Democracy In Greece Research Articles

A Comparative Study of Democracy in Greece, Spain, and Korea from the Perspective of Transitology - An Exploratory Study on the Correlation Between Consolidation of Democracy and Measures of Transitional Justice

A Comparative Study of Democracy in Greece, Spain, and Korea from the Perspective of Transitology - An Exploratory Study on the Correlation Between Consolidation of Democracy and Measures of Transitional Justice

A Multiple Regression Model On The Relationship Between Deliberative Democracy And Political Equity: The Cases Of Greece And Turkey

This article presents a multiple regression model in which the effect of the political equality index on the quality of deliberative democracy in Greece and Turkey is investigated. The data was drawn from the V-Dem (Varieties of Democracy) database which was announced in March 2024. As far as Greece is concerned, the final conclusions of the research include the positive effect of increasing the participation of women and LGBTI people on the index of deliberative democracy. Also, an interesting finding is the fact of the absence of importance of the participation of individuals in primary and secondary education in deliberative democracy, a fact that may be linked to the discredit of the Greek school. As far as Turkey in concerned, there is a negative relationship between the participation of citizens in tertiary education, as well as a negative relationship between the distribution of power by sexual orientation and deliberative democracy index. Finally, the participation of citizens in primary education has a positive coefficient and is highly statistically significant.

“Fascism Can Only Grow in Secrecy”: Greek and Yugoslavian Anti-Fascism in Melbourne’s “Long 1960s”

Studies of post-war anti-fascism in Australia have recently generated new insights into the continuities and transformations of post-war fascist and anti-fascist organisations. However, despite this upsurge in scholarship, the 1960s remain neglected. This article revises this absence through a case study of the Committee for the Restoration of Democracy in Greece (CRDG), the Yugoslav Settlers’ Organisation (YSA), and its successor, The Committee for Democracy in Australia (CDA). It draws on press reports, left-wing publications, and security files to suggest the anti-fascisms of Melbourne in the 1960s were influenced by a parallel politics of anti-imperialism. It shows how both organisations were influenced by the historical experience of resisting fascism, particularly the concept of a “united front” that facilitated a pan-left struggle against fascism and wider systems of oppression and domination. In doing so, this article contributes to the growing historiography on varieties of anti-fascism and their overlap with related emancipation movements.

RENEWAL OF THE GREEK ILLUSTRATED CHILDREN’S BOOK DURING THE METAPOLITEFSI

With the restoration of democracy in Greece in 1974 a period of transition began, known as metapolitefsi, which saw deep political, social and economic changes. Progressive developments also occurred in art, culture and education. The rules of the new pedagogy affected the field of literature and more specifically children’s illustrated books. Thus, writers departed from the old conservative models, dominated by protectionism and superficial idealism. Instead, they introduced political, social and environmental concerns, while the language became friendlier and modern. At the same time, illustrators such as Kyritsopoulos, Zarampouka, Fakinou, Maroulakis, Psaraki a.s.o., begin to move away from the dry literalness and naive realism of most of their predecessors. They draw on a wide range of sources, from cartoons to abstraction and from Art Nouveau to Pop Art, they experiment with techniques never before used in Greek book illustration, and use innovative symbolism to convey textual meanings. Their style becomes intimate, imaginative and humorous. Pictures are no longer a merely decorative accompaniment to the text which is particularly important. They often cover the entire surface of the page, and play a decisive role in the development of the story. In short, they become central to the experience of the book. It is no coincidence that the young illustrators of the 70s and 80s often wrote their own texts. Typography, too, escapes from strict rules. Handwritten lettering, previously unheard of in Greek books, is often used on covers and title pages. Overall, during the early years of the Greek metapolitefsi, children’s illustrated books changed radically and caught up with international developments. The predictable layout and obvious didacticism of previous decades, especially during the military junta (1967-1974), gave way to sophistication, sensitivity and wit, fresh and intelligent ways of introducing children to real-life social and ethical issues.

Involuntary psychiatric hospitalizations in Greece: Contemporary research and policy implications.

