Obušky a chačapuri - Zápisky z Gruzie – Karlíková Eva (2026)

This Czech-language book offers a firsthand account of Georgia’s social, political and cultural situation during the transformative period of 2024–2025, when a young democracy with a pro-European direction became a state controlled by one party. Eva Karlíková, a young Czech researcher, spent a year in Georgia, but instead of carrying out ordinary fieldwork she became a witness to a dramatic social upheaval. Her account combines personal experiences with conversations with journalists, civil society activists and ordinary people from different regions and social groups, including members of ethnic minorities and supporters of the governing party. Each of them faces the new reality differently. The book describes the dismantling of independent media under pressure from new legislation, the intimidation of protesters and the changing public space. It portrays a society and a country that lost its illusions within a single year, but not its dignity or courage. Eva Karlíková studied area studies with a focus on Eastern Europe and Eurasia at Charles University’s Faculty of Social Sciences, where she continues her doctoral research into media freedom and journalism’s democratic role. She has worked on development and humanitarian projects in Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine, led projects supporting independent media in Eastern Europe, and since 2024 has collaborated with the Moldovan investigative project CU SENS. She has travelled extensively through Europe, Central Asia, the Caucasus and Australia. This is her first book, and its contents are in Czech.