Court. The nomination caused controversy among the representatives of civil society organizations as the nominated judges were either leaders or close associates of a group of judges (so called “clan”) exercising an informal power over Georgia’s judiciary. The HCoJ was enabled to make the nominations due to recent constitutional changes that shifted the right of nomination from the President to the HCoJ...

25.02.2019 | Monday

Are there predictors of not knowing and refusing to answer on surveys in Georgia?

Are there variables that predict who is likely to report “Don’t know” or to refuse to answer survey questions more often in Georgia? This blog post looks at this question, using un-weighted Caucasus Barometer 2017 (CB) data for Georgia.

08.04.2019 | Monday

The election environment in minority areas of Georgia is getting worse

Post-election polling by CRRC-Georgia suggests that not only are elections most problematic in Georgia’s ethnic minority regions, they are also getting worse.

The 2018 presidential elections, and particularly, the events surrounding the second round, have come to be considered a setback for Georgia’s democratic trajectory. Between the first and second round, it was announced that 600,000 voters would have debt relief immediately following the elections, leading some to suggest this was a form of vote buying. A number of instances of electoral fraud were also alleged. The use of party coordinators around election precincts was also widely condemned.

15.04.2019 | Monday

Georgians are split over the Prosecutor’s Office in Georgia

On November 3, 2018 Rustavi 2 broadcasted an investigative film created by the Studio Monitor and Radio Liberty about a suspended investigation of the Prosecutor’s Office of Georgia. The film How to subjugate a judge? focused on accusations against prosecutors and judges related to the abuse of power, seizure of real estate, and giving of land to private individuals.

30.04.2019 | Tuesday

Who doesn’t want democracy for Georgia?

After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Georgia adopted western-style democratic institutions. They have never functioned in a fully democratic manner, fluctuating between more liberal and authoritarian tendencies. That is, Georgia is and has been a hybrid regime.

But what do people want?

13.05.2019 | Monday

Pessimism about Georgia’s direction hides room for optimism

While a large number of Georgians think the country is going in the wrong direction, the fact that they are judging the country’s performance based on issues rather than political partisanship alone is a good sign.

03.06.2019 | Monday

It’s the economy stupid: An experiment on Georgian support for the European Union

Georgians are enthusiastic in supporting the country’s accession to the European Union. Since 2012, when the National Democratic Institute (NDI) and CRRC-Georgia started tracking attitudes, three quarters of Georgians approved of the government’s goal of joining the EU, on average. What motivates Georgians to support the Union, or alternatively, to abandon support? A survey experiment included in the latest CRRC/NDI poll suggests potential economic burdens have a modest yet significant effect on support for membership. Results do not support the common belief that a potential military threat from Russia dampens Georgians’ support for the EU.

15.07.2019 | Monday

The direction Georgia’s headed in

The most recent NDI polling showed a decline in the direction the country was heading. Though not the direct cause by any means, the growing sense that Georgia is going in the wrong direction was likely an enabling factor for the protests that erupted in June and have continued through July in Tbilisi. The CRRC-NDI survey has tracked the direction people think the country is headed over the last decade. While numerous factors affect people’s perceptions of where the country is going, a number of events including elections and the devaluation of the Georgian Lari against the US Dollar appear to show up in CRRC-Georgia and the National Democratic Institute’s data. This blog provides an overview of how views of the direction the country is headed in have changed over time.

26.08.2019 | Monday

Attitudes toward politicians are related to evaluations of institutional performance

How citizens evaluate the performance of the state is often a reasonable proxy for its performance. In Georgia, evaluations of public institutions are mixed. While a number of social and demographic variables are associated with people’s perceptions of state performance, so too are people’s attitudes towards political parties and politicians. This shows once again how politics is personalized in Georgia.

17.09.2019 | Tuesday

What divides and what unites Georgian society?

The last year has seen a number of conversations about polarization in Georgia. The President of the European Council, Donald Tusk, even commented on the issue in his Batumi speech. One of the components of polarization, though not the sole factor, is division in society over actors, issues, and institutions.

While many things could divide the public, what do the people think and which groups report more and fewer sources of division? The April 2019 NDI-CRRC poll suggests that there are fewer perceived reasons for division in rural areas and among ethnic minorities.

