Work and schedule in Georgia
The economy in its Soviet version is not so far back in the Georgian past. However, with a growth rate of 5%, the country is starting from a long way off and is not doing so badly. But life is hard and inequalities remain glaring. An exploration of the country reflects this. Futuristic buildings in the city centre in Tbilisi or Batumi on the Black Sea contrast with the rural landscape. Roads crowded with horses, pigs, cows or sheep sometimes run alongside imposing, rusty factories, remnants of Soviet times. These images reflect a two-speed country, a Georgia turned towards the world and the future with a forced march, while many inhabitants are forgotten along the way.
Since the break-up of the Soviet bloc, Georgian society has suffered a shock, to say the least: those who depended on the society planned according to Soviet codes have lost their jobs and income. On the labour market, the economy is divided into two sectors: the public and the private. The labour market in Georgia is currently out of control. Every young graduate dreams of getting a job in a public company, which is known to offer good salaries, sometimes higher than in the private sector, and job security. The sector still has a very high number of redundant jobs, which are better paid than in the private sector. Having a good network is of paramount importance: in order to have the best chance of finding a job, you have to have high connections - a poor person will find it much more difficult.Survive
So you have to live, or survive, at all levels. A working day in a company usually starts around 10 or 11 a.m. and ends late in the evening. Georgian employees don't count their office hours, we work late at night. They come back to work on weekends if necessary, or even sick. They usually work forty hours a week. It is even often considered suspicious to leave the office too early! In Georgia, nothing is due. Every member of the same family is looking for work - a Georgian child can start working with parental consent from the age of 14 on the streets of Tbilisi, late at night, summer and winter, every day. Elderly ladies sell peanut or sunflower seeds, or whatever they can, knitting outside... Their produce has to be sold. They have to sell their produce, so they contribute their share to the family income.
Some figures
In January 2020, the average salary is 728 GEL (€226). The unemployment rate is 13% and concerns 27% of young people. Men retire at the age of 65 and women at the age of 60. The price of a rent in Tbilisi city centre for a three-room apartment is 1 775 GEL, outside the city, it is about 1 000 GEL. Since November 2018, the French Development Agency based in Tbilisi has been helping the government to implement a system of reforms in the social welfare and health system. Universal coverage was introduced in 2014 and a pension reform recently implemented, a necessity when the monthly pension amount is 200 GEL. At the beginning of the 2000s, social security coverage was almost non-existent. The health system is still deficient or unaffordable.
Another option: undertake!
Choosing between an average monthly salary of 500 GEL for a young graduate working in a bank and setting up his own business is just one step that many young Georgians take. Forty-five percent of Georgian youth is thus self-employed. In the booming tourism sector, there is plenty to do! That's why Tbilisi is full of guest houses. The legislation is not too demanding to open a guest house or create one's own business. Driving tourists in private vehicles and earning in a few days what a company executive earns in a month, the dilemma doesn't last long... Nevertheless, you have to take into account the vagaries of supply and demand in the tourism market. Western companies established in Georgia attract a lot of young Georgian graduates. They offer better working conditions and better salaries. Within the company, working in a Western company is considered prestigious.
Community life and social appearance
Despite their harsh living conditions, Georgians are very proud people. They are proud of Tbilisi, of their country, of their culture, of their gastronomy, of the richness of their heritage, of belonging to a country that has had such a turbulent history and has been the object of so many invasions, of being nationals of a country that, against historical winds and storms, still exists.
The basis of society: the clan
The clan is the backbone of Georgian society with the network, including relationships with people considered "important". Thus, the self-help system is paramount. You rely on your family network for everything, finding a job or a place to live. Privileges are exchanged in order to obtain a favour. That said, since 2003, what could be called corruption is no longer in the ascendancy, even though for many people these considerations are a way of life. The family in the broadest sense is the unconditional basis and inescapable structure of Georgian society. Georgia is still subject to great poverty; the upper and middle classes are tiny. We rely on the D system. Whether in business or in social life in general, communication is the watchword. Social structures at the base of everything explain this passion for going out for lunch, dinner or a drink. For example, traditional Georgian festivals are particularly popular. The most important is the supra, the famous Georgian banquet. Any occasion is the right one to organize one. In Georgia, we like to eat and drink, to meet with colleagues in a restaurant in order to establish good relations.
