The social and political position of the…

The social and political position of the Georgian nobility, for centuries the foundation of Georgian society, had deteriorated by 1850.

A new worker class begins to exert social pressure in Georgian population centers.

Because the nobility still represent Georgian national interests, its decline means that the
Armenian merchant class, which has been a constructive part of urban life since the Middle Ages, gains greater economic power within Georgia.

At the same time, Russian political hegemony over the Caucasus now goes unopposed by Georgians.

In response to these conditions, Georgian intellectuals borrow the thinking of Russian and West European political philosophers, forging a variety of theoretical salvations for Georgian
nationalism that have little relation to the changing economic conditions of the Georgian people.