Is the Georgian government doing enough to secure EU membership?

Note: This article first appeared on the Caucasus Data Blog, a joint effort of CRRC Georgia and OC Media. It was written by Dustin Gilbreath, a non-resident Senior Fellow at CRRC Georgia. The views presented in the article are the author’s alone, and do not necessarily reflect the views of CRRC Georgia, NDI, or any related entity.

CRRC Georgia data suggests that while the majority of Georgians want to join the EU, they are largely split along partisan lines on whether their government is doing enough to secure the country’s candidate status.

Georgia has long stated that it aims to join both the European Union and NATO. However, the government’s recent actions, including campaigning for the foreign agent draft law, increasingly critical rhetoric on Ukraine, and the propagation of conspiracy theories suggesting that the West was attempting to draw Georgia into the war in Ukraine have called its dedication to Euro-Atlantic integration into question.

Georgia was denied EU candidacy last year, and obligated to fulfil 12 criteria laid out by the EU for its bid to be re-examined by Brussels.

Data from CRRC Georgia and the National Democratic Institute’s (NDI) December 2022 poll suggests that the public’s support for membership remains as strong as ever. However, a majority think the government is not doing enough to support the country’s bid, and the public is split over how the country’s foreign policy has developed over the last five years.

The CRRC and NDI survey has consistently shown that a large majority of the Georgian public supports the country’s membership in the European Union. Since April 2014, between 61% and 83% of the public has reported support for the government’s stated goal of joining the European Union, with all bar one survey finding that over 70% of the public is in favour of the goal. In the most recent wave of the survey, 81% reported approving Georgia’s membership bid, slightly up from 75% in July–August of 2022. 

Despite widespread support for Georgia’s EU bid, a slight majority of the public (56%) reported that the government is not doing enough (38%) or doing nothing at all in support of EU membership (18%).

In contrast, only 30% reported that the government was doing everything it could to ensure Georgia’s membership. A further 13% were uncertain and 1% refused to answer the question.

In the July and August edition of the CRRC–NDI survey a similar question was asked, with 27% of the public reporting that the government did everything it could to gain candidate status, 49% reporting it did not do enough, and the remaining share of the public either reporting they did not agree with either sentiment (8%) or that they were uncertain or unwilling to answer the question (16%).

The public was also asked whether Georgia had grown closer to the EU, distanced itself from it, or if the relationship has remained the same as it was over the last five years.

The public was split on this, with roughly equal shares reporting that Georgia had grown closer to the EU (30%) and that Georgia’s relationship with the EU remained the same as it was five years ago (29%). A quarter of the public (24%) reported that Georgia had distanced itself from the EU. One in six (15%) report they are uncertain, while 1% refused to answer the question.

While the data show no partisan divide in terms of support for Georgia’s membership in the European Union, the other two questions show clear divisions between partisans over both how Georgia’s relationship has developed with the European Union and the government’s efforts at gaining candidate status.

While 59% of Georgian Dream supporters felt that the government was doing everything it could for Georgia’s bid, only 7% of the United National Movement’s (UNM) supporters and 19% of those who support no party felt the same. Similarly, 51% of Georgian Dream supporters believed that Georgia has got closer to the EU over the last five years, while only 14% of the UNM’s supporters and a quarter (24%) who reported they support no party felt the same.

While the public remains supportive of Georgia’s membership bid in the European Union, they were split over both the government’s efforts at moving Georgia closer to the EU and how they perceived the relationship’s dynamics over the past half-decade, prior to attempts to adopt the foreign agents law. 

As with many perceptions of the affairs of the day, views on these issues are split along partisan lines. However, it is clear that Georgia’s bid for membership in the European Union is increasingly on the rocks.

The data used in this article is available here.

Is People’s Power designed to make Georgian Dream look good?

Note: This article first appeared on the Caucasus Data Blog, a joint effort of CRRC-Georgia and OC Media. It was written by Koba Turmanidze, President of CRRC-Georgia. The views presented in the article are the author’s alone, and do not necessarily reflect the views of CRRC-Georgia or any related entity.

A CRRC Georgia study found that positioning Georgian Dream as more moderate than its spin-off group, People’s Power, increased support for the ruling party. 

