This chapter examines the presidency of Zviad Gamsakhurdia in order to explain how the political regime of Georgia developed into an autocracy without great power competition. From 1991 to 1993, Russia was a dominant- negative external actor, which contributed to the fragmentation of the state as a series of dramatic conflicts and confrontations played out in Georgia. Without a counterweight to Russian autocracy promotion, Georgia lacked the resources to manage its territorial conflicts and their consequences. For this reason, Georgia became dependent on international assistance, and its political leaders franchised the settlement of disputes.

The Origins of Conflict in the Autonomous Republics

To understand the tenures of Gamsakhurdia and Shevardnadze, we must first look to the Georgian nationalist upheavals and political unrest in the Soviet era. The origins of the conflicts in the autonomous republics of Abkhazia and South Ossetia emerge in this period as domestic groups fought at different levels during a political transition from a communist regime to an independent Georgia. Georgians became polarized over issues and personalities. The separatists’ conflicts evolved gradually during the Soviet and early postindependence periods. In South Ossetia, national and autonomous governments fought the war of laws. The Central Committee of the Communist Party of Georgia adopted a law on the status of the Georgian language. This law made it compulsory for students in non-Georgian schools to learn the Georgian language. Ossetians established an informal organization, Adamonikhas, and rallied ethnic Ossetians to protest this decision. The national government under Gamsakhurdia dismissed the claim of South Ossetia regarding the status of their language, which intensified the conflict and put the nation on a path toward fragmentation.

The leadership of the Adamonikhas separatist movement demanded succession from Georgia. In 1991, Gamsakhurdia arrested Torez Kulumbegov, the head of the Soviet Supreme Council of the South Ossetia and a member of the Adamonikhas. The Regional Council of the Autonomous Republic made a unilateral decision and declared independence in 1990. Ossetians refused to vote in the Georgian parliamentary elections in December of that year. Gamsakhurdia then revoked autonomy and Ossetian independence in response. The national Congress opposed Gamsakhurdia, as many believed this decision would provoke a military conflict despite its correct legal reasoning. Some members of the parliament resisted Gamsakhurdia on the grounds that this conflict might pave the way to his dominance.