Education & Academia

During the past five years of intensive work revealing the PRC’s soft and hard power strategies jeopardizing Georgia’s national security, Civic IDEA has already published two reports covering China’s influence on Georgia’s academic, media and CSO sectors before, during, and after the emergence of the covid-19 pandemic. Today, we suggest another monitoring report from the Chinese cooperation and activities in Georgian Academia, though not related directly to the universities, but to the National Academy of Sciences of Georgia.

Through personal correspondence and public information available on their official website, Civic IDEA has discovered several memorandums and cooperation agreements the National Academy of Sciences has signed with both state and private Chinese entities, as well as numerous events and activities following the advanced relations with China. We came across several interesting connections that have already been established between local chapters of the Academy of Science, as well as individual scientists under the auspices of the Academy and Chinese universities, which gives us the idea that the increased research and academic cooperation will only boost and the partnership will gain even more attachment in the future.

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Civic IDEA published the second volume of the report “Chinese Leverage in Georgia’s Academic, CSO and Media Sectors: Post-Covid Reality”. The current paper reviews Georgia – Chinese cooperation in Academia, that is, among various universities, academic programs, scholarships, etc., analyzing realities created by Covid Pandemic and its consequences. Moreover, it gives a comparative analysis by evaluating foreign trends and policies toward Chinese malign academic activities. Mainly, the report focuses on the cases of the Netherlands, Germany, the UK, Hungary, Serbia, the US, and Sweden to demonstrate that, like other essential domains, Academia can be exploited by foreign actors.

The report is implemented with the support of the National Endowment for Democracy and the US Embassy in Tbilisi, in cooperation with the Central European Institute of Asian Studies.

Report ?