Involuntary psychiatric hospitalization is a contested issue in mental health care provision. Despite indications of very high rates of involuntary hospitalizations in Greece, no valid national statistical data has been collected. After reviewing current research on involuntary hospitalizations in Greece, the paper introduces the Study of Involuntary Hospitalizations in Greece (MANE), a multi-centre national study of the rates, process, determinants and outcome of involuntary hospitalizations, conducted in the regions of Attica, Thessaloniki and Alexandroupolis, from 2017 to 2020, and presents some preliminary comparative findings regarding the rates and process of involuntary hospitalizations. There is a major difference in the rates of involuntary hospitalizations between Alexandroupolis (around 25%) and Athens and Thessaloniki (over 50%), that is possibly related to the sectorized organization of mental health services in Alexandroupolis and to the benefits of not covering a metropolitan urban area. There is a significantly larger percentage of involuntary admissions that end in involuntary hospitalization in Attica and Thessaloniki compared to Alexandroupolis. Reversely, of those accessing the emergency departments voluntarily, almost everyone is admitted in Athens, while large percentages are not admitted in Thessaloniki and in Alexandroupolis. A significantly higher percentage of patients were formally referred upon discharge in Alexandroupolis compared to Athens and Thessaloniki. This may be due to increased continuity of care in Alexandroupolis and that might explain the low rates of involuntary hospitalization there. Finally, re-hospitalization rates were very high in all the study centers, demonstrating the revolving-door phenomenon, especially for voluntary hospitalizations. The MANE project came to address the gap in national recording of involuntary hospitalizations, by implementing, for the first time, a coordinated monitoring of involuntary hospitalizations in three regions of the country with different characteristics, so that a picture of involuntary hospitalizations can be drawn at national level. The project contributes to raising awareness of this issue at the level of national health policy and to formulating strategic goals to address the problem of violation of human rights and to promote mental health democracy in Greece.

Voting turnout in Greece: expressive or instrumental?

The study analyses the micro-level determinants of voting turnout rates in Greece. In particular, we test for the effects of citizens’ socio-economic features, political participation, activism and trust as pointing to either an expressive or instrumental voting decision process. The analysis involves bootstrap logistic regression techniques and ESS data covering the 2002-2011 period. Evidence is found of instrumental voting in Greece as suggested by the effects of absolute and relative income and the effect of civic participation and trust variables. In addition, the profile of voters is differentiated in the pre- and during the crisis periods. The study makes a twofold contribution. First, the suggested analysis is unique for Greece, and thus it provides important information regarding citizens’ motives towards electoral participation. The second contribution relates to the study’s relevance to policy analysis and design. Results suggest that not only ideology but also the economic agenda might be an important predictor of electoral participation and consequently, legitimization and the quality of democracy in Greece.

GREECE: A EUROPEAN MECHANISM OF THE EXIT FROM THE CRISIS

Historical aspects of the creation of European countries of the integration association − the EU are highlighted. Historical stages and reformation of the accession of the Greek economy to the EU are estimated. After the restoration of the democracy in Greece, the negotiations about its accession, which lasted three years (July 1976 − May 1979), were intensified again. January 1, 1981, Greece joined the European Community. Since the country’s accession to the EU in 1981, GDP has grown substantially. Considering the level of inflation before and after the accession of Greece to the EU, by 1981, the inflation rate was gradually increasing, and after accession, particular in 2002, the inflation rate stabilized when Greece fully implemented the euro. Despite the GDP growth, the decline of the level of inflation, the Greek government carried out a thoughtless populist policy, spending huge loans from the IMF on social welfare of the population. While the national industry required significant investments. That’s why it’s not surprising that, since 1981, Greece’s national products turned out to be uncompetitive with European analogs in the context of liberalization of foreign trade, and its negative foreign trade balance more increased. Although the amount of export and import of goods and services at current prices between Greece and countries of the EU increased. The decrease of labor productivity, lack of modernization measures of agriculture as a priority sector in Greece led to an increase in the budget deficit and the debt load of the Greek economy. In 2008, government revenues declined even more, which led to bankruptcy of enterprises and a large reduction of employees. Also the macrofinancial assistance to Greece over 2010−2018 for the sum of 288.7 billion euros for the exit from the debt crisis is considered. The implementation of three macrofinancial assistance programs required the Greek government to implement a series of reforms that should reduce the debt deficit and debt load. The last effects of loans of the IMF and the European Stabilization Mechanism are evaluated.

‘Communists are no Beasts’: European Solidarity Campaigns on Behalf of Democracy and Human Rights in Greece and East–West Détente in the 1960s and Early 1970s

Ever since the collapse of the Greek military regime in 1974 European campaigns over human rights and democracy in Greece have been commonly understood within an anti-totalitarian narrative that has celebrated resistance against both communist dictatorship and right-wing authoritarianism as part of a common journey towards a democratic continent. This article analyses the little-studied history of European solidarity movements with Greece during the 1960s and early 1970s that stretched across both the West and East of the continent. In so doing, it suggests that these campaigns were a facet of the politics of détente and rapprochement that brought together Western and Eastern Europe. Communist peace movements played a central role in these human rights campaigns. This was far from a common anti-totalitarian movement; rather, campaigns for Greece were enmeshed within movements that worked on a wide range of issues – from support for Eastern European dissidents and anti-fascism to world peace and protest against the Vietnam War. Nor were they about ‘a return to Europe’: above all they thrived on common connections in East and West with the Third World.

