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Book Note: Globalization and Belonging: The Politics of Identity in a Changing World

The ten authors of this nicely designed and densely packed volume agreed to take a calculated risk: their analysis of the fluent and volatile postrevolutionary situation in Georgia could be overtaken by events (the text was finalized by April 2005), but the logic and the manner of spectacular regime change in late 2003 would continue to shape the trajectory of the country for years to come. They also had no possibility of knowing whether the chain of ‘color revolutions’ that had started in Georgia, continued in Ukraine in late 2004 and spread to Kyrgyzstan in spring 2005 would go any further. However, their insightful and sober examination of the relaunched Georgian national project has much lasting value; while risks stemming from multiple dimensions of insecurity cannot be accurately measured, they cannot cancel the fact that ‘the basic values of democracy and human rights are internalized by the critical mass of the people’ (p. 82). Historical examination of Georgia’s ‘time of troubles’ and current conflict analysis focused on Abkhazia are particularly penetrating. Most of the authors, including the Georgians, emphasize the crucial importance of achieving ‘a safer and more productive relationship with the Russian Federation’ (p. 383), since ‘the gap in expectations between Georgia’s hopes for integration into the West and, unsurprisingly, the West’s hesitancy to provide firm assurance that it will happen’ (p. 30) constitutes an important vulnerability. However, their hopes for ‘a more constructive course’ (p. 203) were not exactly answered by President Saakashvili, who in February 2006 accused Russia of sabotage in supplying gas to Georgia and portrayed it as a ‘strong, experienced and wealthy opponent’. Pavel Baev