Was just looking through Social Science in Caucasus and found links to two Georgian blogs I had never encountered before — We — Georgians, and Writern. The first is particularly interesting in terms of diversity, and posts are in English and Georgian. In addition to carrying details of the iPod Purchasing Power Parity Index I posted about here, it also contains some other interesting snippets of information.

For example, despite having far lower internet costs in Georgia, the number of users is lower than Armenia. There, only 3.75 out of 100 people use the Internet whereas it is 5.03 out of 100 here in Armenia. That puts Georgia at 138th place in terms of global Internet use, and Armenia at 124th. However, Azerbaijan leads the way with 18.4 per 100 and a ranking of 85th place. The same blog also reports that Playboy will soon start publishing in Georgian.

As media.ge reports Georgia will become third country in the CIS where “Playboy” Magazine will be published. Monthly circulation will be 15 thousand and magazine will cost 5 GEL.

Well, Georgians are more free and liberal in such matters than Armenians and Azerbaijanis, but its interesting to consider that there’s apparently a market for such a publication with a cover price of $2.5. Although there’s no shortage of cheap former Soviet soft porn availale at almost every streetside newspaper kiosk, Armenian attempts at producing localized copies of Men’s Magazines from abroad tend to fail if they challenge local culture and mentality too much.

This point about local mentality is also picked up on in a comparison of the capital cities of the three South Caucasus Republics. Social Science in the Caucasus details the general findings of the report written by an Armenian academic using data from Caucasus Resource Research Centers in all three countries. The results are not so surprising, but do at least offer supporting material to known stereotypes.

By analyzing the regional CRRC Data Initiative (DI) 2004 database, Manukyan constructed several typologies of SC capitals’ societies and used mathematical methods to explain the socioeconomic, political, demographic and cultural trends in the region. For instance, he introduced the term “traditionality index,” which is a function of various elements of social behavior. Among other results, he found that men and women in Tbilisi had the most liberal behavior, followed by Yerevan; and that people were most conservative (traditional) in Baku. […] In his 150-page report the researcher developed tools (indices) to measure how the three South Caucasus capitals follow specific patterns in terms of freedom of behavior, as well as the level of tolerance both within and across societies.

Actually, I remember talking to Tom de Waal and Wendell Stephenson about this a few years ago in Stepanakert. Asked what they thought of the three South Caucasus Republics they said that Georgia was more like Europe, Azerbaijan was more like Central Asia, and Armenia was somewhere in between. I pretty much agree with that although I’ve not been to Azerbaijan, of course, and I certainly think that this will be the model followed in terms of democratization.

A Fistful of Euros also recently tried to answer this question.

[…] there are various definitions, and all of them leave a lot of people uncomfortable. There’s general agreement that the northern Caucasus is part of Europe — geographically, anyway — but the southern half of the big isthmus, well, hum.

The discussion gets a little fraught because if the countries of the South Caucasus, Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan, are geographically part of Europe, then they might have a claim to be EU candidates some day. Which at least two of them would really, really like.

Let’s put that aside for the moment. Is Georgia part of Europe? Armenia? They’re in Eurovision, of course, but so are Cyprus and Israel. And they’re in UEFA, but so are Turkey and Kazakhstan.

As does Breed, although focusing on Georgia.

Just a quick note from the front lines of wannabe-Europa today; I thought I’d point out two of the brighter lines between Europe (and by this I mean “civilization”) and the Former Soviet Union. […] And I’m not talking about borderline (or, more appropriately, basket) cases like Azerbaijan that hold themselves out as “europeanizing” but when asked to explain any generally backwards facet of their life, they attribute it to their “Asian mentality.” Like the Japanese or the Koreans, who also can’t come to work on time… Oh, wait, that was… NOT those Asians.

No, I’m talking about places like Georgia, which like to think of themselves as part of Europe. I mean, if Romania and Albania can aspire, why not Georgia? And I’ll admit, they’re close. So close. But that Soviet influence lingers. Like that little kid who got molested by his uncle, .. wait, bad metaphor. Anyway, post-Soviet states.

[…]

1) Stamps. People, people, people. Europeans do not use stamps. Americans do not use stamps. This is worse than phone syndrome (everyone in the former Soviet states with any power over any other poor post-Soviet fucker has a telephone; the number of telephones increases as does the power over others. So you’ll get folks with five or six phones on their desk, four of which are visibly connected to exactly nothing). Enough with the stamps, already. We’re laughing at you. You might as well have t-shirts that say “I was molested by Moscow for 70 years and all I got was electrification and these stupid stamps.” Enough already. Nobody wants to see the scar tissue on your ass.

Anyway, I’d like to find more Georgian, and also Azerbaijani, blogs, so if you know of any, please post links in the comments section of this post. I’ll attempt to start irregular blog roundups from all three South Caucasus republics just because. Let’s face it, we don’t know much about each other, but in the interest of inevitable regional integration, we should at least start.