Participation, Competition, and the Quality of Democracy in Greece

This essay assesses participation and competition in the quality of democracy in Greece. Theoretically, the quality of democracy is assessed in three interrelated dimensions: procedure, result, and content. Procedure encompasses the character and working of the environment in which governance takes place, and it is assessed through the rule of law, accountability, and participation and competition. Result refers to the overall quality of government performance and citizen satisfaction. Content involves the quality of the substance of governance. Using diverse indices and quantitative data, the essay assesses the participation and competition dimensions of the quality of democracy in post-1974 Greece. It concludes that the country's quality of democracy is fair but in need of improvement.

The impact of 'Anti-Political' Parties after the Restoration of Democracy in Greece and the Challenge of Confronting the Crisis

There have been almost 40 years after the restoration of democracy in Greece and a peculiar prosperity, which was consciously cultivated by the leaders of political and economic elites, was promoted before the onset of the financial crisis. However, from the beginning of the financial recession, the temporal illusions have been revealed and the need of a complete transformation of the financial policies has been expressed, while a significant transformation of the entire political culture has started. Parties such as SYRIZA, Independent Greeks(ANEL) and Golden Dawn took advantage of the growing social discontent by propagating themselves as exponents of ordinary people and of their concerns or their fears, as the expression of resistance against an avoidable sellout of public values. However, crisis has exposed a number of successive truths which were elaborately hiding in the underbelly of the detaining political and socioeconomic system. These truths were exteriorized once it became clear that the foundations on which the Greek society was based after the restoration of democracy, were weak and insufficient to lead country towards a modern future.

Connecting work identity and politics in the internationalism of ‘seafarers … who share the seas’

‘We seafarers … who share the seas’ is the expression of a collective identity and mutual responsibility. This article examines that collective identity among members of the Seamen’s Union of Australia and asks, what did internationalism mean in practice to seafarers themselves? Employing an oral history method, coupled with a reading of the union’s own printed media, it explores the seafarers’ understanding of internationalism that they claimed was ‘the language of seafarers’. It was grounded in the nature and reality of their work, and became their politics. The article takes as a case study the campaigns to restore democracy in Greece and Chile after military coups in 1967 and 1973 respectively, and the longer campaign against apartheid in South Africa, which began earlier, before 1960, and ended later, in 1990. These campaigns were conducted alongside many other trade unions, both in Australia and overseas, but maritime workers brought a unique inflection to activism as their internationalism expressed their connectedness across the oceans on which they sailed.

Civil Liberties and Rights, Equality and the Quality of Democracy in Greece

This article assesses the content quality of democracy in Greece. Theoretically, the quality of democracy is assessed in three different but interrelated dimensions: procedure, result, and content. Procedure is about the character and workings of the environment in which governance takes place; result refers to the overall quality of government performance and citizen satisfaction; and content involves the quality of the substance of governance, and it is gauged through two variables: freedom and equality. Freedom involves political, civil, and socioeconomic rights, including speech, property, and social protection. Equality is about prohibition of discrimination on the basis of gender, ethnicity, race, political orientation, or other extraneous conditions. Using various indices as well as more substantive information, the essay assesses the content dimension of the quality of democracy in post-1974 Greece. The study concludes that the country’s quality of democracy is fair, but is in need of improvement.

Change and Continuity: Comparing the Metaxas Dictatorship and the Colonels' Junta in Greece

A comparison between the two dictatorships of Greece in the twentieth century (the 4th of August regime of 1936–41 and the Colonels' dictatorship of 1967–74) cannot be fruitful if it is static. One cannot understand the nature of these two regimes without studying the years that separated them. This period oscillated between Venizelism and anti-Venizelism and was characterized by the ideological struggle between capitalism and communism of the Cold War prior to the restoration of democracy in Greece in 1974. A look at these years reveals interesting insights into the legacies and the continuities of Greek society in the twentieth century.