A popular study suggests that when a person goes for a date, they will be more liked if they take a similar, but slightly less attractive companion with them. Likewise, political parties often look better for their voters when they position themselves against a similar, but less appealing opponent. 

This blog shows how the same principle works in Georgia, and how the ruling Georgian Dream party appears to be boosting its support by arguing with its ‘friendly rival’, the People’s Power movement.  

In summer 2022, three Georgian Dream MPs announced that they were leaving the ruling party to ‘speak more freely’; in practice, this meant criticising the West, including ‘personal attacks’ on the US ambassador, and suggesting that the West wanted to drag Georgia into war. 

More politicians later joined the three MPs, and established the Peoples’ Power movement. Its members remained in the parliamentary majority together with Georgian Dream, which raised questions as to whether People’s Power was a true opponent to Georgian Dream or just a satellite party, intended to advance the ruling party’s more radical policies and boost support amongst anti-Western groups within Georgia’s electorate. 

The latter suspicions have been further strengthened by the ambiguous reaction of Georgian Dream’s leadership to the radical anti-Western statements from their new, ostensible opponents. While Irakli Kobakhidze, the ruling party chair, largely endorsed what People’s Power were saying, Prime Minister Irakli Gharibashvili spoke out against the statements, warning against potential damage to relations with the US. 

Even more tellingly, when the foreign agent law was tabled by People’s Power, Georgian dream’s leading figures were quick to express their support for the bill, despite its ostensibly separate roots. 

To investigate whether Georgian Dream could expect any benefit from its radical knock off party, CRRC-Georgia designed and carried out a survey experiment in November 2022. We randomly split a sample of 1,219 respondents into four groups.

The first, a control group of respondents, were told that politicians from People’s Power had criticised the US ambassador and suggested that the US wanted to drag Georgia into the war in Ukraine.

The second group were told both the above and that Irakli Kobakhidze had issued a note not denying the statement. 

The third group was told about People’s Power’s allegations, but added Irakli Gharibashvili’s comment that such statements would weaken Georgia’s relations with the US. 

The fourth group was informed about all three statements: the original anti-Western statement from People’s Power, Irakli Kobakhidze’s note which did not contradict the statement, and the opposing comment by Irakli Gharibashvili. 

Finally, all respondents were asked about whom they would vote for if elections were held tomorrow.

The data show that the comment that differentiated Georgian Dream from its supposed opponent was most beneficial to the ruling party. 

The Prime Minister’s disagreement with the statement increased Georgian Dream’s expected support by eight percentage points: 19% of respondents voted for Georgian Dream on hearing only the anti-Western statement, but on exposure to Gharibashvili’s counter-statement, support for the party reached 27%. 

Importantly, this share of the vote is in the population overall, rather than amongst those who would actually vote in an election, suggesting that the actual effect in an election could be much larger. 

It is noteworthy that only the counterstatement on its own had a statistically significant effect: neither agreeing with the statement nor hearing both agreement and disagreement changed support for the ruling party in a statistically significant manner. 

These findings are in line with similar studies from democracies and less democratic locales: radical spin-off parties tend to benefit the ruling party more than the party that splits off. 

In this study, on average only 3% said they would support People’s Power across all scenarios. However, the impact of the statement was significant for the ruling party when they decided to appear less radical in comparison. 

Notably, the experiment was conducted with a focus on the country’s Western orientation, which is a matter of national agreement: large majorities support Georgia joining the EU and NATO. It is not clear if the ruling party would still gain support from appearing to be the more attractive option in discussions of issues around which there is less consensus. 

While this could have been tested out with the foreign agent law, ostensibly attributable to People’s Power, the ruling party has resolutely put its weight behind the law since its introduction. Whether Georgian Dream returns to positioning itself as more moderate than its spin-off group remains to be seen.

Read in Georgian on On.ge.

Georgians increasingly feel mistreated by the government

Note: This article first appeared on the Caucasus Data Blog, a joint effort of CRRC Georgia and OC Media. It was written by Eto Gagunashvili, a Researcher at CRRC-Georgia, The views presented in the article are of the author alone, and do not necessarily reflect the views of CRRC-Georgia, or any related entity.