11.11.2019 | Monday

Government employees assess the work of the government better than the general public

The outlook in Georgia continues to be increasingly pessimistic, with more people reporting that the country is heading in the wrong direction. Similarly, performance assessments of government institutions have been on the decline in recent years. As recent CRRC analyses have highlighted, party identification, attitudes towards individual politicians, ethnicity, and Georgian language proficiency among ethnic minorities are associated with attitudes towards government. Analysis of the July 2019 CRRC and NDI survey suggests that working for the state is also associated with performance assessments. However, government employees in poor households and those in Tbilisi rate government performance significantly worse.

18.11.2019 | Monday

Knowledge of visa-free requirements falls since launch of scheme

Georgian citizens have been able to travel visa free within the Schengen zone for approaching three years, the result of several years of complex dialogue and policy reform. Despite the elapsed time, and a major EU-funded public information campaign, the results of the 2019 Survey on Knowledge of and Attitudes towards the European Union in Georgia (EU Survey) suggest that public knowledge of requirements for visa free travel have fallen since the scheme launched. Similarly, the same period has seen a large rise in the number of Georgian citizens being denied entry to EU countries, with Eurostat reporting over four thousand such cases in 2018 alone, up over a third since 2017.

09.12.2019 | Monday

Optimism Regarding EU membership is decreasing

Georgia is not a candidate for membership in the European Union (EU), but the government has the stated goal of joining the EU when the country is ready for it. According to the Knowledge of and Attitudes towards the EU in Georgia survey (EU Survey) CRRC-Georgia conducted in spring 2019 for Europe Foundation, 71% of the population of Georgia would vote for EU membership if a referendum were held tomorrow. Only 10% would vote against it and 7% would not vote at all. While support for joining the EU is clearly high, people are increasingly pessimistic about how long it will take Georgia to join.

06.01.2020 | Monday

Georgia’s Foreign Policy Trilemma: Balance, Bandwagon, or Hedge? Part 1

Georgia is a small, partly free democracy in a tough neighbourhood, and NATO membership remains an unfulfilled promise. While Russia is widely perceived as the main threat to Georgia’s security, the appropriate strategic or political response to the threat is not obvious. What options does Georgia have when faced with a powerful rival on its border, and what public support is there for these options?

13.01.2020 | Monday

Georgia’s Foreign Policy Trilemma: Balance, Bandwagon, or Hedge? Part 2

The first part of this blog post discussed evidence of an association between perceiving Russia as the main threat to Georgia and a preference for a foreign policy that balances against that threat through alliances with the West. The relationship between threat perception and hedging, defined as attempting to maintain good relations with both Russia and the West, is less clear.

20.01.2020 | Monday

The economic and educational consequences of child marriage in Georgia

Widely condemned as a violation of human rights, child marriage is associated with negative health outcomes — both physical and psychological. Aside from these clear issues, a growing body of research suggests child marriage also has economic consequences for both the women who marry under the age of 18 and society at large.

27.01.2020 | Monday

In a sea of pessimism, who is optimistic about Georgia?

The CRRC and NDI survey released two weeks ago showed a pessimistic picture – half the public thinks Georgia is going in the wrong direction, 24% that nothing is changing, and only 19% think it is going in the right direction. A majority (59%) think the country is not a democracy for the first time since the question was asked on the survey in 2010. Moreover, performance assessments of government, parliament, the courts, and most ministries declined.

09.03.2020 | Monday

What kind of electoral system do Georgians actually want?

On 8 March, Georgia’s political leaders agreed on a new electoral system under which 120 seats will be allocated via proportional elections and 30 seats will be allocated via direct election of candidates.

The long-fought-over electoral reform was a compromise which represents two steps forward after three steps had been taken back.

13.04.2020 | Monday

As COVID-19 sends political campaigning to Facebook, will polarisation increase?

With Georgia in an election year and traditional face-to-face campaigning out of the question given the COVID-19 outbreak, the importance of Facebook in Georgian politics is only likely to grow.

Facebook is an important part of Georgian politics. Political campaigns are fought, and public opinion thought to often be formed on the platform...

29.06.2020 | Monday

The most important issues facing Georgia, prior to the COVID-19 outbreak

What did Georgians think was the most important issue facing the country prior to the COVID-19 outbreak? The economy. The current COVID-19 outbreak will shift perceptions surely. Yet, the measures to fight the virus have slowed down the economy, exacerbating the previously existing economic issues. While the economy has consistently been the most important issue for most Georgians in recent years, this headline figure hides some nuance. This blog explores this nuance, looking at who names a mixture of economic and non-economic issues as the most important ones facing the country.

11.08.2020 | Tuesday

There is a gap between support for democracy and liberal values in Georgia

Public opinion polls suggest support for democracy is on the decline in Georgia, but does support for democracy correlate to support for liberal values?

