Georgia Narrowly Escaped West-Induced Suicide. How Did It Do That? | Giorgi Lasha Kasradze

The 2008 Russo-Georgian War has long been overshadowed by the warfare in Ukraine. However, until today it offers one of the most important and most valuable case studies for everything that's wrong with the relationship between the West, Russia, and then in-between lands of the former Soviet Union. In this talk, Giorgi Lasha Kasradze discusses all the lessons we haven't learned, or simply forgot in relation to Georgia and why it is that this small nation in South Caucasus managed to escape the fate of Ukraine. Spoiler alert: it has something to do with not being rational.

Giorgi Lasha Kasradze is originally from Georgia (the country in Eastern Europe, not the US state). He is an international relations analyst and expert on the former Soviet Union, covering mainly the South Caucasus and the Black Sea region. 

He works in the US as a liaison officer for the Sokhumi State University, which itself used to be part of Abkhazia’s state university, but since the 1993 Abkhazia War has been based in Tiblisi, the capital of Georgia.

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Pascal’s academic articles about neutrality studies:

“In Defense of Neutrals: Why They’re More Than Fence Sitter” Foreign Policy, June 6, 2023. https://foreignpolicy.com/2023/06/06/ukraine-russia-war-neutrality-nonalignment/

“The Future of Neutrality”. Geneva Center for Security Policy, Policy Briefs, no.4, 2023. ISBN: 978-2-88947-407-3.

“Dual-Neutrality for the Koreas: A Two-Pronged Approach toward Reunification.” Defense & Security Analysis, 2022, http://doi.org/10.1080/14751798.2022.2085109

“The Politics and Diplomacy of Neutrality.” Oxford Bibliographies in International Relations, New York: Oxford University Press, 2022, http://doi.org/10.1093/OBO/9780199743292-0307

“Neutrality Studies.” Oxford Research Encyclopedia of International Studies, New York: Oxford University Press, 2022, http://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780190846626.013.680).

“Going East: Switzerland’s Early Consular Diplomacy toward East and Southeast Asia.” Traverse: Zeitschrift für Geschichte 27 no. 1, 2020, 23–34, http://doi.org/10.5169/seals-881084

“Violent Conflicts and Neutral Legations: A Case Study of the Spanish and Swiss Legations in Wartime Japan.” New Global Studies 11, no.2, 20 17. 85–100, http://doi.org/10.1515/ngs-2017-0018

Pascal’s books about neutrality studies:

Lottaz Pascal, and Ingemar Ottosson. Sweden, Japan, and the Long Second World War 1931–1945. London: Routledge, 2021. https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/oa-mono/10.4324/9781003182061/sweden-japan-long-second-world-war-pascal-lottaz-ingemar-ottosson

Lottaz Pascal, Heinz Gärtner, and Herbert Reginbogin, eds. Neutral Beyond the Cold: Neutral States and the Post-Cold War International System. Lanham: Lexington Books, 2022, https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781666901665/Neutral-Beyond-the-Cold-Neutral-States-and-the-Post-Cold-War-International-System

Reginbogin, Herbert, and Pascal Lottaz, eds. Permanent Neutrality: A Model for Peace, Security, and Justice. Lanham: Lexington Books, 2020, https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781793610287/Permanent-Neutrality-A-Model-for-Peace-Security-and-Justice

Lottaz Pascal, and Herbert Reginbogin, eds. Notions of Neutralities. Lanham: Lexington Books, 2019, https://rowman.com/ISBN/9781498582261/Notions-of-Neutralities