Contemporary left in Georgia

Photo courtesy of Bakar Berekashvili

The political parties in Georgia’s political field share views and strategies about the neoliberal organisation of the state and society. This means that Georgia’s dominant political class believes that salvation can only be found in the free market economy. This is the main political idea that they usually follow and share. Practically, if you observe Georgia’s political parties, we cannot even say that there is a left-right dichotomy. There is only right-wing hegemony. For them, liberalism is something like a religion that must be preached and followed. When I speak about liberalism, I mean the equating of the free market economy with democracy. For Georgia’s political parties, this is the liberal agenda that they usually follow. Thus, the political field in Georgia is completely devoid of leftist ideas.

However, there is another dimension that we need to observe when we speak about the left in post-Soviet Georgia. This is leftist activism – the left outside of the political field. This can be found in academia and cultural life. In this field, we see some forms of leftism. I see that those young people who are engaged in activism – the students in academia who participate in cultural life – are a generation living under a form of post-Soviet capitalism that gave practically nothing to them – apart from social suffering and boredom. As a result, they are more attached to these leftist ideas in general.

There was a time in Georgia, in the early stage of the transition, when leftist ideas were not popular among students – among young people. I remember some 18–19 years ago when I was a student, there were just a few students who considered themselves to be left. There were really very few. You could count them on one hand. Now, however, the situation has changed. This is because Georgia has positioned itself to be among the “best” in today’s capitalist reformation. Due to this, many young people are now associated with the left. Again, the development of capitalism, especially the development of neoliberal capitalism in Georgia, encourages certain structures – certain forms of structural violence, including social injustice, inequality, deindustrialisation, problems of cultural inequality, and poverty. Thirty years of neoliberal transition saw leftism re-emerge in Georgia’s cultural field.

When talking about the left, which ideological outlooks would you include? How would you define leftism ideologically in Georgia?

Predominantly, the “ideological habitus” of the post-Soviet Georgian left is a simulation of western Marxism. In order to understand this ideological habitus, we need to look at a broader picture – an ideological portrait of Georgia. In some respects, the left in Georgia copy the West much like other ideological groups in the country. For example, liberals, as well as conservatives, traditionalists and nationalists, do the same. There is a very funny competition, actually, especially between liberals and conservatives in Georgia. Liberals say, “you know we are a real pro-western group because we are loyal to secularism, we are loyal to the market economy, we are loyal to various democratic ideas. This is the real West.” Then conservatives say, “Oh no, it is not you who is pro-western. We are pro-western because we look to Marine Le Pen in France, Matteo Salvini in Italy and Viktor Orbán in Hungary.” They all try to shelter their ideological identities under this umbrella of the western ideological mentality. The left in Georgia is not so attached to pro-westernism. They are more critical; they question western history and today’s life. However, they still use lots of western Marxist narratives in order to interpret the totality of today; politics, economics, cultural life and so on.

When we speak about this ideological habitus of the left, I would like to make a distinction and categorise the Georgian left into two groups: the liberal left and the anti-liberal left. They have different views in terms of politics, society and morality. Left-wing liberals are closer to the general philosophy of liberalism, especially cultural liberalism. For the liberal left, the class issue is not important; they focus on cultural emancipation. The anti-liberal left is engaged in the field of socio-economic emancipation, a traditionally Marxist mentality. Sometimes, they are supportive of certain social norms that are not liberal. They are supportive of certain views that are shared by the majority of Georgian citizens. They are more attached to the idea of socio-economic emancipation.

I would like to say that there is a new generation attached to a completely new process of leftist formation. There are some collectives of students, some groups of young people, who show more interest in Soviet Marxism. This is a new trend. They want to look into the intellectual history of Soviet communism; they want to look into alternative stories about Soviet Georgia. They feel the need to re-interpret today. These young people I am referring to want to be emancipated from the prevalent neoliberal, right-wing ideology. I think this is quite a progressive approach.

Can we state then that the new left in Georgia consists mostly of young people?

There have always been young people who are attached to the left, but this is a growing trend. Today, I cannot say that the left is flourishing among young people in Georgia, but it is stronger than it used to be. Of course, this needs to be researched more.

My own general impression is that there are more people [involved in the left] who were born at the end of the 1990s or the beginning of the 2000s. These are young people who were born in the times of Mikheil Saakashvili or, let us say, grew up in the time of Saakashvili. Today’s young people had many negative experiences when they were studying in school. I mean even the young people who were school children in the 2010s and after 2013, for example, when Saakashvili lost power. Then, Georgian Dream came into power and continued with the same ideological outlooks. These young people who were school children and then became university students are getting angrier because they know some stories about the past. Of course, there is a large section of young people who are captured by right-wing ideology or non-ideological narratives. People are captured – let us say, students, for example – in this neoliberal ideological narrative, but they do not know about it. Ideology is not about what you know; ideology is about what you do not know but still believe in. It is not about verbal statements; it is about internal feelings.

