TBILISI, December 8 – Georgia’s ruling party is celebrating a rare piece of praise from Europe this week after a new EU-funded study placed the country among the top performers in long-term reduction of elite economic dominance.
The report, released by the European Center for Anti-Corruption and State-Building Studies, covers 41 European Union members, candidate countries and associated states. It evaluates how concentrated national wealth has become and how that concentration has shifted over the past decade. According to the Georgian government, the study shows that since 2012 the country has recorded one of the strongest improvements in Europe.
Researchers built two indicators to capture long-term changes in ‘oligarchic influence,’ as the researchers call it. The first, described as the baseline index, measures how the share of national wealth held by the richest 1 percent has changed over ten years. The second is a corrected index that adjusts the baseline result for broader economic well-being and income inequality trends from 2013 to 2023.
On the baseline measure, Georgia ranks third in Europe behind Ireland and the Netherlands. The improvement places Georgia among only 15 countries that recorded a positive shift since 2012. In contrast, the baseline index deteriorated in 20 EU and Schengen states, including France, Germany, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Finland, Denmark, Austria, Estonia, Latvia, Poland and Greece. The report stresses that in most European countries wealth concentration has increased, not decreased.
The corrected index produces an even stronger relative outcome for Georgia. When factoring in shifts in inequality and economic welfare, Georgia rises to second place in Europe, again behind Ireland. The study notes that the corrected score worsened in 17 countries across the continent, reinforcing the country’s unusual upward trajectory.
The ruling Georgian Dream (GD) party has moved quickly to publicize the findings. The government’s summary highlights passages in the study that acknowledge a risk factor: Georgia’s wealthiest individual is a supporter of the ruling party. Even so, the authors conclude that actual measurable trends point toward reduced oligarchic concentration over the long term.
The government’s emphasis on the rankings comes at a time when local politics is heavily polarized, especially around accusations that the country remains dependent on powerful unelected figures. Opposition parties and several watchdog groups have argued that Georgia’s political environment does not reflect a meaningful reduction in the influence of oligarchs. The new report does not address political dynamics directly. Its indicators examine only wealth distribution patterns, not political influence or regulatory power.
Even so, the findings are likely to become part of Georgia’s ongoing argument with Brussels over democratic standards. EU institutions have pressed Georgia for years to adopt clearer anti-corruption safeguards and to reduce the role of powerful individuals in shaping public institutions. The study, commissioned by the European Commission’s research and innovation program, now provides the government with an EU-funded dataset suggesting improvement in one part of the broader anti-corruption landscape.
The methodology is straightforward. The baseline index measures changes in the relative strength of the country’s richest 1 percent and offers a 10-year view of whether wealth has become more concentrated or more dispersed. The corrected index then adjusts these results to reflect shifts in inequality and economic welfare over the same period. According to the documentation, this creates a more complete picture of long-term tendencies rather than short-term political swings.
The study’s online publication includes an overview of all 41 countries and emphasizes that oligarchic risk takes different forms across Europe. Some states showed worsening concentration despite high GDP growth, while others improved even without sweeping structural reforms. Georgia’s upward movement is described as rare among developing and middle-income economies.
