They don't want us in: misrecognition and Georgia's contested departure from Europe

Since independence, Georgia has anchored its ontological security narrative in a “return to Europe”. Yet since the early 2020s, the authorities have shifted away from the EU, just as the door to enlargement is finally opening. This article argues that enduring misrecognition has fuelled the securitisation of the EU as an emotion management strategy. Once emulative, Georgia now contests the EU's dominance. The paper analyses how the authorities have reframed Georgia's identity and foreign policy discourse and instrumentalised collective emotions to support this shift – yet have ultimately failed to impose a lasting departure from the European path in Georgian society.