This volume provides an overview of the history of Greece, while also focusing on contemporary Greece. Coverage includes such 21st-century challenges as the economic crisis and the influx of immigrants and refugees that is changing the country's character. This latest volume in the Understanding Modern Nations series explores Greece, the birthplace of democracy and Western philosophical ideas. This thematic encyclopedia is one-of-its kind in its down-to-earth approach and comprehensive analysis of complex issues now facing Greece. It analyzes such topics as government and economics without jargon and brings a lighthearted approach to chapters on such topics as etiquette (e.g., what gestures to avoid so as not to offend), leisure (how Greeks celebrate holidays), and language (the meaning of "opa"). No other book on Greece is organized like this thematic encyclopedia, which has more than 200 entries on topics ranging from Archimedes to refugees. Unique to this encyclopedia is a "Day in the Life" section that explores the actions and thoughts of a high school student, a bank employee, a farmer in a small village, and a retired couple, giving readers a vivid snapshot of life in Greece.

When Greece's economic troubles began to threaten the stability of the European Union in 2010, the nation found itself in the center of a whirlwind of international finger-pointing. In the years prior, Greece appeared to be politically secure and economically healthy. Upon its emergence in the center of the European economic maelstrom, however, observers and critics cited a century of economic hurdles, dictatorships, revolutions, and more reasons as to why their current crisis was understandable, if not predictable. The ancient birthplace of democracy and countless artistic, literary, philosophical, and scientific developments had struggled to catch-up to its economically-thriving neighbors in Western Europe for years and quickly became the most seriously economically-troubled European country following a fiscal nosedive beginning in 2008. When the deficit and unemployment skyrocketed, the resulting austerity measures triggered widespread social unrest. The entire world turned its focus toward the troubled nation, waiting for the possibility of a Greek exit from the European Monetary Union and its potential to unravel the entire Union, with other weaker members heading for the exit as well. The effects of Greece's crisis are also tied up in the global arguments about austerity, with many viewing it as necessary medicine, and still others seeing austerity as an intellectually bankrupt approach to fiscal policy that only further damages weak economies. In Modern Greece: What Everyone Needs to Know®, Stathis Kalyvas, an eminent scholar of conflict, Europe, and Greece combines the most up-to-date economic and political-science findings on the current Greek crisis with a discussion of Greece's history. Tracing the nation's development from the early nineteenth century to the present, the informative question-and answer format covers key episodes including the independence movement of the early nineteenth century, the massive ethnic cleansing in Turkey and Greece following World War I, the German occupation in World War II, the following brutal civil war, the conflict with Turkey over Cyprus, the military coup of 1967, democracy at long last, and the country's entry into the European Union. Written by one of the most brilliant political scientists in the academy, Modern Greece is the go-to resource for understanding both the current crisis and the historical events that brought the country to where it is today. What Everyone Needs to Know® is a registered trademark of Oxford University Press.

Modern Greece is an updated and enhanced edition of a classic survey of Greek history since the beginning of the 19th century. Giving equal weighting to social, political and diplomatic aspects, it offers detailed coverage of the formation of the Greek nation state, the global Greek diaspora, the country's relationships with Europe and the United States and a range of other topics, including women, rural areas, nationalism and the Civil War, woven together in a nuanced and highly readable narrative. Fresh material and new pedagogical features have been added throughout, most notably: - new chapters on 19th-century nationalism and 'Boom to Bust in the Age of Globalization, 1989-2013'; - greater discussion of the late Ottoman context, Greeks outside of Greece and the international background to the Greek state formation; - revisions to take account of recent scholarship, Greekscholarship ; - new timelines, maps, illustrations, charts, figures and primary source boxes; - an updated further reading section and bibliography. Modern Greece is a crucial text for anyone looking to understand the complex history of this now troubled nation and its place in the Balkans, Europe and the modern globalized world.

