Following up on the systemic mapping report of national responses to hate speech in Georgia, some 25 participants took part in a roundtable which focused on the role of awareness-raising, counter-speech and education in combatting hate speech. The round table in Tbilisi gathered representatives of the Public Defender’s office, Prosecutor’s office, Central election commission, education and training practitioners, various human rights and minority civil society organisations to exchange views about the recommendations and ways forward proposed by the mapping report. 

The systemic mapping of national responses to hate speech in Georgia shows that the primary source of discrimination and hate speech is the lack of respect for fundamental rights, the principles of equality, lack of respect for diversity, deeply rooted stereotypes, misinformation, and related factors. The Georgian legislation ensures that the learning environment in public schools shall be non-discriminatory and religiously neutral. Despite this, the stakeholders participating in the mapping process raise concerns about frequent violations of these principles and the stereotypical perceptions held by public-school teachers. 

The participants discussed on ways how Georgian stakeholders can apply awareness-raising, counter and alternative narratives, media literacy and education to combat hate speech and intolerance. The key to addressing hate speech is that all stakeholders - government, media, and civil society - should take their part of the responsibility and unite efforts to spread counter speech, fight misinformation, raise awareness among the population and implement joint educational activities.

This activity was implemented in the framework of the regional project “Strengthening the access to justice through non-judiciary redress mechanisms for victims of discrimination, hate crime and hate speech in Eastern Partnership countries” in the framework of the Council of Europe/European Union Partnership for Good Governance – phase II.