Tbilisi, Rustaveli Avenue, October 2025. Three hundred days of protest. European Union flags on barricades, water cannons, tear gas, hundreds detained. Georgia—a country that just a year ago was considered a showcase of democratization in the post-Soviet space—has transformed into an authoritarian regime with unprecedented speed. Oligarch Bidzina Ivanishvili, a man whose wealth equals a third of the country's GDP, has frozen EU accession negotiations, established a de facto one-party dictatorship, and is crushing NGOs and independent media. The response: the longest-running protest in modern European history—a horizontal, self-organized movement without leaders, coordinating through social media.
This is not simply the story of one democracy's collapse. It is a laboratory experiment where Russia's vertical power model collides with the European ideal of horizontal civil society; where the geopolitics of the war in Ukraine directly determines domestic political trajectory; where leaderless protest attempts to overcome a regime built on cronyism and clientelism.
What is happening in Georgia? Who is fighting whom? And why does the outcome of this confrontation matter not only for Georgians but for all of Europe? We examine the anatomy of a crisis where the future is being decided every day on the streets of Tbilisi.
October 26, 2024, became the point of no return. Parliamentary elections that international observers called neither free nor fair marked the beginning of an open authoritarian drift. The OSCE documented voter intimidation, media bias, unequal conditions, and violations of ballot secrecy. But the real shock lay ahead.
On November 28, the Georgian Dream government announced the freezing of EU accession negotiations "until 2028." The decision was met with brutal police repression against peaceful demonstrators. What began as a protest against a shift in foreign policy course escalated into nationwide resistance against the regime.
The following month became a test of endurance. By early December, more than 400 protesters had been detained, and numerous journalists subjected to physical violence. Masked special forces systematically beat people; dozens of activists sustained serious injuries. But Georgians did not surrender: Rustaveli Avenue became a site of daily resistance.
On December 29, the regime staged a constitutional coup: parliament "elected" Mikheil Kavelashvili, a former footballer without a university degree, as president. President Salome Zourabichvili left the residence, declaring that she was taking legitimacy with her, and proclaimed herself the only lawful institution. Not a single foreign ambassador attended the inauguration.
The year 2025 brought a new wave of repression. In March, courts froze the accounts of seven leading NGOs, including foundations that had helped detained protesters pay fines. At least 60 people were detained on criminal charges related to participation in protests. Independent media came under attack, universities were purged, and civil servants were fired for pro-European views.
October 4, 2025, became the day of the "Flag Revolution." Twenty thousand people took to the streets on municipal election day. The vast majority gathered peacefully, but a small group attempted to storm the presidential palace. Police deployed water cannons and tear gas. President Salome Zourabichvili directly accused the regime of provocation: "The staged 'seizure' of the presidential palace is a regime provocation to discredit 310 days of peaceful protest." Five opposition leaders, including opera singer Paata Burchuladze, were charged with attempting a coup d'état. The regime is using the incident to delegitimize the protest movement, portraying it as violent, even though the overwhelming majority of protesters remained peaceful.
By September 2025, the protests reached their 300th day. From a showcase of democratization to an international pariah—in one year, Georgia traveled a path that took Belarus a decade.
Power as a network, not a vertical. Georgia is no longer governed by institutions—it has been captured by a plutocrat using mafia-type connections, limitless money, and intimidation. Bidzina Ivanishvili's wealth equals a third of the country's GDP—the highest ratio of oligarch wealth to GDP in the world. Power is distributed through personal connections, debts of loyalty, and financial flows. But Ivanishvili is ruthless with traitors: in 2025, a purge of former allies began. In October, police raided former Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili, former State Security Service chief Grigol Liluashvili, and former Prosecutor General Otar Partskhaladze. Former Interior Minister Vakhtang Gomelauri—Ivanishvili's bodyguard for decades—was forced to resign in May 2025 after U.S. and UK sanctions.