This clear, balanced book explores the dilemma of Greece, the font of European civilization. Despite its classical past and EU membership, Greece has been unable to escape the limbo of being nearly developed. Illuminating the impact of borrowed western institutions on Greeces traditional culture, the authors analyze the paralyzing consequences: a political process dependent on personal relations and a civil society dominated by a highly centralized bureaucracy. State dominance, Legg and Roberts argue, has turned politics primarily into a struggle for office. This emphasis on political conflict has allowed politicians and their supporters to employ emotional nationalist rhetoric to flout democratic rules and to avoid genuine issues. Concluding that the Greek political systems nature precludes real reform, the authors show how EU opportunities for both economic and political reform have been largely lost. Unfortunately, the aspects of Greeces nearly developed status are mirrored in eastern European states with similar pasts. Indeed, the authors warn that the Greece of today may be the future of many of its neighbors. }This clear, balanced book explores the dilemma of Greece, the font of European civilization. Despite its classical past and EU membership, Greece has been unable to escape the limbo of being nearly developed. Illuminating the impact of borrowed western institutions on Greeces traditional culture, the authors analyze the paralyzing consequences: a political process dependent on personal relations and a civil society dominated by a highly centralized bureaucracy. State dominance, Legg and Roberts argue, has turned politics primarily into a struggle for office. This emphasis on political conflict has allowed politicians and their supporters to employ emotional nationalist rhetoric to flout democratic rules and to avoid genuine issues. Concluding that the Greek political systems nature precludes real reform, the authors show how EU opportunities for both economic and political reform have been largely lost. Unfortunately, the aspects of Greeces nearly developed status are mirrored in eastern European states with similar pasts. Indeed, the authors warn that the Greece of today may be the future of many of its neighbors.

Every Greek and every friend of the country knows the date 1821, when the banner of revolution was raised against the empire of the Ottoman Turks, and the story of 'Modern Greece' is usually said to begin. Less well known, but of even greater importance, was the international recognition given to Greece as an independent state with full sovereign rights, as early as 1830. This places Greece in the vanguard among the new nation-states of Europe whose emergence would gather momentum through to the early twentieth century, a process whose repercussions continue to this day. Starting out from that perspective, which has been all but ignored until now, this book brings together the work of scholars from a variety of disciplines to explore the contribution of characteristically nineteenth-century European modes of thought to the 'making' of Greece as a modern nation. Closely linked to nationalism is romanticism, which exercised a formative role through imaginative literature, as is demonstrated in several chapters on poetry and fiction. Under the broad heading 'uses of the past', other chapters consider ways in which the legacies, first of ancient Greece, then later of Byzantium, came to be mobilized in the construction of a durable national identity at once 'Greek' and 'modern'. The Making of Modern Greece aims to situate the Greek experience, as never before, within the broad context of current theoretical and historical thinking about nations and nationalism in the modern world. The book spans the period from 1797, when Rigas Velestinlis published a constitution for an imaginary 'Hellenic Republic', at the cost of his life, to the establishment of the modern Olympic Games, in Athens in 1896, an occasion which sealed with international approval the hard-won self-image of 'Modern Greece' as it had become established over the previous century.

Every Greek and every friend of the country knows the date 1821, when the banner of revolution was raised against the empire of the Ottoman Turks, and the story of 'Modern Greece' is usually said to begin. Less well known, but of even greater importance, was the international recognition given to Greece as an independent state with full sovereign rights, as early as 1830. This places Greece in the vanguard among the new nation-states of Europe whose emergence would gather momentum through to the early twentieth century, a process whose repercussions continue to this day. Starting out from that perspective, which has been all but ignored until now, this book brings together the work of scholars from a variety of disciplines to explore the contribution of characteristically nineteenth-century European modes of thought to the 'making' of Greece as a modern nation. Closely linked to nationalism is romanticism, which exercised a formative role through imaginative literature, as is demonstrated in several chapters on poetry and fiction. Under the broad heading 'uses of the past', other chapters consider ways in which the legacies, first of ancient Greece, then later of Byzantium, came to be mobilized in the construction of a durable national identity at once 'Greek' and 'modern'. The Making of Modern Greece aims to situate the Greek experience, as never before, within the broad context of current theoretical and historical thinking about nations and nationalism in the modern world. The book spans the period from 1797, when Rigas Velestinlis published a constitution for an imaginary 'Hellenic Republic', at the cost of his life, to the establishment of the modern Olympic Games, in Athens in 1896, an occasion which sealed with international approval the hard-won self-image of 'Modern Greece' as it had become established over the previous century.

Focusing on one of the most dramatic and controversial periods in modern Greek history and in the history of the Cold War, James Edward Miller provides the first study to employ a wide range of international archives_American, Greek, English, and French_t