Analysis

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2024 Georgian Parliamentary Elections

Ranking Georgia’s political parties by gender balance in the 2024 elections

by Shota Kincha

•5 min read

Georgia’s parliamentary elections on 26 October, unlike the previous vote, will be held without any gender quotas. As women’s representation in Georgian politics remains an issue, we have examined the electoral lists of all the major parties and groupings and ranked them based on how many women they included — and how highly they were placed. The ruling Georgian Dream party pushed through mandatory gender quotas ahead of the 2020 parliamentary and 2021 local elections in an apparent bid to pro

2024 Georgian Parliamentary Elections

Who’s who in Georgia’s parliamentary elections?

by Shota Kincha

•13 min read

Georgians will go to the polls on 26 October in crucial parliamentary elections. Unlike in previous years, this election will be held under a fully proportional system. This means parties will be allocated a percentage of parliament’s 150 seats based entirely on the percentage of votes they receive nationwide, doing away with elections for individual MPs in single-seat constituencies. However, despite calls from many smaller parties, and despite previously promising the opposite, the ruling

Analysis

Explainer | What’s in Georgia’s new anti-queer bill?

by Shota Kincha

•7 min read

The ruling Georgian Dream party has tabled a package bill of anti-queer legislation and amendments, coming in the wake of years of rhetoric condemning ‘LGBT propaganda’. OC Media breaks down the changes, their impacts, and the ruling party’s rhetoric on the subject. On 10 June, a group of ruling party lawmakers led by Parliamentary Speaker Shalva Papuashvili tabled a bill centred on a law ‘on protection of family values and minors’ and associated amendments to 18 existing laws. The bill is

The devastating landslide in Shovi in August 2023. Photo: Netgazeti

Analysis

Datablog | Georgians are feeling the effects of climate change

by Dustin Gilbreath

•3 min read

The effects of climate change are increasingly being felt acutely in Georgia. A CRRC poll investigated Georgian people’s perception of climate change, and found that 90% of respondents considered it to be an important issue, and 75% had experienced changes in local weather patterns. Climate change is increasingly having catastrophic impacts around the world, from an increase in insect-borne infectious disease to a rise in deadly heatwaves, flooding, and storms. These impacts are also being

Anti-Russian graffiti in Tbilisi. Photo: OC Media

Analysis

Datablog | Georgians are split on economic relations with Russia

by Zachary Fabos

•3 min read

Despite significant negative public sentiment towards Russia’s relations to Georgia, a 2023 CRRC survey found that there were mixed opinions on Georgia’s economic ties to Russia. In CRRC Georgia’s 2021 Caucasus Barometer Survey, 66% of Georgians surveyed identified Russia as the country’s main enemy. However, NDI and CRRC Georgia’s October 2023 survey data found that those surveyed had a variety of opinions on Georgia’s economic relations with Russia. Georgian support for deepening economi

Analysis

Why is Georgian Dream reviving the foreign agent law?

by Shota Kincha

•7 min read

Georgia’s ruling party has promised to pass a controversial ‘foreign agents’ law a year after it was withdrawn following mass street protests. Coming just six months before parliamentary elections, why is the ruling party making such a risky move? On the morning of 3 April, Georgian Dream’s parliamentary leader Mamuka Mdinaradze announced that the government would be bringing back the law — dubbed the ‘Russian law’ by critics — that would target civil society organisations and the media and li

A phone at a protest by journalists near Georgia's parliament in July 2021. Photo: Mariam Nikuradze/OC Media

Analysis

Datablog | Young, in the city, and online: most Georgians use more than one social media platform

by Zachary Fabos

•2 min read

A CRRC Georgia survey found most Georgian respondents use more than one social media platform, with younger people and people living in cities using a greater variety of platforms. According to Georgia’s National Statistics Office, 96% of Georgia’s internet users use social media. While social media’s popularity in Georgia is clear, which platforms are most used and who uses the most platforms? According to the 2021 Caucasus Barometer survey, 68% of Georgians use the internet daily. The mo