The Making of Modern Georgia, 1918-2012

The First Georgian Republic and its Successors

Stephen F. Jones

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2014
• Topic: Social Sciences
• eBook ISBN:
  9781317815921
• Subtopic: Ethnic Studies
• Index: Social Sciences

When most of Eastern Europe was struggling with dictatorships of one kind or another, the Democratic Republic of Georgia (1918-1921) established a constitution, a parliamentary system with national elections, an active opposition, and a free press. Like the Democratic Republic of Georgia in 1918, its successors emerged after 1991 from a bankrupt empire, and faced, yet again, the task of establishing a new economic, political and social system from scratch. In both 1918 and 1991, Georgia was confronted with a hostile Russia and followed a pro-Western and pro-democratic course. The top regional experts in this book explore the domestic and external parallels between the Georgian post-colonial governments of the early twentieth and twenty-first centuries. How did the inexperienced Georgian leaders in both eras deal with the challenge of secessionism, what were their state building strategies, and what did democracy mean to them? What did their electoral systems look like, why were their economic strategies so different, and how did they negotiate with the international community neighbouring threats. These are the central challenges of transitional governments around the world today. Georgia's experience over one hundred years suggests that both history and contemporary political analysis offer the best (and most interesting) explanation of the often ambivalent outcomes.

1 Geopolitics and foreign powers in the modern history of Georgia Comparing 1918–21 and 1991–2010

Revaz Gachechiladze

DOI: 10.4324/9781315818207-1

Introduction

Geopolitics plays an exceptionally important role in the fate of small states like Georgia. Historically, small states—especially if strategically located in border zones or between imperial spheres of influence, have been subject to intense Great Power rivalries. In the worst case scenario, such rivalries develop into international conflagrations, as was the case in 1914. This may sound like an introduction to nineteenth-century diplomatic history, but this is a twenty-first-century phenomenon too. The geopolitical interests of major powers, even if disguised as “liberal,” “democratic,” or “friendly” in intention, are a stark reality for small states, and central to their formulation of foreign policy. The two independence periods of Georgia, in 1918–21 and after 1991, illustrate both the differences and the geopolitical continuities that have shaped (and shape) Georgia’s political opportunities and strategic constraints.

A “shatter zone” is originally a geological expression used to describe rifts and instabilities in the Earth’s crust. Social scientists have adopted the term to characterize unstable conflict zones, often located on the periphery of empires (or former empires). These “shatter zones” frequently threaten to explode in conflict, or minimally they “maintain a fragile equilibrium” which verges on instability.¹ Robert Kaplan suggests the Greater Middle East is such a zone. The multilingual, multi-ethnic, multi-religious Caucasus located just to the north of the Greater Middle East, surrounded by regional superpowers—Russia, Turkey, and Iran—and consisting of small states, most certainly qualifies for the “shatter zone” rubric.

What do we mean by “small states?” There is much dispute: is it size, capabilities, is it power relations with other states? Alexander Rondeli, with Georgia specifically in mind, wrote that “… the meaning of a small state is not expressed only quantitatively, but by the state’s ability to influence the international system. This is why the terms ‘small state’ and ‘weak state’ have become synonyms.”² “Weak state” has assumed other connotations in the political science literature, expressing problems of legitimacy, economic stability and institutional coherence.³ Small states are not always weak ones, but in Georgia’s case in both 1918–21 and 1991–2003, the two concepts of small and weak could be applied.

