The Regulation of Lobbying in Georgia

Abstract

Georgia was one of the first countries in Europe to adopt a special act regulating lobbying activities – “Law of Georgia on Lobbying” -in 1998 during the presidency of Eduard Shevardnadze. The referred law was one of the first unified acts regulating lobbying not only in the legal systems of the former Post-Soviet, but also of all European countries as a well.

The question of our research is whether the Law of Georgia on Lobbying really works and whether it is effective. The purpose of the report is to show the ways of regulating lobbying in Georgia and effectiveness of the law on lobbying as well. To my mind, the regulation of lobbying in Georgia is relevant, but ineffective.

The document regulating lobbying activities is assessed using the CPI method in the current report. Each element of the lobbying law is evaluated through the aforementioned method in our case.

According to the CPI index, (CHARI, R.; HOGAN, J., MURPHY, G. Report on The Legal Framework for the Regulation of Lobbying in the Council of Europe Member States),  7 elements of lobbying regulation have been identified.

We used these 7 characteristics during the study of “Law of Georgia on Lobbying” to determine the compliance of each paragraph of the latter with the norms defined by this index. According to the results of the study, “Law of Georgia on Lobbying" can be considered as a medium-regulated system.