There were students, I remember, some ten years ago when I started teaching, who did not represent a high social class but were fans of this market economy. They liked rich people and the economy of rich people. They disagreed with progressive taxation; they did not like the idea of equality even though they came from low social classes. This is because of the ideological incorporation of the masses into mainstream ideology that was promoted by Saakashvili. This approach still continues. It is also how universities, schools and cultural institutions are training [students] in these kinds of ideas. But again, there are young people who confront these narratives. There are not as many as there used to be under today’s neoliberal capitalist order. However, if Georgia continues this neoliberal order, these left-wing sentiments will definitely increase.

The politics of memory is also a tool to enforce certain ideologies. Could you elaborate more on the Georgian case in the 1990s and the beginning of the 2000s before Saakashvili? Was there any attempt to form a certain memory of the Soviet Union? How was it done?

The Georgian politics of memory from Zviad Gamsakhurdia’s times (1991-92) until now is defined by two ideological determinates. Georgian history and memory are focused on the rethinking of liberal or nationalist narratives. In this way, liberals and nationalists agree on various things. They have one enemy, which is socialism. Clearly, we can talk more about socialism in the Soviet Union. Liberals and nationalists considered the Soviet Union a socialist society. The liberals usually talk in a way that rejects pursuing any rethinking of liberalism and nationalism in reference to the Soviet Union. I would say that Georgia’s politics of memory is based on the right-wing ideological sentiment of the past, starting with Gamsakhurdia, continuing with Saakashvili, and lasting until today, with Bidzina Ivanishvili.

Eduard Shevardnadze’s period (1995-2003) was the time of silence. Shevardnadze’s regime, as an ex-communist nomenklatura regime, was an exhausted regime. They did not have the energy to organise the strong cultural politics of liberal nationalism. I am not saying that it was completely muted, but it was more or less silent. What we have today is rooted in Gamsakhurdia’s anti-Russian history. These discourses, hysteria, anti-Russian sentiments, and nationalist liberal sentiments were rehabilitated under Saakashvili after 2003. Both Saakashvili and Gamsakhurdia engaged in the so-called memory wars. They had a very particular aim. This was the consolidation of power. Gamsakhurdia tried to use this politics of memory to stay in power, but he was not successful. Saakashvili did the same, and he managed to rule the country through neoliberal autocracy for nine years. Saakashvili was involved in this process of liberal nationalist reconstruction – the revision of history and the past. He needed the support of cultural institutions, like universities and schools, especially in urban areas. He mobilised right-wing intellectuals around his idea. What he did, in a typical old-fashioned autocratic way, was to consolidate the intellectuals and scholars around this idea that “Not only the Soviet Union, but also socialism is our enemy.” This was a larger goal of politics of memory in the times of Saakashvili. In this way, the ideological rethinking of the past – this liberal-nationalist ideology – was a class-based project and remains a class-based project. It creates certain illusions – a “dogma” – to get the society to focus on the past and forget about today. By demonising the past, it is possible to legitimise today’s neoliberal capitalism. This process, from Saakashvili until now, has been morally sanctioned by the liberal class of the West. The post-Soviet liberal revision of history consciously and knowingly marginalises the history of the Soviet Union – its processes of urbanisation, industrialisation, population growth and modernisation of the social and economic system. Georgia was an example of this Soviet story. However, they consciously and knowingly marginalised it. This is a purely ideological process.  

What about a rural left in Georgia? Are there any alliances between urban leftist groups and workers in such towns as for example Tkibuli or Chiatura?

At a glance, of course. We mostly see the left in Tbilisi – only in the urban area – and even in Kutaisi, but this is not the whole story. Because recently, and you probably know this, there was a protest that emerged in Namakhvani around the power plant. This shows that there are leftist practices and circles that have emerged particularly in western Georgia, not only in Kutaisi but also in other small towns, such as Tkibuli and Chiatura. These are some small-scale leftist practices but you were talking about alliances. In Chiatura, I saw that young people are actually working with miners – young people who consider themselves more or less left, maybe not so much in their political and intellectual foundations, but they are leftists in their emotions, in their thinking, in a way. They have some alliances with workers in Chiatura. Strikes occur frequently and young people support them.

Kutaisi is definitely another locus of leftist activism that has been growing in the last few years. Historically, Kutaisi has always been the locus of intellectuals – of poets, of writers, and of scientists. I cannot say that there are more leftists there than in Tbilisi, but there are more than there used to be before.

This could be related to many factors. One of the factors is the ruthless deindustrialisation of Kutaisi, which affected the social lives of local citizens. The leftists in the regions are not institutionally organised. We also cannot say that the left in Tbilisi is very well organised institutionally. Of course, there are some small groups in the regions, but they are devoted and enthusiastic; they are local patriots, especially when speaking about western Georgia. And I believe this tendency will become stronger. At least, this is my observation.

