In 2024, Georgia adopted a new legal framework that mirrors Russia’s ‘gay propaganda’ ban. Alexander Kondakov and Sandro Tabatadze explore how this law blends Russian-inspired anti-gender policies with homegrown political logic. It is reshaping Georgia’s identity and challenging its Western ties, while raising broader implications for global authoritarian movements
September 2025 marks a year since Georgia’s parliament adopted its Family Values Bill. Ongoing political turmoil and Russian-style governance link this legislation with Russia’s 'gay propaganda' law, first enacted in 2013 and expanded after the 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
In practice, the Georgian version is different. Much like its Russian variant, however, it is attempting to erase gender diversity and LGBTQ+ rights from public life.
In Russia, the 'propaganda' of 'non-traditional sexual relations' is subject to a total ban, turning queerness into an official taboo. Additionally, the Kremlin even prohibited same-sex relations being mentioned to minors. Georgia’s law follows suit, but it is not a straightforward copy. While Russia legislates by exclusion, branding certain identities 'non-traditional', Georgia asserts a biologically fixed truth. Article 2 of the Bill grounds gender in 'hereditary genetic characteristics', presenting male and female as immutable categories. This framing is far more than a technical choice: it signals that Georgia is constructing its own way of policing gender and sexuality.
The Georgian law stretches across domains as diverse as marriage, child-rearing, medical procedures, labour contracts, and media content. It even changes the significance of symbolic dates. 17 May, marked internationally as the Day Against Homophobia, Transphobia, and Biphobia, has been rebranded in Georgia as a celebration of the Day of Family Sanctity and Respect for Parents.
Georgia's Family Values Bill embeds the gender binary into law, insisting that biology is destiny, and foreclosing any space for ambiguity
The Russian and Georgian laws both rely on the power of symbolism. They make queerness unspeakable and render 'traditional values' the only legitimate identity marker for the nation. But Georgia’s version goes further. It embeds the gender binary into law, insisting that biology is destiny, and foreclosing any space for ambiguity. Initially, the Russian law focused much less on gender and explicitly included 'sex change propaganda' only in 2022.
Is Georgia simply transferring the law’s model from its northern neighbour? The answer is more complicated. Scholars have long argued that laws resonate in different ways across national contexts; they do not travel like objects, but are interpreted, adapted, and sometimes resisted in their new environment.
Georgia’s law is one such example. It resonates with Russia’s legislation, but is shaped by local context. Transgender issues, biological determinism, and the ban on information are all central to the Georgian debates. There, the government aggressively rejects the concept of gender as a social construct in favour of medicalised claims about 'natural' difference. In Russia, sexuality is an explicitly political question, encapsulated by the notion of traditions and external influences, not biology.
Georgia's law resonates with Russia's 'gay propaganda' ban, but transgender issues, biological determinism, and the ban on information are all more central to the Georgian debates
At the same time, Georgia is not an isolated case. It is part of a global web of anti-gender discourse promoted by conservative NGOs, religious movements, and political actors, from Poland and Hungary to the United States and Latin America. But Russia is not the sole source of inspiration for this global spread. Georgia’s law may appear Russian, but it derives its ideological DNA from multiple sources.
What Russia and Georgia undeniably share is their political exploitation of anti-gender legislation. These laws are less about child protection, family values – or even public morality – than about power. They allow governments to shore up legitimacy, to distract from governance failures, and to rally conservative factions.
In Russia, the 'gay propaganda' law helped Vladimir Putin consolidate support during a period of domestic discontent and international isolation. In Georgia, the government is becoming increasingly authoritarian. It has staged highly contested elections and has repressed civil society organisations and political opponents. Meanwhile, Brussels is increasing pressure on Tbilisi over the Georgian government's turn away from the EU. The new law provides an easy rallying point. It is a means for the government to present itself as the guardian of tradition against liberal values and the perceived betrayal of the West, while simultaneously dividing the opposition and fragmenting civil society.
In both Georgia and Russia, anti-gender laws operate as technologies of governance, defining who belongs – and who constitutes a threat to the nation
In both countries, anti-gender laws operate as technologies of governance. They define who belongs and who constitutes a threat to the nation. They channel social anxieties into 'safe' targets, such as LGBTQ+ communities, feminists, and foreign nations. Their intention is to reinforce the moral authority of the state.
Our analysis provincialises Russia’s role in global conservative networks. Since the early 2010s, Moscow has claimed to be leading an international traditional-values movement, offering up its propaganda law as a model for other countries to follow. But Georgia's example suggests that is not the case.
Georgia is, of course, Russia's close neighbour, with a similarly shaky democratic record. Even so, it did not simply import Moscow’s law wholesale. Instead, Georgian lawmakers, inspired by other countries' examples, grounded their efforts in home-grown discourse. The result is legislation that bears a resemblance to Russia’s but is clearly not its offspring.
Georgia’s 2024 law shows us what twenty-first-century anti-gender politics looks like: hybrid, adaptive, and manipulative. But this is not just a Russian story, nor only a Georgian one. It is a node in a much larger network of far-right backlash. The novelty of this law lies in how it combines local political needs of authoritarian practice with global ideological toolkits in a uniquely Georgian configuration.
The stakes, however, remain the same. Laws like these strip away rights, kill and injure stigmatised individuals, silence dissent, and reconfigure national identity on exclusionary terms. They are not about protecting children, but protecting power.
Blog prepared during a short-term scientific mission at the Institut Barcelona d'Estudis Internacionals (IBEI), supported by COST Action CA23149 Antigender-Politics.
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