This book details how small, rural communities in Georgia have successfully opposed the development of large-scale hydropower projects.

The dissertation examines the Namakhvani, Khudoni, and Nenskra hydropower plants (HPPs) in Svaneti and Racha/Imereti, detailing the international, national, and local politics that have shaped efforts to build and oppose these projects. These projects are internationally funded and have been supported by multiple governments. This should, in theory, create a significant power imbalance between those advocating for the development of the HPPs and those opposing them. However, local communities have proven resilient to the development in numerous ways.

By taking a multi-tiered approach to explaining events, this dissertation provides insight into the institutional and social dimensions of conceptualisations of ‘power.ʼ Mapping the institutional machinations of development and the political justifications for these projects exposes the limitations of these frameworks. Thus, this manuscript employs ethnographic research in conjunction with interviews conducted at local, national, and international levels to examine how small village communities have managed to obstruct and stall the development process.

The book operationalises concepts such as collective memory, sense of place, and local social structures to explain community success. In a broader context, this illustrates the limitations of political writings on Georgia (and similar countries), which often rely on grand narratives and easily accessible information to explain events and geopolitical power. By taking a bottom-up approach, the agency and power of local communities—despite a significant imbalance in resource-based power—are highlighted, raising questions about the capacity of existing paradigms to fully grasp political conceptualisations of power in a global context.