My other observation is that eastern Georgia is completely silent. In western Georgia, the regions are more active in terms of leftist practices. This can be explained by the area’s history since eastern Georgia was not so highly industrialised. Plus, western Georgia usually faces many more economic problems than eastern Georgia. For example, in eastern Georgia, agriculture is developed. There is wine, and so on. Historically, western Georgia lived well under socialism and socialist industry. This could be related to several socio-economic and cultural factors. Western Georgia used to be the locus of socialism – Guria and these regions.

And what is the role of trade unions and especially the involvement of the youth in them?

There are some young people in trade unions but I am not very familiar with it. Most of the young people, students at universities – they are not so much attached to the trade unions. They also might not have trust in the trade unions. People do not trust these organisations because their reputations were destroyed in the 1990s. In Soviet times, trade unions were very strong. Of course, they were under the ideological supervision of the Communist Party, but they had strong mechanisms to protect workers… However, in the 1990s they were completely destroyed and practically did not exist. In the times of Saakashvili, in turn, they faced a great conflict. Later on, they tried to confront Saakashvili so there are plenty of dark stories surrounding trade unions in Georgia. That is why, unfortunately, they are not strong today. However, some independent trade unions have also appeared and there are autonomous unions that are trying to self-organise.

Like when they organised the strikes with the metro workers in Tbilisi.  I would say this shows how diverse the left is in Georgia, at least the division line goes between leftists in non-governmental organisations and those who are trying to strengthen the workers’ movement. Here, it becomes visible that it is necessary to analyse the different ideologies and, I think, utopias as well.

There are two types of utopias among the Georgian left. One, which is equality, is perceived to be a utopia, although I believe it is not. In today’s world, there is consistent neoliberal propaganda. You know, this idea that equality is a strange utopia that is promoted by socialists. This is actually a crazy and inaccurate approach. When speaking about utopia, which particular utopia? I believe there are many utopias that are considered to be utopian, but in fact, they are not. You know about the Georgian case. This is the long result of neoliberals misusing and misinterpreting the concept of equality and inequality. In Georgia, they tell people – especially young people – that equality is a dangerous socialist utopia; nobody can be equal and live in complete equality. This is such a misuse of the concept of equality. Of course, no one, not even socialists, have such a perception of equality. Socialists do not think that we will all be the same in every aspect of life – that we would have the same amount of money, same clothes, same cars, and so on. Equality, first of all, means having access to welfare – access to good education, healthcare, and welfare in general. In Georgia, young people have this utopia. However, the neoliberals say that this is a utopia because they do not want to improve the social order. Some young people are trying to emancipate themselves from this ideological pressure. Equality is something that can be real. You do not need to think that we are all the same.

However, there is another utopia, which is a real utopia for leftists. Some Georgian leftists, especially liberals, believe that there should be certain alliances with the liberal class. Some leftist-liberals have this hope that they can transform society with Georgian liberals. In my view, this is utopic and not realistic thinking as liberals do their best to maintain the current system. The neoliberal transformation is nothing else but a class-based project which is only useful to those dominant in the current civil society and financial institutions.

Another utopia might be to reimagine democracy as thoroughly economic in nature: to rethink the notion and interrelation between liberalism and democracy. 

I believe that historically liberalism and democracy have always been hostile to each other, but today they are particularly incompatible. Actually, they are hostile because the pathos of democracy is different from that of liberalism. Liberalism is about individual and economic liberties. Democracy sticks to collective interests. The English political scientist Harold Laski wrote that capitalism and democracy cannot be built together because capitalism seeks inequality while democracy is always trying to destroy it. Today’s liberalism has mutated into neoliberalism. Actually, about democracy, I now recall the great Soviet film director Andrei Tarkovsky’s very succinct words about western democracy: “Western democracy is egoistic because western democracy gave freedom to the people but took from them the belief in other people.” In western democracy, the individual only trusts him or herself. He or she does not trust other people. As Pierre Bourdieu said, in capitalism you are the owner of yourself, and you are responsible for your happiness and unhappiness. This is what neoliberals repeat: you are a free person and you are responsible for your happiness and unhappiness. The social order and system have nothing to do with it. If you are happy, then the system is good, and then you are good, too. Unfortunately, today’s western liberal democratic model clearly offers greater opportunities for the Darwinist social order.

Bakar Berekashvili is a professor of political science and sociology at the Georgian American University in Tbilisi, Georgia.

Veronika Pfeilschifter is a doctoral researcher and social scientist at the Institute for Caucasus Studies at Friedrich Schiller University Jena, Germany.

Georgia, politics, Social policy