Recent CRRC Georgia data suggests that people in Georgia’s age and foreign policy preferences affect how they feel the government is treating them.

The public’s perception of the fairness of the government’s actions is critical to governance and may reflect the quality of democracy in a country. Today, Georgians tend to feel like their country is no longer a democracy, while the public feels that people like them are not being treated fairly by the government.

According to data CRRC Georgia collected for the Europe Foundation since 2009 through a survey on Georgian attitudes towards the EU, the share of Georgians who disagree with the opinion that people like them are being treated unfairly by the government has increased from 46% in 2009 to 60% in 2021. 

Today, twice as many people think that the government treats people like them unfairly as those who feel otherwise.

In the 2021 data, older people (55+) were more likely to agree with the opinion that in Georgia, people like them are treated fairly by the government than younger people (18–35). Other social and demographic variables were not statistically associated with whether or not someone thinks the government treats someone like them more or less fairly.

People’s perceptions of how democratic Georgia is, which country can best support Georgia currently, and support for EU membership are correlated with people’s views of whether people like them are treated fairly by the government. 

People who report that they would vote against EU membership were 18 percentage points more likely to agree that the government treats them fairly than those who report that they would vote for EU membership.

People who report that the USA can currently give the best support to Georgia were 18 percentage points less likely to agree with the statement that people are treated fairly by the government compared to people who report that Russia can best support Georgia.

People who think that Georgia is not a democracy yet, but is developing in that direction or think that Georgia is a democratic country with room for improvement were 13 and 25 percentage points more likely to agree that they are treated fairly than people who think that Georgia might become a democracy in the future, but it is not developing in that direction now. 

With the perception that Georgia’s democracy is backsliding, so too comes the public perception that the government is increasingly not treating people like them fairly. However, older people and people who think Russia can best support Georgia were more satisfied with how the government treats them. 

Note: The above data analysis is based on logistic regression models which included the following variables: age group (18-34, 35-54, 55+), sex (male or female), education (Secondary or lower; Secondary technical; Higher; type of settlement (capital, urban, rural); who can currently best support Georgia (EU, USA, Russia), how democratic Georgia is (Georgia might become a democracy in the future, but it is not developing in that direction now; Georgia is not a democracy yet, but it is developing in that direction; Georgia is a democratic country, but there is still room for improvement); Agree/disagree with the statement: "I am Georgian, and therefore I am European”); Would vote for or against EU membership? (For EU membership; Against EU membership; Would not vote at all).

Who’s to blame for Georgia’s EU candidacy debacle?

Note: This article first appeared on the Caucasus Data Blog, a joint effort of CRRC Georgia and OC Media. It was written by Dr. David Sichinava, Makhare Atchaidze, and Nino Zubashvili, CRRC-Georgia. The views presented in the article are of the authors alone, and do not necessarily reflect the views of CRRC Georgia, or any related entity.

As Georgian officials ramp up their anti-Western rhetoric, recent CRRC Georgia data suggests that most Georgians are uncertain who to blame for the country’s failed European Union membership bid.

On 17 June 2022, the European Commission decided not to grant Georgia EU candidate status, unlike Ukraine and Moldova. In its memo, the Commission recognised the country’s ‘European perspective’, while pointing at an extensive list of issues it needs to address before its candidacy bid is re-examined.

Officials in Brussels later explained that the EU will return to discussing Georgia’s candidacy status ‘sometime in 2023’, by which time the country is supposed to implement reforms addressing political polarisation, the judiciary, and ‘de-oligarchisation’ among a number of other concerns.

Following the announcement, Tbilisi became the epicentre of mass protests attended by tens of thousands of disappointed citizens. Protestors blamed the government for its inaction. Many alleged that the ruling Georgian Dream party deliberately tanked EU membership candidacy talks.

In the lead-up to the announcement, Georgia’s actions placed the bid into question; the country’s political leadership, including the country’s Prime Minister Irakli Gharibashvili, hinted that they would, “say everything” if the European Union decided ‘unfairly’ on the country’s candidate status. 

On the other hand, Irakli Kobakhidze, the chair of Georgian Dream, bluntly stated that if Georgia were to go to war against Russia, it would ‘have been guaranteed EU candidate status by December’. Adding fuel to the fire, the pro-government outlet Imedi ran a poll asking respondents what Georgia should do if the west asked the country to get involved in a war against Russia. Unsurprisingly, the majority said that the country should reject such a proposal.