Size is also a definitional problem. Rondeli’s characterization, for example, does not exclude largish territorial countries, such as Mongolia, from the category of “small states.” However, it is rare to find a territorially “small state” that can influence the international system. Israel is the exception rather than the rule. Georgia is the rule. In this paper, when using the term “small state,” I focus on states with a relatively small population, a smallish gross domestic product (GDP), and small military forces; ones that cannot, as Rondeli suggests, significantly influence international politics. Georgia is a typical small state. Its smallness is underlined by its relative size compared to major neighboring powers such as Russia, Turkey and Iran, all of which have a substantial impact on geopolitics and the economies in the region, and on the strategies of local foreign policy elites.⁴

1918–21: the Democratic Republic of Georgia

The Western philosophy of territorial nationalism found fertile soil in the South Caucasus in the early twentieth century. By the time of the collapse of the Russian Empire in 1917, there existed a relatively consolidated Georgian nation, which had a basic idea about its territorial space, and had substantial political and intellectual elites to lead the country towards independence.⁵ However, as Laurence Broers points out in this volume, there was still considerable dispute as to what actually constituted Georgia’s rightful territories among other groups such as the Abkhazians and South Ossetians. In the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth centuries, Georgian political activists directed their policies towards the idea of administrative-political autonomy within the Russian Empire. Georgians could look to the successful Grand Duchy of Finland, an autonomous unit within the empire, or even to Poland, as examples of imperial colonies possessing significant autonomy. There were a few political figures and local parties (notably the Socialist Federalist Revolutionary Party (SFRP) and the National Democratic Party (NDP)) that may have dreamed of full independence at the beginning of the twentieth century, but bearers of such ideas were hugely outnumbered by the followers of socialist internationalism. Among Georgians, the more moderate faction of the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party (RSDLP), termed “Menshevik,” was the most powerful organization, with a mass following from 1905 onwards. The Georgian Social Democrats considered themselves an “internationalist party” dedicated to the well-being of the oppressed in the Russian Empire and the world. At the same time, their socialism was national in form, although full sovereignty within national borders was not a popular idea in Georgia until 1918. The Bolsheviks, who for all practical purposes had separated from the RSDLP after 1912, enjoyed very little support in Georgia.

World War I dramatically changed this internationalist way of thinking in the South Caucasus. A group of Georgian intellectuals, mostly émigrés living in Germany and the Ottoman Empire, then at war with Russia, saw an opportunity to restore the independence of Georgia. They formed an Independence Committee, sponsored by Germany and Turkey, but they had little support within Georgia.⁶ In reality the role of nation and state building fell to the internationalist-minded Social Democrats who had enormous support among all social groups in the country. In 1918, they created a national Georgian Social Democratic Labor Party. The independence of Georgia in 1918 as well as that of Armenia, Azerbaijan, Ukraine, Belorussia, the Baltic states, Poland, and Finland, followed upon the collapse of the Russian imperial state. The Bolsheviks, who seized power in Russia in November 1917, realized it could not continue the war abroad, and on 3 March 1918, signed a treaty with the Central Powers in Brest Litovsk. This signaled Russia’s temporary abandonment of the South Caucasus. Soviet Russia gave up the Russian Empire’s territorial acquisitions of 1878, including Kars, Ardahan and Batumi, with their adjacent districts located in Georgia’s south-west, and on Armenia’s western borders. They were returned to the Ottoman Empire. The Russian army, which in 1917 seemed poised to march through the Anatolian highlands and fulfill its dream of a Russian Constantinople, rapidly disintegrated after the October 1917 revolution. Suddenly, the unexpected victor in the war on the Caucasian Front was the Ottoman Empire, which was ready to seize Caucasian territories beyond those granted by the Brest-Litovsk Treaty. Soon after the Ottomans launched attacks on Armenian, Georgian and Azerbaijani territories, the Great War came to an end, and in October 1918, the Ottoman Empire buckled. It was forced to surrender its newly gained territories to the Allies. Amidst this chaos, the South Caucasian leaders seized power, taking advantage of a political vacuum.⁷

