Colorful Authoritarians? Protest, Policing and Repression in Georgia and Kyrgyzstan 2005-2007 Author: Jason E. Strakes

Abstract: In the years following the Eurasian “color revolutions”, newly elected leaderships in the process of consolidating democratic regimes have engaged in the limited or direct suppression of the very popular forces that they once represented. Most recently, post-revolution executives (and former opposition figures) such as Mikhail Saakashvili in Georgia and Kurmanbek Bakiev in Kyrgyzstan have surprised international democracy advocates by responding to organized protests with the deployment of security services and militia, control of the media, mobilization of pro-regime counter-demonstrators and provocateurs, charges of foreign influence, or the imposition of emergency laws. These actions indicate the relative continuance of Soviet-era policing patterns and perceptions of political association among governing elites, in which opposition activities are regarded as a threat to public order and the stability of the state rather than as necessary elements of a civil society in which the right of assembly is safeguarded by constitutional law. This suggests a linkage between the specific qualities of opposition movements and protests that have evolved since the revolutionary period, and the use of traditional mechanisms of social control in states that have limited historical experience with organized popular dissent. The present study will seek to develop a comparative theoretical account of unstable democratization and neo-authoritarian behavior in Eurasian polities by analyzing the relationship between the structure, size, strategies and tactics of opposition groups, the extent of security sector reform (SSR), and the level of “neo-Soviet” government responses by post-revolution regimes in Georgia and Kyrgyzstan during 2005-2007.