Evaluation of the pre-election environment for the 2020 Parliamentary elections
This report evaluates the political and media landscape in the country ahead of the 2020 Parliamentary elections. Although the adoption of constitutional amendments on the electoral system avoided further tension and protests, political polarization remains as a challenge. The media environment, as well as political environment, is very polarized and continues to face challenges related […]
Evaluation of the pre-election environment for the 2020 Parliamentary elections
On October 31, 2020, regularly scheduled parliamentary elections will be held in Georgia. On June 1, the International Society for Fair Elections and Democracy (ISFED) launched nationwide monitoring of the pre-election period with approximately 70 long-term observers. The monitoring entails observation of the pre-election period, the Election Day and the post-election period. Along with the […]
2020 Parliamentary elections – first interim report of pre-election monitoring
The International Society for Fair Elections and Democracy has been monitoring pre-election period of the October 31, 2020 Parliamentary Elections of Georgia since June 1. The monitoring is implemented with support of the United States Agency for International Development and the EU. The first interim report of the pre-election monitoring mostly covers the period from […]
Georgian CSOs call on Facebook to improve ad transparency
Today, nearly 50 Georgian CSOs and media outlets issued an open letter to Facebook urging the social media giant to promptly launch Political Ad Library and introduce other measures for increased ad transparency and countering disinformation ahead of the 2020 parliamentary elections in Georgia. The letter addressed to Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg and […]
ISFED uncovers further false media pages that survived the Facebook takedown
In April 2020, Facebook removed 943 pages, profiles, groups and Instagram accounts engaged in domestic political campaigns in Georgia, for coordinated inauthentic behavior. Among them was a network of false media pages identified by ISFED. The primary tactic of false media pages removed in April was sharing of posts in public and private groups through the use of Facebook […]
Policy Alert # 2 – Electoral system agreement should be implemented without further delay
Image source: Thiago B Trevisan/Shutterstock Five months before the 2020 Parliamentary Elections in Georgia, there is still uncertainty over the electoral system under which these elections will take place. While a breakthrough agreement about the system was reached on March 8, 2020, the Coronavirus pandemic and subsequent state of emergency has halted the process […]
Georgia’s electoral system agreement should be implemented without further delay
COVID-19 and the subsequent state of emergency has halted the process of constitutional amendments to introduce a new mixed electoral system ahead of the 2020 Parliamentary election in Georgia. However, now that the state of emergency has been lifted and some of the opposition leaders have been released, which was an important condition of the […]
Fake accounts of Russian news outlet involved in supporting state agencies
On May 1, the International Society for Fair Elections and Democracy (ISFED) published its report on organized information operations by Kremlist news agency News-Front in the Georgian Facebook space. Facebook removed the global inauthentic network of News-Front from its platform on April 30. Along with the official News-Front Facebook page in Georgia, profiles of 12 inauthentic accounts […]
Russian information operation encourages political polarization in Georgia
On April 30, 2020 Facebook removed from its platform Kremlin’s propagandistic information agency News-Front’s pages in Georgian and other languages that they used in various countries. As part of its social media monitoring, the International Society for Fair Elections and Democracy (ISFED) was studying News-Front Georgia and Facebook accounts connected to it since November, 2019. […]
Coordinated domestic network of false media pages on Facebook operating with political intentions
As the parliamentary election date gets closer, waves of disinformation and discrediting content intensifies both from Russian and domestic sources. It is likely that the coronavirus pandemic has caused early activation of the infrastructure created for exerting information influence on election processes. Consequently, a high level of activity of coordinated Facebook pages, groups and accounts […]