About Political Change in Greece

There have been almost 40 years after the restoration of democracy in Greece and a peculiar prosperity, which was consciously cultivated by the leaders of political and economic elites, was promoted before the onset of the financial crisis. However, from the beginning of the financial recession, the temporal illusions have been revealed and the need of a complete transformation of the financial policies has been expressed, while a significant transformation of the entire political culture has started. Parties such as SYRIZA, Independent Greeks (ANEL) and Golden Dawn took advantage of the growing social discontent by propagating their selves as exponents of ordinary people and of their concerns or their fears, as the expression of resistance against an avoidable sellout of public values. However, crisis has exposed a number of successive truths which were elaborately hiding in the underbelly of the detaining political and socioeconomic system. These truths were exteriorized once it became clear that the foundations on which the Greek society was based after the restoration of democracy, were weak and insufficient to guide the country’s way towards a modern future.

Tsipras and the Rhetorical Speech as Policy

It is the first time after the restoration of democracy in Greece that such a U-turn has been conducted. The radical, unconventional and extreme rhetoric against harsh austeritywas sharply transformed into a tactical retreat in order to supposedly support more effectively the public interest. SYRIZA, a heterogeneous alloy of leftist tendencies, treated the popular anger and resentment towards harsher austerity measures in order to achieve electoral rise. Consequently, it was rapidly transformed from a small – protest – party into a power party. In this instance, it transformed, without moral curb, citizens’ despair into an extreme rhetoric which defended their “rights” in order to rise to power. Namely, SYRIZA treated instrumentally the expectations of the desperate as a means to rise to power in order to benefit the party but not for the whole society.

Transnational militancy in Cold-War Europe: gender, human rights, and the WIDF during the Greek Civil War

This paper examines the involvement of the Women’s International Democratic Federation (WIDF) in the politics of the Greek Civil War (1946–1949). The article’s specific focus is on the organisation’s international campaigns for the end of state-sanctioned persecution of leftists, especially women, and the re-instatement of democracy in Greece, utilising the expanding human-rights system at the United Nations. It draws on selected WIDF and United Nations (UN) documents, in addition to primary and secondary materials relating to the cold war and the Greek Civil War.

Easy Come, Easy Go? Economic Performance and Satisfaction with Democracy in Southern Europe in the Last Three Decades

In the literature on political support, much empirical effort has been devoted to the link between economic performance and satisfaction with democracy. Nevertheless, analyses are often inconclusive in their findings. This study tries to renew the interest in the topic by using multilevel models to analyse 108 surveys from the repeated cross-sectional Eurobarometer data between 1985 and 2013, and focuses on southern European countries which share political and economic characteristics. Thus, the article links economic trends to changes in satisfaction with democracy in Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain, also emphasizing the relevance of transformations in their political systems. The results demonstrate that low economic performance seems to negatively affect citizens’ satisfaction with democracy in the four countries and across the whole period analysed. This also holds true for different model specifications and when other potential factors such as the format and the performance of the institutional context are controlled for. By providing empirical evidence based on a longitudinal analysis, this article contributes to the wider debate on how economic conditions influence opinions about democracy.

Accountability and the Quality of Democracy in Greece

This essay explores and assesses the connection between accountability and the quality of democracy in modern Greece along three key dimensions: vertical, horizontal, and social. Vertical involves elected officials and the three branches of government; horizontal deals with the nonelected arms of government and bureaucratic agencies; and social addresses civil society, the mass media, and nongovernmental organizations. Examination and analysis of the relevant data indicate that the state of accountability in Greece is weak in all three dimensions, and a host of structural, social, and attitudinal factors contributes to this weakness. Accountability problems undermine the quality of democracy. The essay expresses hope that reforms initiated under pressure from the European Union eventually would strengthen accountability and Greece's quality of democracy.

A Constitutional Discussion of Participatory Democracy in Greece

A high level of mistrust toward institutions of representative democracy occurs within Greece, dramatically increasing in recent years. As indicated in the 2013 European Commission’s Standard Eurobarometers, the tendency to trust the Parliament has reached 10-12%, while the respective percentage of trust toward the government is only 9-10%. Unavoidably, the severe economic crisis in Greece and its consequences have influenced the country’s citizenry.

Ley y democracia en la era del terrorismo

Gradually, the law and state are funcional to defend the interest of status quo. We believed having seen anything before the disaster of Nuremberg, but we were wrong. Even United State defended racism inner-ward at time this power expanded the discourse of democracy beyond its boundaries. We strongly believe not only that the law is determined by economy but also the right paves the way for the upsurge of dictatorship. Whether the old democracy in Greece encouraged the possibility to derogate an unfair law if necessary, the Anglo democracy (functional to capitalism) today recycles sites and states in order to install a regime of consumption where the gap between representants and citizens are shortened. As a result of this, the capital plays a pivotal role in configuring the tenets of dictatorship beyond its veil of liberty.