As emotions have tempered, CRRC-Georgia’s omnibus survey clarifies how Georgians feel about the candidacy status controversy. Fielded in late July, the survey shows that most Georgians reject Georgian Dream politicians’ allegations that the country’s EU membership status was somehow contingent on Georgia’s involvement in a war against Russia.

Instead, people tend to blame the government’s inaction, polarisation, and the country for simply not meeting membership requirements.  Yet another rather worrying trend shows a small but statistically significant shift in the support for Georgia’s EU membership.

Who is to blame?

Overall, three-quarters of Georgians (76%) know the EU did not grant Georgia candidate status. Those who knew about it were asked what they thought the main reason behind the European Commission’s decision was. A third (30%) were uncertain. About a fifth (18%) blamed the Georgian government’s inaction, while equal proportions (14%) attributed this to political polarisation in the country and Georgia not fulfilling the requirements set for membership.

A further 8% believed that Georgia was not granted candidate status due to opposition meddling and sabotage. Fewer (4%) said that this happened because Georgia did not get involved in a war against Russia, with 3% blaming the Russian government. Close to 1% named options such as the government not complying with the agreement brokered by the President of the European Council Charles Michel, or that the EU does not need Georgia, Bidzina Ivanishvili’s supposed informal rule, former President Mikheil Saakashvili’s imprisonment, and the Ukrainian government’s stance towards Georgia. Close to 5% named other options or refused to answer.

Does the public believe the West asked Georgia to start a war with Russia?

No — most Georgians do not think that the EU candidacy bid was contingent on the country starting a war with Russia. Respondents were initially informed that some Georgian politicians claimed that Georgia would have only become an EU candidate if the country had waged war against Russia or opened a ‘second front’.

Next, they were asked whether or not it was true that Georgia would only be granted candidate status if it was involved in a war. Sixty per cent of Georgians said that this claim was either not true at all or mostly not true. Only one in six (17%) believed that the claim was either mostly or absolutely true. Importantly, close to a quarter (23%) were unsure, while a further 1% refused to answer.

Partisanship, place of residence, ethnicity, wealth, and education predict whether or not someone believed the statement. While a majority across the political spectrum reported that the statement that Georgia would have gained candidate status if it had engaged in a war against Russia is false, about a quarter of Georgian Dream supporters believe in the statement. Almost two-thirds of opposition supporters and those who say that no party is close to their views say that the statement is false. More than one-third of respondents who do not know or refuse to state their political preferences are ambivalent about whether or not the above-mentioned statement is true or false.

Ambivalence predominates among ethnic minorities and those with lower socio-economic standings. Notably, it also declines with increases in wealth: those who are most well-off are also the most polarised when assessing whether or not the statements about Georgia’s involvement in the war are true.

Where to now?

The European Commission handed Georgia an extensive list of priorities it expects the country to deliver on for candidacy status. The poll shows that most Georgians are sceptical that the government will be able to implement the necessary reforms the EU requested.

When asked whether or not they expect the Georgian government to implement the reforms, the plurality (45%) says they do not expect it to happen, with 17% saying they are not expecting reforms to move forward and 29% believing that it is more unexpected than expected by the end of the year.

By comparison, 29% expect the Georgian government to comply with the EU’s recommendations, about a quarter believe that it is more expected than unexpected that the government will implement the reforms, and 4% think that it is totally expected that the government will complete necessary reforms for Georgia’s EU candidacy status. A quarter of Georgians are unsure (25%).

Several civil society activists suggested that a technocratic government should oversee the implementation of the reforms. When asked whether or not they approved of creating a technocratic government tasked with implementing the reforms needed to fulfil the EU candidacy criteria, the plurality (42%) said they disapproved, 29% approved. More than a quarter were uncertain (26%).

Who is an oligarch?

Among the conditions the EU set for Georgia was the ‘implement[ation] of the commitment to “de-oligarchisation” by eliminating the excessive influence of vested interests in economic, political, and public life’.