The elected Caucasian deputies of the All-Russian Constituent Assembly (dispersed by the Bolsheviks on 19 January 1918) came from leading local parties: the Armenian Dashnaktsutiun (Armenian Revolutionary Federation), the Azerbaijani Müsavat (Equality) and the Georgian Social Democrats. They gathered in Tbilisi and created an independent Transcaucasian Federative Democratic Republic (TFDR) on 22 April 1918. However, it soon became apparent that this ethnically diverse federation was not viable; it was soon torn apart by the mutually antagonistic interests of its constituent national groups.⁸ Foreign powers had their own strategic interests in the region, particularly those connected with Baku’s oil. In September 1918, Baku became the capital of the newly established Democratic Republic of Azerbaijan (DRA). Earlier that same year the city had been held by Russian Bolsheviks, and later by a coalition of leftist parties. Germany and the Ottoman Empire understood that their influence would be greater dealing with weak new states bilaterally, and so backed the declarations of independence by the new South Caucasian states at the end of May 1918. The Georgian government declared its secession from the TFDR on 26 May 1918; this was followed on 28 May by the Azerbaijanis, and two days later by the Armenians. The German empire briefly established a protectorate over newly independent Georgia, although this protection disappeared in November after Germany’s defeat in World War I.

In 1918, the conditions for successful independence for the South Caucasian states were hardly propitious. The economic situation was disastrous. Azerbaijan had superiority over the other states with huge oil resources in Baku, much in demand for post-war industrial reconstruction in the global economy. However, getting adequate revenue from the export of mineral resources, whether Baku oil, manganese ore from Georgia, or copper from Armenia—was difficult for these young states with empty treasuries, inexperienced personnel, and dilapidated infrastructures. This was complicated by the serious geopolitical situation in the South Caucasus, blockaded by civil war to the north and to the west (the Black Sea), and by hostile powers to the south. Economically, each state had had to rely upon its own agricultural products to feed its citizens, but lack of productivity, supplies, and manpower after the war, limited the villages’ ability to support the towns. However, famine was avoided in Georgia. Traditionally a subsistence economy, over 80 percent of the population was rural and could survive by its own production. Although there was an absence of petrol products throughout 1918–21, rural and internal urban transportation was mostly by railway (coal), oxen and horses; electricity was a scarce commodity available only in larger cities (Tbilisi, Kutaisi, and Batumi), and rural areas and small towns were lit with candles or kerosene lamps. Local fuel was mostly firewood. A handful of industries, such as food, alcohol, and furniture factories, were partially functional as much as they depended on local raw materials. In terms of political leadership, Georgians (as well as the neighboring Armenians and Azerbaijanis) had an abundance of powerful political figures concentrated within a small number of political parties. The parties had, in most cases, a clear ideology and were not overly dependent on the authority of a single leader, as is the case in post-1991 South Caucasian states. Almost all of the multiple parties in South Caucasian states today, with few exceptions, are elite formations with weak roots among the population.

The internal issues in 1918–21, such as inter-ethnic relations, fuel supplies, inflation, and corruption, though extraordinarily difficult for the new state-builders, were less existential than the issue of foreign relations. First on the list for the new Georgian leaders in 1918, was the question of borders. The three newly independent South Caucasian states had no mutual understanding of their shared borders. There was no consensus on how to define them. This was also true in Central Europe after the demise of the European empires, but in the case of the Caucasus, it led quickly to war and bloodshed. An Armenian-Georgian military conflict broke out over the disputed Lori district at the end of 1918; escalation was only prevented by the interference of British forces, which were stationed in the Caucasus in 1918–20.⁹ The British established a buffer (“neutral”) zone between Armenia and Georgia after the three-week-long military conflict, but mutual distrust between the two states remained high. Peaceful relations between Georgia and Azerbaijan didn’t exclude unresolved territorial problems over the ownership of Zakatala district and other border areas, but they were not followed by warfare. Much more disturbing for the region as a whole, was the growing Armenian–Azerbaijani tension over Karabakh, Zangezur and Nakhichevan, producing thousands of refugees on both sides as it spilled over into intense skirmishes.

