Die Macht der Stigmatisierung: Wie das georgische „Agentengesetz“ – und andere Gesetze dieser Art – der Demokratie schaden können

[SS from essay by Maxim Krupskiy, human rights lawyer and analyst focused on foreign-agent legislation and was previously the Galina Starovoitova Fellow on Human Rights and Conflict Resolution at the Wilson Center.]

In May, the Georgian parliament passed a “transparency of foreign influence” law amid large-scale protests. The new legislation requires Georgian media and nongovernmental organizations that receive more than 20 percent of their annual funding from abroad to register with the state as entities “pursuing the interest of a foreign power.” The law has met with intense criticism, spurring tens of thousands of Georgians to take to the streets. Opponents of the law—including Georgian President Salome Zourabichvili, who had attempted to veto it—have called it the “Russia law” for its similarity to the Kremlin’s legislation targeting so-called foreign agents. Since 2012, Moscow has used its own foreign-agent legislation to persecute independent NGOs, media outlets, and citizens who criticize the Russian government’s policies, and many Georgian civil society leaders view the new law as a threat to civil rights and an obstacle to Georgia’s prospects for joining the European Union.

In and of themselves, laws to monitor and prevent harmful foreign influence are not antidemocratic. Indeed, laws that curb covert, destructive interference in domestic politics can act as vital mechanisms to ensure the resilience of democracies. Australia, the United Kingdom, and the [United States](https://www.foreignaffairs.com/regions/united-states), for instance, all have well-designed foreign-agent laws that do not provoke public backlash or prevent freedom of association. The problem arises when states exploit vaguely worded legislation to stigmatize dissent and violate human rights. Foreign-agent laws are especially dangerous in the hands of antidemocratic regimes, which use them to suppress criticism and stifle civil society, primarily NGOs and independent media.