ABSTRACT

Studies explaining Georgian foreign policy present Tbilisi’s options as a dichotomy between the West and Russia, focusing either on power politics or personal characteristics of decision-makers. To paint a more nuanced and holistic picture, this article departs from these models and uses content analysis to explore what foreign policy visions political parties present to voters in their manifestos for parliamentary elections between 1992 and 2016. Grounding conclusions in empirical data, the article elaborates a novel analytical framework with two dimensions: alignment and orientation. This framework advances the understanding of foreign policy in two major ways. First, the framework reveals changes in foreign policy behavior that would normally be overlooked. Second, it shows that parties sometimes form pairs of circular foreign policy preferences (i.e., A > B > C > A). An added value of the framework is its potential application to other small states in the post-Soviet space and beyond.

摘要

解释格鲁吉亚外交政策的研究将第比利斯的选择视为西方国家与俄罗斯之间的二分法，侧重于权力政治或决策者的个人特征。为了描绘出更加细致和全面的图景，本文脱离了这些模型，并使用内容分析来探索各政党在1992年至2016年议会选举宣言中向选民展示的选民外交政策构想。本文以经验数据为基础，阐述了这一点。一个具有两个维度的新颖分析框架：对齐和方向。该框架通过两种主要方式促进了对外交政策的理解。首先，该框架揭示了通常被忽略的外交政策行为变化。第二，它表明，政党有时会形成成对的循环外交政策对（即，A> B> C> A）。该框架的附加价值是其在后苏联时期及以后的其他小国中的潜在应用。