Issue 2 September 2004 The Hellenic Observatory Newsletter 2004 Editorial Welcome to this second issue of our newsletter. grateful to him. Dimitris continues as an Honor- I’m pleased to report that the Observatory is in a ary Fellow of the Observatory. strong position, as it looks forward to the new academic year. Sadly, the Observatory had to say goodbye to Katerina Loukopoulou, our Administrator. We We had a very active programme of confer- were very pleased, nevertheless, to welcome ences, seminars and research workshops in Maria Kantirou in April as our new Administrator. 2003-4. Our biggest public event was held at the She joins Eleni Xiarchogiannopoulou, HO Re- Inside this issue: National Film Theatre on London’s South Bank search Officer, who started in summer 2003. on 17th November. The date represented the 30th anniversary of the Athens Polytechnic rebel- The year 2004-5 will be a period of change for lion against the Greek junta. It was especially the Observatory. I am delighted that Dr. Spyros Editorial 1 poignant to show the film ‘Z’, depicting the politi- Economides has been appointed as Deputy Di- cal assassination of Lambrakis, on this day and rector. He and I will work closely together to we were delighted to welcome the film’s direc- sustain and develop our programme of activi- tor, Costas Gavras, to the event. The NFT audi- ties. This will be particularly relevant to me, A major anniversary, a major 2 whilst I am Director of the European Institute for event torium was packed with an audience that was both young and old, Greek and non-Greek in the next three years. In addition, a major new almost equal measure. It was a memorable oc- appointment for the Observatory is to the new Is our future pensionable? 2 casion for us. post of Lecturer in the Political Economy of Greece and South East Europe. The creation of More conventionally, our research conferences the post has been made possible by the gener- covered a range of important topics for Greece. ous financial support of a new consortium of Whither the Balkans 3 We held conferences on Greek foreign policy in donors. The School has now appointed Dr. Vas- a changing Balkans; the Greek EU Presidency; silis Monastiriotis to the post and he begins this Romania and the EU; and domestic pension summer. Vassilis obtained his PhD from the Greece: a source of stability in a 4 reform. We also welcomed Mr. Zoran Zivkovic, LSE in 2002 and he was previously Lecturer in Europe of turmoil the Serbian Prime Minister for a well-attended Economics at the Royal Holloway of the Univer- public lecture in the Old Theatre. sity of London. The Observatory in Athens 4 The Observatory’s regular research seminars Further, we look forward to welcoming Professor continued to draw diverse audiences from Panos Tsakloglou, of Athens University of Eco- across the School and well beyond. Some 11 nomics and Business. He will join us as a Senior seminars were held in total, with audiences of Research Fellow, to research on changes in the Not a Greek LSE 5 between 20 and 50 for each event. As the main- Greek economy. stay of our public activity, such support is very heartening. As this newsletter will elaborate, we have an A new journal on Greece 5 exciting programme of events planned for 2004- The Observatory was again able to welcome a 5. These include: public lectures by Dora Bakoy- number of fellows and visitors. Dr. Dimitris Tri- annis (Mayor of Athens) and Professor Loukas antaphyllou was appointed as Senior Research Tsoukalis; our 2nd Biennial PhD Symposium on HO Papers 5 Fellow on Greece and European Security for the Modern Greece; and further conferences and year. He was called away early, to be a special seminars. advisor to Mr. Yiannis Valinakis, as the new We very much hope that you will wish to partici- HO Seminars 6 Deputy Foreign Minister. We were also pleased to appoint Dr. Christos Paraskevopoulos as Re- pate in these events and to support the work of search Fellow. His appointment allowed him to the Hellenic Observatory. With your help, we are work on social capital in Greece and on infra- confident that we can continue to serve our core HO’s events—Autumn 2004 8 structure development. We also had to say fare- purpose: increasing the public awareness of well to Dr. Dimitris Papadimitriou, Research Fel- contemporary Greek society by fostering teach- low in the HO, as he moved to take up a perma- ing and research. nent position as Lecturer in Government at the In memory of Ioannis Boutos and 8 Kevin Featherstone Theodoros Karatzas University of Manchester. Dimitris was an enor- mous help to the Observatory and we are very Director Page 2 The Hellenic Observatory Newsletter 2004 A major anniversary, a major event Thirty years ago, in another