Social Policy in Greece in the Interwar Period: Events, Conflicts, and Conceptual Transformations

Abstract

1. George Nikolaidis[1][1] 2. Spyros Sakellaropoulos[2][2] 1. 1Institute of Child Health, Athens, Greece 2. 2Panteion University, Athens, Greece 1. Spyros Sakellaropoulos, Department of Social Policy, Panteion University, Leoforos Syggroy 136, Athens 17671, Greece Email: sgsakell{at}vivodinet.gr This study gives an outline—by period—of the most basic social policy measures and health and welfare programs of the Venizelist political center. The periodization involves a breakdown of the above-mentioned policy into three separate phases whose distinguishing characteristics are then outlined—namely, the first period from 1910 to 1916 where the predominant feature is the attempt to develop a range of structures and services that might begin to try to cover the growing needs of the population of a geographically expanding Greece. In the second period between 1918 and 1920, this expansionist strategy of the social state would come to be regarded as too advanced by the Venizelist center itself, and on the basis of forms of social and political expression, including some previously developed inside the working class, attempts would be made to roll it back. In the third period between the years 1928 and 1932, which was to be marked by a greater sharpening of social conflict, the politics of the Liberals were to involve endeavors to carry out bourgeois modernization as a counter to the social crisis, efforts conducted in a spirit of pragmatism in a situation where a whole array of economic, social, and political parameters were limiting the potential for promoting implementable policy measures at that time. Moreover, in this final phase, all such social policy measures were characterized by obvious efforts to manipulate and control the political and social forms of organization of the popular classes. Starting from the above considerations, our analysis seeks to distinguish itself from views particularly prevalent among Greek politicians even today, as well as among sections of the electorate, that portray Venizelos as a representative of advanced social radicalism. But we also distinguish ourselves from those who regard him as an exponent of bourgeois modernization. Whereas the former view perceives Venizelos’ policies as part of a continuous linear course toward progress, the latter sees everything as the outcome of a bourgeois class strategy for modernization of economic and social processes. Both stances suffer from an inability to comprehend that social evolution develops unevenly, and above all is the product of social balances of forces that are overturned, modified, and transformed. [1]: #aff-1 [2]: #aff-2