Shifting Expectations Regarding Glasnost’ and Perestroika in Georgian Print Media

Abstract

Since the declaration of Soviet Perestroika and Glasnost (Перестройка и Гласность) in the second half of the 1980s, this Soviet ideological product has been continuously studied in both the West and the post-Soviet space. On an international level, Glasnost (openness), a key constituent of Perestroika, is treated as the most vivid example of the media model of change and development.

Without studying the Georgian periodicals from this point in history, meaning the second half of the 1980s, it is impossible to analyze the incremental development of the media in the era of independence, and to paint a picture drawing on historical context, to explain interdependence and cause and effect relationships, and to systematize empiric knowledge.

This paper seeks to examine and systemize growing expectation-related sentiments as a result of declared Glasnost (openness), transformation of editorial policy, and qualitatively modified communication in the periodicals from the second half of the 1980s. The paper offers a review of a particular section from a vast study/thesis, Refraction of the Concept of Perestroika and Glasnost
in the Georgian Print Media, which refers to the significance of Perestroika and Glasnost for a specific artistic social strata, those engaged in the areas of literature and cinema, also reflecting their changing expectations and the confirmed results of Perestroika and Glasnost as a means for enhanced opportunities.