world, stu- authorities. The local police in Thessaloniki dents at the Athens Polytechnic staged a were directly implicated. But the trail went major rebellion against the brutal dictator- much higher up the ladder of the state. ship of the Greek Colonels. With the ac- Suspicion turned towards Government min- tive support of many others, the uprising isters and members of the Royal Palace. In sent a clear signal to the world of the any event, the police officers that were sus- popular opposition to the junta. On the pended following the inquest, were later morning of 17th November, however, tanks reinstated without loss of pay. The murder entered the grounds of the Polytechnic to of Lambrakis was the first, open signal of the revolt. Soldiers and police vied with the anti-democratic forces at work within each other to ‘let the students have it’. the state apparatus. These feared the Left, Some 24,000 rounds of ammunition were and implicated the centre. The paranoia fired by the police alone into the grounds would later spread and form the basis for of the Polytechnic. The protestors had the Colonels’ coup d’etat in April 1967. been given just ten minutes warning of the th intention to use live ammunition. Many On Monday 17 November 2003, the Hel- were arrested, while the estimates of the lenic Observatory at the LSE joined forces numbers killed vary from two dozen up- with the National Film Theatre in London wards. and The Hellenic Foundation for Culture, to commemorate the Polytechnic and Lam- The images that were sent around the brakis events. The initiative from the Obser- world were a shocking reminder of the vatory was originally made by Dr. Lou brutality of the dictatorship established by Klarevas, a Research Fellow in 2002-3. An the Greek Colonels. The photographs of evening was held at the NFT on the South An evening with Costas Gavras at the Na- tanks crashing through the gates of an Bank, which involved the screening of the tional Film Theatre on the South Bank institution of learning represented a film ‘Z’ and a ‘Question and Answer’ ses- graphic representation of the clash be- sion with its Director, Costas Gavras. The serious and expresses a sustained an- tween civilised values and the repression event was a sell-out, with a diverse and ger. The critique of the political estab- of those that feared freedom. The stu- enthusiastic audience contemplating the lishment that gave rise to the Colonels dents’ revolt focussed attention on the film and the society it portrayed. is immensely powerful. brutality, the incompetence, and the moral The film portrays the kind of society in emptiness of the Colonels’ regime. It oc- The career of Costas Gavras has which Lambrakis was murdered. The film curred in a period when student protest stretched over many highly acclaimed never mentions Greece by name and, as it had a greater vigour and international films. He is no stranger to controversy. was made during the period of the Colo- prominence, challenging the cosy as- After ‘Z’, he has confronted the abuse nels, it was filmed in Algeria. But there is no sumptions of the post-1945 settlement. of institutional power in many different doubting the references to Greece: the uni- contexts. His film, ‘The Confession’, forms are Greek, many of the names are It is difficult to fully recall this other ‘world’. attacked the Stalinist purges in Greek, the newspaper shown is that of ‘Ta The history of Greece on the eve of dicta- Czechoslovakia. ‘State of Siege’ ex- Nea’, and the photographs in the police torship is complex and still contested. A plored the activities of the CIA in Uru- station are of King Paul and Queen clear focal point, however, is provided by guay. ‘Missing’ with Jack Lemmon cov- Frederika. another event for which the anniversary ered the overthrow of Allende in Chile fell in 2003. Forty years earlier, Grigoris The film is based on the novel of the same and Washington’s involvement in it. His Lambrakis was assassinated in Thessalo- title, by Vassilis Vassilikos. It is a documen- film, ‘Amen’, explored why the Vatican niki. Lambrakis was a rising Member of tary and a drama. The film’s success was remained silent during the Holocaust. Parliament, representing an increasingly to popularise an ugly incident in Greek po- He is clearly a film director who com- popular left-wing movement. He was mur- litical history. It is a political thriller that is bines cinema excellence with deep po- dered by thugs acting at the behest of the extremely well made. The film is deeply litical concerns. Is our future pensionable? There has been much public attention given in recent years to the problem of balancing the need to provide suitable incomes for those who are retired with the constraints on raising current revenue.