Showing off
In Georgia, status is important. Even if it can sometimes be far from representing reality, you have to show and show off, show off in a nice luxury car, show off a top-of-the-range mobile phone, wear designer clothes. Since the vast majority of Georgians are far from driving on gold, we like to display signs of wealth to give the illusion that we belong to this tiny class of privileged people.
Women and Marital Life in Georgia
It's a man's world. They dominate a patriarchal society. In the Soviet Union, the communist ideology was one of equality between men and women. After independence, a very traditional society was claimed. In Georgia, gender equality is a real issue. We are still a long way from achieving it. In the old mentality, the woman is the guardian of the home, the mother, she gets married and takes care of the children. The statue of the Motherland in Tbilisi, dominating the city, embodies all that. Paradoxically, the current president, Salome Zurabishvili, is a woman, and women are increasingly to be found in decision-making positions in the government or as leaders on Georgian television. Nevertheless, men still dominate, and the woman, who is supposed to be pretty, often finds herself confined to secretarial and administrative tasks.
The die is cast at birth
No two people are in the same boat. The status of women in Georgian society depended on several criteria, depending on whether they lived in urban or rural areas, whether they were part of a minority or not, whether they were educated and favoured or not. A woman living in rural areas, subject to the diktat of traditional society, has few career opportunities. Urban women as well as men have access to higher education. Social background is a determining factor in terms of opportunities: a woman from an educated middle class background can become economically independent. Within the family, the little girl often has to help her mother with household chores, while the little boy is often brought up as a child king. Nothing is done to help the mother to work; there are few crèche places that do not facilitate her access to the labour market. For example, about 55% of women work compared to 73% of men. The difference in pay is glaring: a man's pay can be 88% higher than a woman's, in the public or private sector. In the political sphere, women's access is even more complicated. There are only 23 women MPs out of a total of 150. But the most dramatic phenomenon is still domestic violence, which is still widespread, especially in rural areas, but also in urban areas and in refugee camps. What is worrying is that it is widely accepted in the mentalities of Georgian men. The weight of religion makes society very sexist; rape is a minor offence. In short, women are still confined to domestic tasks to the detriment of a public social position.
Married or not: the family, the real social core
Before marriage, we still rarely cohabit and few couples remain unmarried. In rural areas, especially among minorities, women may be married and become mothers far too early, sometimes as teenagers. Nothing changes the weight of traditions, however scandalous they may be. Men go abroad to work and women become the head of the household and the only source of income. So there is a lot of progress to be made: a wide variety of cases depending on origins and mentalities that evolve only very slowly. While the institution of marriage remains central, "a social pillar" reflecting a highly hierarchical patriarchal system, divorce is becoming a fairly common phenomenon. It is difficult to compare a woman executive in Georgian society with a young Azeri girl living in the countryside who was forced to marry at the age of 12.
Housing and family life
At independence, with the liberalization of the economy, the country experienced a considerable increase in the cost of living. A social drama for many. State aid disappears, infrastructures such as crèches or public institutions such as hospitals fall into disrepair. Rents are so expensive that married couples come to live with the husband's parents. In order to counterbalance the high cost and difficulty of living, family mutual aid is particularly important. Georgian men often live with their parents. In the other direction, the parents are taken care of by the elder brother in the siblings. A man may stay at home with his wife or be divorced. It is not uncommon for a man to stay with his parents, and tradition dictates that he should support them financially when they are no longer able to take care of themselves.
Silk Road, Drug Road
Again and again an ideal position: Georgia, by virtue of its geographical position, is the ideal crossing point for drugs between Russia, Turkey and the Schengen area, in both directions: opiates from Central Asia, synthetic opiates such as heroin, among others, produced in Azerbaijan, Turkish and Iranian channels or "Krokodil", an amphetamine produced for personal consumption, "subutex" imported from Europe. Cannabis is the most widely used drug in Georgia. In the face of the government's harsh crackdown on trafficking, "home-made" drugs are on the rise. Since 1991, drug trafficking and consumption have exploded: 53,000 drug addicts out of a population of 3.7 million. On the other side of the coin is a power that is committed to zero tolerance: two months' basic salary as a fine or eight to twenty years in prison if a Georgian is caught with a gram of heroin. Faced with the abuse of power by a police force that goes far beyond its prerogatives to catch, convict or falsely convict any citizen, a debate has been going on for some years now. If the policy of "zero tolerance" is not working, is it not time to approach the problem from another angle: tolerating drug use? In Georgia, it is a veritable scourge, and the answer to the debate is still pending...
