Reinventing ‘Europeanness’ as a tool of negotiation

Abstract

The present paper was written prior to the unjustified, unprovoked full- scale Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. This war has re- sulted in an unprecedented acceleration of rapprochement of Georgia to the EU, a unique event that greatly increased the dynamics of relations between the EU and Georgia. But before this one-off condition, the fun- damentals of Georgia-EU entered into stagnation. We will try to analyse the obstacles challenging closer EU-Georgian relations, and will look for a possible way out of the current lassitude. These obstacles existed even before the war in Ukraine, and they continue to exist. This paper presents the external and internal obstacles (from the point of view of Georgia), encompassing both hard and real problems, and the perceived dimensions of hindrances. Real problems are pressure on the single currency, immi- gration, and enlargement fatigue. The perceived problem is the long and subtle transformation of the EU’s image from an object of admiration to one of nihilism and even bitterness.

The paper suggests that lowering the expectations of Georgian society to that of a truly peripheral region will bring more adequate modus operan- di between the two entities, putting Georgia in a more realistic position.