EIU: in 2008, Russia and Georgia departed a lot away from democracy

By the outcomes of the study carried out by the analytical group named "The Economist Intelligence Unit" (EIU), by the level of democracy development, Georgia takes the 104th place in the world, and Russia - the 107th. The document notes that among the post-Soviet countries these two powers lost most rating points compared with the previous research made in 2006.

The so-called "revolution of roses" in Georgia, when in November 2003 peaceful demonstrations against forged parliamentary elections resulted in dismissal of the then President Shevardnadze, created an impression that the country was progressing to democracy. However, subsequent events failed to answer the expectations. The changes in the Constitutions adopted in 2004 concentrated the power in the hands of President Mikhail Saakashvili and weakened the legislation. In 2006, the government manipulated with municipal elections to ensure the victory of the party in power. Dispersal of the opposition and introduction of the state of emergency in November 2007 demonstrated the absence of any progress. The course of elections in 2008 left much to be desired. At last, Saakashvili's attempt to force Abkhazia and South Ossetia back to Georgia in August 2008 resulted in conflict with Russia and catastrophe for Georgia, state the authors of the document published in the EIU website.

In their opinion, the situation in Russia looks same disappointing: "In Russia, one positive moment (the fact that that Vladimir Putin lost his presidency in May 2008) was outweighed by a number of negative factors. Although formal attributes of democracy still remain, today's Russia can be named as "controlled democracy". The State Duma is no more than a place for stamping documents, governors are appointed, the main media are supervised by the state, NGOs are under strong pressure, and the state has essentially increased its presence in the economy. However, most of Russians "are not too concerned with the motion towards authoritarianism."

As to other Transcaucasian republics, Armenia was ranked the 113th in the list, and Azerbaijan, rated as an authoritative country, the 135th.