An increasing number of Georgians view their country as ‘a democracy with major problems’, with CRRC’s Caucasus Barometer survey showing the share of people reporting this belief to have increased from 27% in 2011 to 48% in 2019.

In parallel to this growing scepticism towards the country’s democratic situation, surveys show a decline in the proportion of the population believing that democracy is preferable to any other kind of government, falling from 65% in 2011 to 49% in 2019.

17.08.2020 | Monday

Support for democracy increased in Georgia during COVID-19, but what does that mean?

The COVID-19 outbreak generated discussion about whether support for democracy would decline during and after the crisis. While reported support increased, this did not necessarily match support for democratic means of governance.

Data from the CRRC’s COVID-19 monitor shows that more people in Georgia reported support for democracy compared to the pre-crisis period. However, as before the crisis, support for democracy does not seem to be grounded in the values commonly associated with democratic governance.

06.10.2020 | Tuesday

Is Georgia really polarised?

Talk about political polarisation in Georgia is easy to find. Some have suggested that the recent United National Movement (UNM) announcement that Saakashvili will be their prime ministerial candidate will only make matters worse.

A new data analysis CRRC Georgia released on Tuesday suggests that this may in fact be the case. Data from several years of CRRC Georgia and NDI polling indicates that there are few ideological or policy issues that the supporters of Georgian Dream (GD) and the United National Movement (UNM) disagree about. Rather, attitudes towards politicians and political events are what divides, a fact the public intuitively recognises.

08.12.2020 | Tuesday

Georgian voters: personalities, policies, or a bit of both?

While personality in politics matters greatly for the Georgian public, data from this year shows that for Georgian Dream and United National Movement voters, policy is still important.

A recent CRRC Georgia policy brief argued that what was really dividing Georgians politically was personalities rather than policies. Data from the August 2020 CRRC and NDI survey provides further evidence for this idea.

However, the data also shows a difference between Georgian Dream (GD) and United National Movement (UNM) voters in terms of policy preferences and that economic policy is the most important issue for a plurality of voters.

22.12.2020 | Tuesday

Political campaigning in Georgia: informing or mobilising?

Political campaigning takes a wide range of forms, from digital advertising to door knocking. Generally, campaigning is believed to both mobilise voters to actually go out to vote as well as win over voters, but which is most relevant in Georgia?

Data from the August CRRC Georgia and NDI public opinion poll indicate that people who wanted to be contacted by campaigners also appeared more partisan than others. This may suggest that campaigning in Georgia will be more effective at turning out partisans than persuading the undecided.

24.02.2021 | Wednesday

Who thinks Georgia handled the pandemic successfully?

Prior to the most recent episode in Georgia's political crises, COVID-19 was the country's main concern. Yet, data on how the public views the country's handling of the crisis shows a stark partisan divide.

It has been a year since the first case of coronavirus was detected in Georgia. Since then, over 260,000 cases have been confirmed, over 3,300 fatalities, and the economy has suffered the largest decline since 1994. In light of this, how does the Georgian public assess the country’s handling of the pandemic?

Data from the 2020 Caucasus Barometer survey offers a snapshot of how well people think the country did in dealing with the outbreak.

04.03.2021 | Thursday

UNM supporters are especially pessimistic about their economic future

With the pandemic still raging and accompanying economic restrictions still in force, Georgians are unsurprisingly pessimistic about their economic future. This holds true especially for supporters of the opposition United National Movement Party, above all other party supporters.

COVID-19 restrictions have impacted people’s economic activity heavily. This is reflected in key economic indicators such as GDP, which declined by 5.9% year on year between January and November 2020.

It is also reflected in employment, with fewer people reporting starting new jobs and more people reporting having lost one, according to the 2020 Caucasus Barometer.

22.03.2022 | Tuesday

Грузини хочуть, щоби їхній уряд підтримав Україну

Війна Росії з Україною шокувала світ. Вона також шокувала Грузію, а нове опитування від CRRC Georgia викриває ступінь наявних політичних наслідків.

Наслідки війни, що стосуються зовнішньої та внутрішньої політики Грузії, виявилися доволі масштабними. Офіційна позиція Грузії щодо війни була суперечливою: в той час як прем’єр-міністр Іраклі Гарібашвілі категорично заявив, що Грузія не приєднається до санкцій, накладених Заходом проти Росії, президент Грузії Саломе Зурабішвілі почала медійний та дипломатичний бліц у Європі, висловлюючи рішучу підтримку Україні.

07.02.2023 | Tuesday