While the opinion did not give a conclusive answer as to whom the Commission considered to be an oligarch, Georgian officials were quick to respond. In a 12 July Facebook post, Irakli Gharibashvili, the country’s prime minister, fiercely rebuked the suggestion that Bidzina Ivanishvili, the founder of Georgian Dream and a former Prime Minister, is still in charge.

Gharibashvili even penned another letter to Ursula von der Leyen, the President of the European Commission, where he requested that she distance herself from a European Parliament resolution that called for sanctioning Ivanishvili.

CRRC Georgia asked who the public thinks the EU considers an oligarch in their statement. Notably, more than half said that they didn’t know who the European Commission was hinting at. Among those that did have a concrete response, a third (35%) consider Ivanishvili to be the oligarch in question. Few (3%) named the currently imprisoned Former President Mikheil Saakashvili or Davit Kezerashvili, a businessman and a former defence minister. A further 2% named Mamuka Khazaradze, a co-founder of TBC Bank and the Lelo party, or Vano Chkhartishvili, a Shevardnadze-era businessman and alleged power broker under Ivanishvili. 

Interestingly, those who support Georgian Dream (51%), non-partisans (55%), and those that don’t know which party is closest to their views (62%) are more likely to be uncertain, while a majority of the opposition supporters (60%) believe that the EU was singling out Ivanishvili.

Is Euroscepticism spreading among Georgians?

CRRC Georgia’s omnibus survey shows that most Georgians (68%) still support the country’s membership in the EU fully (53%) or partially (15%). This is slightly less, though still broadly comparable, to previous levels of support in earlier surveys. The 2020 Caucasus Barometer showed that five percentage points more (73%) expressed full or partial support for EU membership.

In a similar survey fielded in mid-March 2022, EU support stood even higher at 75%, indicating a seven-point decrease over the course of five months. Still, this finding should be viewed with some caution, given that the surveys had different questions, which in turn can moderate or exaggerate support.

The decline in support for Georgia’s EU membership appears to stem from changing views among Georgian Dream supporters. In the 2020 Caucasus Barometer survey, Georgian Dream supporters backed Georgia’s EU membership by eight percentage points more compared to the July 2022 survey (68%).

Many in Georgia are afraid that the controversy surrounding EU candidacy might undermine public support for Georga’s EU membership. CRRC Georgia’s omnibus poll paints a rather complex picture. EU support runs high, and the majority disagrees with the baseless allegations that the West is dragging the country into a war against Russia. Nevertheless, survey results hint that some Georgians, particularly supporters of Georgian Dream, might be questioning their support for the EU. Whether this is the start of a real shift in public opinion or a statistical blip remains to be seen.

Note: Differences across groups are identified using regression models. Reported figures might not sum up to 100 due to rounding errors. A replication code for the analysis above is available here. Marginal frequencies and crosstabulations are available here.

The optimism of pro-EU Georgians

Note: This article first appeared on the Caucasus Data Blog, a joint effort of CRRC Georgia and OC Media. It was written by Julia-Maria Xavier, an International Fellow at CRRC-Georgia. The views presented in the article are of the author alone, and do not necessarily reflect the views of CRRC Georgia, Europe Foundation, or any related entity.

The  2021 CRRC and Europe Foundation Knowledge of and Attitudes toward the EU in Georgia also shows that a strong majority of the Georgian population supports the country joining the European Union.

The survey asked respondents whether they would vote for membership in the European Union if a referendum were held tomorrow. Overall, 77% reported they would vote for membership, 8% that they would not, and 6% that they would not vote. A further 9% reported that they were uncertain and 1% refused to answer.

To measure optimism about the future, people were asked whether the situation in Georgia would never improve or whether, eventually, everything would be fine. In total, 18% reported that things will never improve, while 77% reported that eventually everything will be fine and 5% either did not know or refused to answer.

The data shows that people who would vote for EU membership are more hopeful about the future of Georgia. People who would vote for membership in the European Union were nine percentage points more likely to be optimistic about the country’s future than people who reported that they would vote against EU membership. People who reported that they would not vote were the most pessimistic, being a full 28 percentage points less likely to report optimism for the country’s future. 

People who were employed were nine percentage points more likely to have a positive outlook than people who were not working. There were no meaningful differences in support between men and women, people residing in different settlement types, or in different age groups, controlling for other factors.