The Russian node. Ivanishvili made his fortune in 1990s Russia, was among the oligarchs in Yeltsin's circle, acquiring metallurgical and banking assets. The family continues to expand assets in Moscow: his wife acquired real estate near Moscow in 2021-2024, and a company receives rental profits from a Moscow property through an offshore. In February 2022, he placed his bet: Russia would quickly crush Ukraine; better to be on the winning side. Three years later, he cannot retreat without losing everything. Direct subordination or playing by the Kremlin's rules—the result is the same: following the Kremlin line and diverging from the West.
The regime's social base. In 2017, Georgia was among the top ten countries with the highest Gini coefficient. The virtually nonexistent middle class causes social fragmentation. Regional salaries are 40-60% of Tbilisi's; more than 40% of the population lives in rural areas, engaged in subsistence farming. Georgian Dream maintains power through clientelism: patronage networks in the state apparatus, unchecked power of security forces especially in the regions, distribution of jobs and benefits to loyalists. Their 35-45% support base consists of urban poor, pensioners, rural dwellers, and those afraid of war.
The new force: urban middle class and the generation without connections. Against the regime stands the urban educated middle class and Generation Z. This generation criticizes the radicalization of Georgian politics and prefers informal, peaceful, decentralized, creative forms of protest. This youth has no emotional or cultural ties to Georgia's Soviet past. The protests are a spontaneous, self-organized movement without a single center, coordinating through social media. However, since March, Generation Z's activity has decreased, with the stubborn resistance of the urban middle class coming to the fore.
Power here is not a monolith against the masses, but a dynamic confrontation of networks: Ivanishvili's personalized vertical, maintained through clientelism and fear, against the horizontal self-organization of the streets.
The Georgian protest is a horizontal movement without a single hierarchy. There is no charismatic leader, no central headquarters, no political party at the helm. Coordination occurs through Telegram channels, improvised gatherings on Rustaveli, and local initiatives in neighborhoods. This is a strength: the regime has nothing to behead. Arrests of opposition leaders do not stop the protest because the protest is not a party—it is the people.
But this is also a weakness. Without a single decision-making center, the protest struggles to transition from resistance to constructive alternative. How to negotiate a transitional government when there are no recognized representatives? How to conduct negotiations when there is no mandate to speak on behalf of the movement? Horizontality is effective in mobilization and resilience but makes it difficult to transform street energy into concrete political results.
Political opposition exists—United National Movement, Coalition for Change, Strong Georgia—but it does not control the protest and does not enjoy the street's full trust. Salome Zourabichvili as legitimate president possesses symbolic capital but is limited in real instruments of power. Perhaps this very fragmentation is a strategic advantage: the regime cannot fabricate a deal with the protest's "leadership" because such leadership does not exist. The protest is not an organization that can be bought or intimidated. It is a social phenomenon.
Scenario one: revolution. The term "revolution" here is not rhetorical. The de facto government has already reached a stage where changing power through elections is impossible: the electoral environment and laws are rigged. In October 2025, the Constitutional Court began proceedings to ban leading opposition parties, including UNM. The electoral path is blocked—only extra-electoral change of power remains.
Revolution could result from a combination of factors. The first is Russia's clear failure in global politics and/or in Ukraine. Internal crises in Russia, including economic collapse, will hit the weak, Russia-dependent Georgian economy. Economic shock will intensify discontent and undermine the regime's resource base: patronage networks run on money, and money is running out.
The second factor is internal cracks in the regime, already visible in the purge of Garibashvili's team. Purges of former allies reveal Ivanishvili's paranoid logic: the circle of trust narrows, fear grows. Resource scarcity and loss of sufficient loyalty from the state apparatus, including security forces, is a critical point. When police stop executing orders to disperse protests, the regime hangs by a thread.
The third factor is the transition of former non-partisans or even Georgian Dream supporters to the opposition side. This translates into more massive street protests, quantitatively exceeding control capabilities. If not 20,000 but 200,000 take to Rustaveli, if protests engulf not only Tbilisi but also the regions, if children of security officers are among the protesters—the control system collapses. Revolution happens not because protest becomes violent, but because the regime loses the ability to control territory and population.
