Europe, Russia, or both? Popular perspectives on overlapping regionalism in the Southern Caucasus

Political elites often construct dichotomous images of foreign policy choices. This paper is interested in how overlapping regional integration projects such as the European Union or the Russia-initiated Eurasian Economic Union are regarded by the larger public. Based on survey data, the paper analyses foreign policy orientations in Georgia, a country that has been considered as one of the most strongly pro-Western nations in the post-soviet world. The paper finds that despite having idealistic pro-European foreign policy elites, a substantial part of the Georgian population does in fact pragmatically supports closer ties with Russia and with the European Union at the same time. Several explanatory factors for the different foreign policy choices are proposed, of which identity- and interest-based ones prove to be most important.