The reverse is also true: people who are optimistic about the country’s future would be more likely to vote for EU membership. People who are optimistic about the country’s future are 10 percentage points more likely to report that they would vote for the country’s membership in the European Union, controlling for other factors.

Ethnicity also predicts voting intentions. Ethnic Georgians are 21 percentage points more likely to support joining the EU than ethnic minorities. 

Employment status also predicts voting intentions, with employed people being 12 percentage points more likely to report that they would vote for EU membership. 

There were no meaningful differences in support between men and women, people residing in different settlement types, or in different age groups, controlling for other factors. 

While the data shows that Georgians who would vote for EU membership are more optimistic about the country’s future more broadly, whether those hopes will be dashed awaits a decision on whether Georgia receives EU candidacy status later this month.

Note: The above analysis is based on logistic regression models that include age (18-35, 35-54, 55+), settlement type (capital, urban, rural), sex, employment, optimism about the future, ethnicity (ethnic Georgian, ethnic minority). Willingness to vote for the European Union and optimism about the future were assessed in separate models, which also included these controls. The data this article is based on is available here.

How does Georgia’s democracy compare with countries granted EU candidacy?

Note: This article first appeared on the Caucasus Data Blog, a joint effort of CRRC Georgia and OC Media. It was written by Givi Silagadze, a researcher at CRRC-Georgia. The views presented in the article are of the authors alone, and do not necessarily reflect the views of CRRC Georgia, or any related entity.

The government’s decision to bring forward their application was spurred by Ukraine’s application several days prior as well as mounting pressure from Georgian society.

Despite the extraordinary circumstances, some argue that full integration could take decades unless standards for accession to the EU are lowered.  

Countries aspiring to become EU members must meet several demanding criteria to be considered eligible for membership, known as the Copenhagen criteria. These can be categorised into three groups: (1) political criteria largely relating to democracy, the rule of law, and human rights, (2) economic criteria, and (3) administrative and institutional capacity. 

Georgia, alongside Ukraine and Moldova, is now waiting for the EU to either grant them candidate status or reject their application, which would be a major blow for Georgia’s EU aspirations. 

According to data from Freedom House and Varieties of Democracy, all of the countries that became EU member states during the last two decades had a higher level of democracy when they were granted candidate status than Georgia does in 2022. 

However, Georgia has higher democracy scores than other countries granted candidate status which have not yet become EU member states. 

Georgia vs countries that became EU members in the last two decades

Freedom House scores suggest that all the countries that became EU members over the last two decades were more democratic during their application than Georgia in 2022 when applying for EU membership. 

This observation holds for the moment these countries were granted candidate status and negotiations for accession were opened up until they officially became EU member states.

Click to enlarge.

Data from the Varieties of Democracy project (V-Dem) suggest a slightly different picture. 

According to V-Dem’s electoral democracy index, Georgia’s democracy in 2022 is similar to the level of electoral democracy of Bulgaria and Romania when they were granted candidate status as well as when they became members of the EU in 2007. 

Click to enlarge.

Moreover, Romania’s scores on the electoral democracy index when the EU opened accession negotiations with the country as well as when it became a full-fledged member of the union were slightly worse than Georgia’s scores on the same index in 2022. 

The V-Dem dataset also contains a more demanding democracy index, known as the liberal democracy index. This index shows a similar picture. Romania is the only country that became a member of the EU in the 21st century that had lower scores on the liberal democracy index when the EU opened accession negotiations with it than Georgia in 2022.

Click to enlarge.

Georgia vs countries granted candidate status yet to join the EU 

According to Freedom House, some of the countries that were offered the EU candidate status but are yet to become full-fledged members had comparable levels of democracy with Georgia during the period when the EU granted them candidacy. 

Albania and North Macedonia had only slightly better scores (10 for both) than Georgia in 2022 (9) when they were officially considered candidate countries.

As for Turkey’s democracy, it had lower Freedom House scores in 1999 when granted candidate status (7) than Georgia in 2022 (9). However, accession negotiations with Turkey were conditioned on improvements in its democracy score, and negotiations did not start until its Freedom House score improved to 10 out of 14.

