On September 11-12, 2019 Tbilisi and Gori Democracy Schools of Eastern European Centre for Multiparty Democracy (EECMD) hosted Dr. Will Derks, External Advisor at Netherland’s Institute of Multiparty Democracy (NIMD).

During his lecture in Tbilisi Dr. Derks talked about the end of a nation-state.Topics covered included: the role of representative democracy, political parties and ‘social contract’ for modern nation-states; the importance of digital technologies and innovation in the process of political transformation; post-national forms of democracy and alternative models of citizenship.

While the lecture delivered at Gori Democracy School – ‘’Innovating Democracy; Possibilities for Strengthening a Political System under Siege” concentrated mainly on the challenges and problems of modern democracies, as well as initiatives and solutions to tackle those problems.

It is worth mentioning, that both meetings were public, letting all the interested stakeholders deepen their knowledge about democracy and politics and sharing the experience of a Dutch expert of the field.

Besides Democracy Schools in Tbilisi and Gori, Dr. Derks visited Democracy Schools in Lviv and Odessa as well. All the lectures were followed by interactive and heated discussions, once again highlighting the importance of above-mentioned topics.