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Date

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Sovereignty without Sovereignty and Peace without Peace: Georgia’s Post-Election Crisis and Current Mass Resistance
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This event is online only.

Please join the Harriman Institute for a panel discussion with Nutsa Batiashvili, Ia Eradze, Tamta Khalvashi, and Luka Nakhutsrishvili. Moderated by Julie George. This event is part of our Democracy in Crisis and Transformation series.

Georgia’s recent nationwide protests have brought to the forefront a new form of authoritarianism, blending nationalist rhetoric with geopolitical ambitions. This panel explores the political technologies and affective politics in the ruling Georgian Dream party deployed to retain control and hinder the country’s integration into the European Union. By invoking the language of sovereignty and peace while simultaneously wielding the narrative of a multipolar world, the government has justified the repression of dissent and escalated state violence. In this context, the panelists will examine how these tactics maintain an illusion of stability while undermining both democratic processes and the rule of law. Despite unprecedented state violence, the resistance continues to mature, signaling a profound shift toward a grassroots democracy that challenges the current political order. This roundtable will consider the implications of these developments for Georgia’s political future and the broader geopolitical struggles in the region. We aim to critically uncover how these protests embody a dynamic new form of resistance that may reshape the nation’s sovereignty and quest for peace.

 

Nutsa Batiashvili is Professor of Anthropology, the Dean of the Graduate School and the Director of the Memory and Anxiety Research Lab at the Free University of Tbilisi. She earned her PhD in Anthropology from Washington University in St. Louis. Her research focuses on the Caucasian highlanders and ethnic Armenians in Georgia and the anthropology of anxiety.

 

 

 

Ia Eradze is a political economist with expertise in economic development, central banking, and Georgia’s financial history. She is Associate Professor and CERGE-EI Foundation Teaching Fellow at the Georgian Institute for Public Affairs (GIPA). In addition, Ia is a researcher at the Institute for Social and Cultural Research at Ilia State University.

 

 

 

Tamta Khalvashi is Professor of Anthropology and the Head of the PhD Program of Social and Cultural Anthropology at Ilia State University. She earned her PhD in Anthropology from Copenhagen University. Her research interests include post-socialist transformations, peripheral histories and infrastructures in Georgia and the Caucasus.

 

 

 

Luka Nakhutsrishvili teaches critical theory at Ilia State University in Tbilisi and is a researcher and project coordinator at the Institute for Social and Cultural Research at the same university. He studies projects of modernity, popular resistance, and revolutionary culture in Georgia and the Caucasus.

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