Click to enlarge.

Data from the Varieties of Democracy project (V-Dem) present a different portrait. According to V-Dem’s electoral democracy index, the level of Georgia is more democratic in 2022 than five other countries when they were given candidate status. 

Click to enlarge.

Similarly, the Liberal Democracy Index suggests that Georgia’s democracy in 2022 is stronger than that of Albania, North Macedonia, Montenegro, and Turkey when they were given candidate status. 

As for Serbia, its scores on the index when it was granted candidate status in 2012 were the same as Georgia’s in 2022.

Click to enlarge.

Even though the quality of Georgia’s democracy lags behind EU member states, international democracy indexes suggest that Georgia is as democratic, sometimes more so, than other current candidates when they were granted candidacy status.

Georgians increasingly optimistic about joining the EU

This article first appeared on the Caucasus Data Blog, a joint production of CRRC Georgia and OC Media. It was written by Lucas Fagliano, an International Fellow at CRRC Georgia. The views presented in this article are the author’s alone, and do not reflect the views of the Europe Foundation, CRRC Georgia, or any related entity.

Despite worsening relations between the EU and Georgia, newly released survey data from the spring of 2021 suggests Georgians are increasingly optimistic about the country’s prospects of joining the bloc within the next five years.

According to data from the newly published Knowledge of and Attitudes towards the EU in Georgia 2021 survey CRRC Georgia conducted for the Europe Foundation, there was a steep rise between 2019 and 2021 in the share of people thinking that Georgia will join the EU in the next five years.  This is of course an unrealistic expectation, as the EU accession process itself would likely take more than five years if Georgia already had candidate status.

Between 2019 and 2021, there was a 12-percentage point jump in people believing that Georgia will join the EU in the next five years. This growth marks a recovery in optimism towards Georgia's EU accession chances. 

In 2015, people were 16 percentage points less likely to think Georgia would join the EU in the following five years compared with 2013. In 2019, it was at 13%, and today, 25% believed Georgia would join in the next five years.  

In its 2020 parliamentary election platform, later transformed into the ‘Building a European state’ parliamentary project, Georgian Dream declared the country would apply for EU membership candidacy in 2024. 

As a result, one might expect that the unrealistic expectations stem primarily from Georgian Dream supporters. 

The data does suggest that Georgian Dream supporters are significantly more likely to think Georgia will join the EU in the next five years than people who support no party, though by only eight percentage points. However, there is no significant difference between opposition and Georgian Dream supporters. 

Ethnicity also matters. Ethnic minorities were 17 percentage points less likely than ethnic Georgians to believe Georgia will join the EU in five years or less. 

Looking closer at ethnicity, the data indicates that language also matters. Ethnic minorities had a 20% chance of thinking Georgia will join the EU in the next five years or less if they speak Georgian, while ethnic minorities that did not speak Georgian had a seven percentage point chance of believing Georgia would join the EU in the next five years. 

The growth in the belief that Georgia will join the EU in the next five years highlights a rising optimism in the EU, but also a rising incoherence with past experiences of EU enlargement. 

Accession procedures have lasted on average between eight and nine years after the country applies for candidate status. Georgia's current foreign policy strategy states that by 2024 Georgia will apply for candidate status, expecting to be accepted as a candidate by 2030. 

If accepted and if negotiations start right away (instead of in 2030), Georgia will need to join in two years to comply with the five-year belief. That is six years below the average, one year ahead of the fastest accession, and eight years ahead of the post-2000 average. 

This could be possible, as there is no time requirement for EU negotiations, and every accession is dealt with individually. However, it is highly unlikely.

It seems particularly unlikely considering the increasingly tense relations between the EU and Georgia. An illustration of this was Georgia’s ‘rejection’ of the EU’s September 2021 financial assistance package under the auspices of healthy economic decision making. However, EU officials, both from the Commission and the Parliament, reiterated the fact that Georgia would not have been able to receive the aid given its failure to fulfil the rule of law and reform conditionalities. 

With Georgia’s relations with the EU in quite poor shape, Georgians are also increasingly optimistic about when the country will join the European Union. Whether Georgians’ optimism will eventually be translated into closer relations though, remains an open question.

The data used in this article is available here.