Scenario two: consolidation of dictatorship. This is the current authorities' preferred scenario: an Azerbaijani-type dictatorship with controlled fake opposition and formal/informal centralization of power. The model is simple: Aliyev has ruled for 21 years, opposition is imprisoned or in emigration, NGOs are strangled, elections are theater, the economy is sustained by oil and transit, and the West tolerates it for the sake of stability.
For Georgia, this requires favorable geopolitical conditions: Europe's distancing from the South Caucasus in exchange for stable trade routes. If the EU decides that the Azerbaijan-Georgia-Black Sea transit corridor matters more than democracy in Tbilisi, Ivanishvili gets carte blanche. This also requires complete suppression of protest and NGOs, leaving only loyal parties and organizations. The Constitutional Court is already working to ban real opposition, leaving puppet parties to simulate pluralism.
But there is a problem: Georgia is not Azerbaijan. There is no oil, no resources to buy the loyalty of the entire population. Civil society is too developed, protest culture too strong, European identity too deep. Suppression is possible, but maintaining it? The Azerbaijani model requires not only repression but also prosperity for the elite and relative stability for the masses. Ivanishvili lacks Aliyev's resources.
Scenario three: freezing. The most likely in the short term—a stalemate. The regime cannot completely suffocate the protest; the protest cannot overthrow the regime. Street confrontation continues for years at low intensity, flaring up with new repressions and fading from fatigue. The economy slowly degrades, emigration intensifies, society splits. Neither victory nor defeat—an exhausting trench war for the country's future.
This scenario benefits the regime: time works for the normalization of authoritarianism, for habituation, for protest exhaustion. But it is also dangerous: a frozen conflict is unpredictable; any external shock can unfreeze it toward revolution or consolidation.
The 2026 fork. Realistically assessing the chances of each scenario is impossible. The protest is still alive, the regime is still strong, geopolitics are still uncertain. The next year will likely be pivotal: Ukraine's position, the state of the Russian economy, the regime's internal resilience will become clearer. This is a fork where chance may determine the trajectory for decades. Georgia balances between three futures, and no one knows which way the pendulum will swing.
The geopolitical imperative. Georgia is the only suitable outlet for Central Asian countries to open seas. The Middle Corridor through the Caspian, Azerbaijan, and Georgia to the Black Sea is vital for connecting Central Asia's growing economies with EU and Mediterranean markets. Although the new Zangezur Corridor through Armenia is presented as an alternative, both routes are necessary for full freedom from Russian routes and ensuring sufficient capacity. Zangezur shortens the route but does not cancel Georgia's critical importance: both arteries are needed for diversification and resilience of regional trade. Russian control over Georgia means the ability to cut off both routes.
The military-strategic dimension. Russian forces threaten to undermine Georgia's strategic role as an energy transit corridor linking the South Caucasus and Caspian energy producers with Europe. Russia seeks to use the Black Sea as a platform for projecting power and influence over the Middle East, Mediterranean, and Caucasus. Russian control over Georgia means the ability to sow chaos in the South Caucasus and Black Sea region. Russia is building a new port in occupied Georgia (Ochamchira), creating additional obstacles to the Middle Corridor's development.
The war of values. The war in Ukraine clearly demonstrated: Russia successfully exploited the gap between Europe's pragmatic path to trade with Russia and support for the values that unite Europe itself. This gap cost Ukraine thousands of lives and Europe its illusions. Supporting democracy, rule of law, and freedom abroad is not altruism—it is defending the EU itself from within. If Europe allows Georgia to fall, it legitimizes the Russian model of forcibly coercing neighbors, undermines the trust of all partners from Moldova to Central Asia, and opens the path to destabilizing its own borders.
Georgia today is not the periphery—it is the frontline of the struggle for the type of world in which Europe will live. The choice is simple: invest in democratic Georgia now or pay for chaos in the Black Sea and Caucasus for decades. Values and pragmatism do not compete here—they coincide.
https://denikreferendum.cz/clanek/238100-330-dni-odporu-gruzie-se-stala-bojistem-o-budoucnost-evropy
