Parliamentary elections in Georgia showed great promise after the recent election reform which allowed for more competition and optimism in creating a pluralistic parliament structure. However, the results may deepen political apathy and the faith in Georgian democracy still remains questionable. How did a promising reform lead to such pessimistic result and can we question the attempts to consolidate Georgia’s democracy? Furthermore, what is the international impact of such attempts, in a shadow of the current conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia, leading further towards the consolidation of power of the Georgian Dream party? It would seem that answers to such questions can be found by placing Georgia in a broader global context – one focusing on the process of democracy building.

The aim of this paper is to analyze the recent parliamentary elections in Georgia through a prism of legislative endeavors, political schemes and international consequences and influences all forming a broad assumption of where to go next and answer a rather complex question – how does a country consolidate its democracy. Such a question at first glance may seem contradictory – a country is a democracy or it is not. That kind of a mathematical categorization would lead us to ignore the ever-changing nature of political processes. Hence to build and consolidate democracy is to look past what is written and search for the meanings which always present themselves as a scale, never mathematical and always changing. What makes this event in Georgia rather unique are not the numbers, nor the outcome, rather it is the analysis of an endeavor to consolidate democracy.

Policy Paper – Mihajlo Jakovljev, November 2020

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