Georgia is on the frontline of the struggle between Russia and the west. Will its democracy survive? | Nathalie Tocci

Polarisation is growing across Europe and the west. Nowhere is this clearer than in the former Soviet republic of Georgia. The “Russian law”, a copycat piece of legislation imported from Moscow, which forces Georgian civil society groups to register as foreign agents if they receive more than 20% of their funding from abroad, was recently passed – despite massive protests and widespread police violence. The law is set to be implemented later this summer, just in time to cripple civil society and squeeze the opposition parties ahead of the country’s crucial parliamentary election on 26 October.

Against the backdrop of the protests, the governing party, Georgian Dream, lowered its mask. In a hyperbolic speech in April, the billionaire tycoon and behind-the-scenes leader of the party, Bidzina Ivanishvili, launched an all-out attack against the liberal west, rife with conspiracy theories about a putative “global war party” driven by Freemasons, traitors, foreign agents and more. Georgian Dream does not claim it wants to abandon the path to the EU and Nato. On the contrary, it boasts that under its watch, Georgia was recognised as an EU candidate. For its part, the EU took too long to distance itself from the government in Tbilisi, which brazenly dusted off the Russian law – postponed after the first protests last year – only weeks after Georgia was granted candidacy in December.

European leaders and institutions condemned the law and the police violence against demonstrators, who mobilised for the second time in the spring to stop the law – this time to no avail. Yet in the eyes of civil society and the opposition, European criticism was too timid. As one opposition leader put it to me in Tbilisi a few days ago: “When you’re in a room with a snake, you don’t engage with it or seek to understand its ‘legitimate concerns’. I was shocked to watch on television the EU ambassador cut ribbons with top Georgian Dream leaders while I was in hospital with a concussion caused by police violence.”

The EU has now toughened up. A few days ago it formally suspended Georgia’s accession process and froze €3om (£25m) in financial aid for the country’s defence ministry. Meanwhile, the EU has rightly agreed to move forward with Ukraine and Moldova’s accession negotiations.

But more is needed. So far the Georgian government has had its cake and eaten it. When the Russian law comes into effect, the EU should consider personal sanctions and travel bans on individuals in the political, business and media circles of the regime. Were the authoritarian squeeze to continue in the event of Georgian Dream’s electoral victory, the EU should revoke Georgians’ free movement across Europe without the need of a visa.

The opposition knows that the autumn election is a fight for life or death. As one academic and renowned opposition figure told me: “Georgia is already lost. This is our last chance to recover our country.” Opposition leaders are having tactical discussions on how to create a united alliance to avoid splitting the opposition vote, especially given the 5% electoral threshold below which parties are not represented in parliament at all. Yet they know that they can’t afford to blow this chance: it may be their last to restore liberal democracy in Georgia.

However, the outcome is uncertain. Alongside the skewed political playing field – with funds, social welfare programmes, police forces, a well-oiled propaganda machine and the upcoming repression of civil society on its side – Georgian Dream has a story to tell. The message is simple: war versus peace. In its narrative, the opposition fell into Russia’s trap in 2008, led by an irresponsible Mikheil Saakashvili and egged on by a hypocritical west, which then abandoned Georgia to its destiny when Russia invaded. Playing on citizens’ fears, exacerbated by the trauma of Russia’s invasion in 2008, the government portrays itself as the party of “peace”. In contrast, the opposition, which now firmly backs Ukraine’s resistance against Russia, is depicted as the “global war party”. Glossing over its ever closer ties to Moscow, Georgian Dream depicts itself as the bulwark against a new, unwinnable war against Russia.

The opposition also has a strong story to tell: it’s about Europe and freedom versus Russia and repression. An electoral victory in October, it says, represents the only route for Georgia to avoid sinking deeper into a post-Soviet authoritarian swamp. The mass demonstrations against the Russian law, both in 2023 and this year, tell us that it has a compelling case, capable of mobilising people and putting Georgia back on track towards democracy and the EU.

But it will not be easy. Georgian Dream also has a unified Russia backing it up. The opposition has a distracted and divided west. The divisions in the west mirror precisely those in Georgia. Georgian Dream could not win the election on a clear anti-west and anti-European ticket. Georgians know that their country’s independence and freedom (from Russia) is tied to the west. But is it an open, democratic and law-abiding west, or a closed, nationalistic and socially conservative one? If it’s the west represented by Viktor Orbán, Marine Le Pen, Giorgia Meloni and Geert Wilders in Europe, flanked by Donald Trump on the other side of the Atlantic, Ivanishvili may be quite comfortable with being pro-west. Probably Vladimir Putin would too.

Tiny Georgia is a microcosm of the fight for liberal democracy in the west. For years, Georgian democrats pleaded for their western partners to wake up to the threat posed by Russia. But as those eyes started opening after the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the Georgian government turned towards Moscow in a tragic twist of history. Paradoxically, it did so just as Georgia came a step closer to joining the EU, riding the wave of the revival of its enlargement policy and spurred on by the Ukraine war.

In older democracies, where institutions are stronger, liberal democracy can withstand (for a while) the election of autocrats, nationalists and populists. In young and fragile democracies on Russia’s doorstep, in contrast, democracy, has to be supported and saved. If not, it can quickly end with a bang.