A criminology of the postsocialist East: State-corporate harm in Georgia

Konstantine Eristavi

doi:10.35295/osls.iisl.2463

Authors

Konstantine Eristavi Georgian Institute of Public Affairs (GIPA) https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8269-9844

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.35295/osls.iisl.2463

Keywords:

Global East, regimes of permission, state-corporate crime, critical criminology, Georgia

Abstract

This article critically engages with recent calls for a Global East criminology that highlight the marginalisation of East-Central Europe and Eurasia (ECEE) in criminological knowledge production. It argues that a focus on epistemological exclusion should not obscure the unequal integration of ex-socialist states into the global economy and the inequalities this generates within and between them. Bringing postsocialism into conversation with recent critical criminological accounts of neo-colonialism, the article shows how criminological inquiry in and from the East can illuminate the mechanisms and violent consequences of the global system of capital accumulation. Using the case of Georgia — and the mining town of Chiatura — it demonstrates how neoliberal restructuring, anti-communist ideology, and the selective reappropriation of socialist legacies combine to enable the state-corporate co-production of crime and harm in a postsocialist setting.

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