The UK was vaguely interested in the South Caucasus in 1918–19, based on the region’s transit and oil capabilities, and its potential role as a buffer between Russia and British India. However, the British government refused to engage in confrontation over the Caspian oilfields with Bolshevik Russia. London was focused on its geopolitical interests in the Middle East; it had well-established claims in the southern Persian oilfields and in the newly discovered fields in northern Mesopotamia (now Iraq). Small military units of the British and British Indian armies, stationed briefly in Baku, and later in Tbilisi and Batumi, left the South Caucasus in July 1920. The French and Italians had displayed lukewarm interest towards the South Caucasus. French representatives in Georgia were primarily concerned about balancing the British presence, and the Italian government, though it briefly considered adopting the Caucasian mandate after the departure of the British, was beset by too many problems at home to maintain its commitments abroad.¹⁰ The US Senate declined to accept President Wilson’s appeal for a mandate for Armenia, and offered only moral support, although it recognized Armenia as a sovereign state.¹¹

Figure 1.1 Approximate territorial claims of the South Caucasian states, early 1920 Source: Map compiled by author.

Paradoxically, the most serious geopolitical problem for all South Caucasian states was this absence of geopolitical rivalry among the great powers. Competition could potentially have increased the leverage of the small states, and enhanced diplomatic maneuvering at the Paris Peace Conference. The Peace Conference, which began its deliberations in January 1919, signed innumerable treaties; one of the last was the Treaty of Sèvres in August 1920. This treaty promised Armenia large territory at the expense of Turkey, but after the Armenian–Turkish war of September–December 1920, Kemalist Turkey returned to the South Caucasus and stripped Armenia, and later Georgia, of territories they had controlled after the Russian Empire had disappeared.

As a result of weak commitments from the Western powers, the region remained at the mercy of Bolshevik-led Russia and Kemalist-led Turkey. In 1918–19, Moscow and Ankara had other priorities; Bolshevik Russia was engaged in a bloody civil war, while Turkey, successor to the Ottoman Empire, was fighting for its survival against the Greeks in the west, and against the French in the south-east. Georgian diplomats, many of whom had spent years in European capitals before the revolution, were convinced their new country was culturally and politically closer to Europe than Asia, and sought Western protection. However, the level of political and m...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title
• Half Title Page
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Contents
• Illustrations
• List of Contributors
• Maps
• Preface
• Acknowledgements
• Notes on transliteration and terminology
• Introduction
• I Good neighbors, bad neighbors
• 1 Geopolitics and foreign powers in the modern history of Georgia Comparing 1918–21 and 1991–2010
• 2 The Russian–Georgian war and its implications for Georgia's state building
• 3 Georgia's European aspirations and the Eastern partnership
• 4 Georgia as a geographical pivot Past, present, and future
• 5 Georgia's military and civil security challenges1
• II Creating democracy, building states
• 6 Georgia's ethnic diversity A challenge to state-building
• 7 The Democratic Republic of Georgia (1918–21) and the search for the Georgian model of democracy
• 8 The Democratic Republic of Georgia Forgotten lessons for our democracy
• 9 March of the goblins1 Permanent revolution in Georgia
• III Home for whom?
• 10 A fateful moment Ethnic autonomy and revolutionary violence in the Democratic Republic of Georgia (1918–21)1
• 11 “From words to action!” Nationality policy in Soviet Abkhazia (1921–38)1
• 12 Unpacking the meta-conflict Claims to sovereignty, self-determination and territorial integrity in the Georgian–Abkhaz conflict
• IV The power of the past
• 13 The young Stalin and the 1905 revolution in Georgia
• 14 The Soviet occupation of Georgia in 1921 and the Russian–Georgian war of August 2008 Historical analogy as a memory project
• Appendix 1 Extracts from Peace Treaty, concluded in Moscow on 7 May 1920, between the Russian Socialist Federal Soviet Republic (RSFSR) and the Democratic Republic of Georgia
• Appendix 2 Constitution of Georgia Adopted by the Constituent Assembly February 21, 1921 (Extracts)
• Appendix 3 The Constitution of Georgia Adopted on 24 August 1995. Last amendment 27.12.06 (Extracts)
• Index