Abstract The Rose Revolution of 2003 marked Georgia’s strategic turn toward a Western-oriented path and liberal democracy, but the country’s recent conservative turn – a political and societal shift toward traditional values, nationalism, and resistance to liberal reforms – may signal a significant reversal of that trajectory. Most notably, this shift reflects considerable public support for the conservative and increasingly authoritarian course pursued by the country’s Georgian Dream government. Although various factors may have contributed to the public’s acceptance of this transformation, this article focuses on the role of Russian soft power in shaping this shift in attitudes. Strategically deployed Russian soft power has promoted narratives, values, and ideas that have arguably played a key role in normalising the conservative turn within Georgian society and, ultimately, in weakening Georgia’s prospects for integration into Western institutions.

Abstract This article examines Soviet internationalism through the long-term artistic collaboration of Armenian composer Arno Babajanian, Russian poet Robert Rozhdestvensky, and Azerbaijani singer Muslim Magomayev. Using the ‘strange attractor’ metaphor from dynamical systems theory, it explores how Soviet cultural policy generated structured contingency: a system in which artistic creativity thrived within ideological bounds. Their collaboration culminated in Nocturne, a fragile elegy and final harmonic signature of late Soviet cultural synthesis—infused with emotional clarity, yet bounded by aesthetic constraint. The case reveals how Soviet ideology fostered bounded unpredictability in cultural production and how its collapse fractured shared artistic legacies across Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Russia. By situating their music within shifting ideological frameworks, this study demonstrates how Soviet internationalism functioned as a generative but volatile system, sustaining cross-national collaboration until its structural unraveling.

Abstract This article examines the 1917 Revolution in Daghestan through the lens of a newly uncovered vernacular source: the Arabic-language manuscript Tarīkh al-inqilāb fī Dāghistān (History of the Revolution in Daghestan) by Ali Kaiaev, a prominent Daghestani scholar of Islam. This article argues that Kaiaev’s account provides a crucial alternative perspective to the historiographies shaped by Soviet, Western, and post-Soviet scholars, who often overlooked vernacular sources due to the inaccessibility of private archives. By analyzing Kaiaev’s narrative alongside these historiographies, this study seeks to illuminate his understanding of the Revolution and how it contributes to a more nuanced reconstruction of Daghestan’s revolutionary history. Through this, we reassess the political and social transformations in the region, highlighting the local agency in the face of broader imperial collapse.

Abstract This paper explores the reactions of Poti’s residents, a small port city in Georgia, to the changes and development resulting from the Rose Revolution in 2003. Specifically, it analyses the reforms implemented by the revolutionary government aimed at negotiating relations with regard to the sea between private fishing companies and local fishers and shows how these reforms led to the establishment of new ‘informal maritime economic practices’. Contrary to the government’s intention of turning fishers and fish-smoking communities into successful entrepreneurs, the reforms strengthened previously existing informal networks and turned them into robust social safety nets. Using the informal economy approach, this paper emphasizes the importance of understanding the informal economic practices of post-Soviet Georgia as embedded in the social and cultural spheres. Moreover, I suggest that through specific informal practices and networks, city dwellers maintain their connection with the sea to reclaim their rights to maritime resources and a better future.

Abstract This article uses Joseph Nye’s soft power framework to identify and compare the sources of Turkish and Iranian soft power in Azerbaijan. The study makes three core arguments. First, there exists a growing gap between championed values and actual practices both in Türkiye and Iran. The democratic credentials of Turkish and Iranian political regimes have deteriorated continuously in the last 16 years, in connection with the stricter application of Islamic rules in Iran and government-led Islamization in Türkiye which may undercut their soft power in Azerbaijan. The second argument states that aware of the significance of resolution of the Nagorno-Karabakh impasse for Azerbaijanis, Türkiye and Iran have endeavored to join in mediation efforts to break the deadlock. Lastly, the third argument maintains that Türkiye and Iran, although to different extents, make use of products of high and popular culture to appeal to the Azerbaijani public.

Abstract How do we determine whether a migration is voluntary when persons organize their own displacement under the shadow of ethnic violence? I examine this question through a case study of a 1989 Soviet village exchange between Azerbaijanis from Gizil-Shafag (in the Armenian Soviet Socialist Republic – SSR) and Armenians from Karkanj (in the Azerbaijani SSR), where residents negotiated their mutual relocation while operating under threats to their safety. Through analyzing competing accounts of voluntary migration, I demonstrate why the agential account fails to capture the fundamental difference between fleeing ethnic violence and migrating for career advancement. This inability makes the agential account susceptible to misuse by nationalists attempting to justify ethnic cleansing. However, the political account – which focuses on whether migration is motivated by one’s belief that one lacks objectively acceptable alternatives – not only better reflects the lived experiences of ethnic minorities facing displacement but also provides clearer guidance for migration policies.