Greek Communists Stage a Comeback
KORAKAS, MANOLIS
Note second party, they polled 24% in recent election Greek Communists Stage a Comeback By Manolis Korakas Athens Greece on May 2 held its sixth election since the liberation— which means that...
...Along with this polarization, we have seen the failure of the Center parties...
...The Karamanlis Radicals, who won a plurality of the popular vote and, thanks to the election law, a majority of Parliament seats, won a Pyrrhic victory in view of the Communist performance...
...The Union of the Democratic Left (EDA), legal arm of the Communist party, led by John Passalides...
...Economic stability and fortunate circumstances have not, however, had the same meaning for all Greeks...
...And a Communist victory in the ideological battle is certain if its only adversary is the existing order...
...In the course of the six elections since 1946, we have witnessed such a shuffle of politicians from one party to another that all the politicians—without a single exception—have lost respect among the voters...
...Since Greece lacks an authentic play of social-political forces, personalities and intrigues play a decisive role...
...For this bourgeois opposition stands only for the negation of the party in power and not for serious opposition to the growth of Communism...
...Is there still time to remedy the situation...
...The accompanying table shows the losses of the Right, the fall of the liberals and the gains of the Communists...
...Communism can be defeated only on the social and ideological plane, and Greek Communism has no true adversary in the social and ideological sphere...
...These were the virtual erasure of the Liberals from Parliament and the great triumph of the EDA, which more than doubled its vote, became the leading Opposition party and won 71 seats in the 300-seat Parliament...
...The Liberal Democratic Union, led by ex-Premiers George Papan-dreou and Sophocles Venizelos...
...Add to this social unrest the reactions of the Greek public to the free world's attitude on Cyprus and to the installation of missile bases on Greek soil, and you have the background against which the campaign unfolded...
...The PADE coalition and the EDA stressed the fight against the installation of bases and the struggle for Cyprus...
...Note second party, they polled 24% in recent election Greek Communists Stage a Comeback By Manolis Korakas Athens Greece on May 2 held its sixth election since the liberation— which means that we have had a vote about every two years...
...The most effective force against Communism throughout Europe is the labor and Socialist movement...
...The lack of appeal on the part of the Liberals and the small parties is no explanation for the Communist comeback...
...While the pre-election maneuvering was marked by the Communist failure to establish a popular front with the PADE, as it had in 1956, the election itself had two results which are portentous for the future of Greece...
...The general sentiment of the electorate was a distinct malaise, shared even by certain parts of the Right...
...The party now consists largely of cadres without troops, and will not survive its defeat last month except in Crete and a few scattered districts in the rest of the country...
...And, because of the election law, the small parties of the PADE coalition have disappeared from the Parliamentary scene, even though they got 13 per cent of the vote...
...This depends as much on the understanding of democratic forces abroad as on the development of new social and political forces in Greece itself...
...The Communist showing is even more impressive when one looks at the big cities—• Athens, Piraeus, Salonika, etc.— where the EDA received about half of the popular vote...
...The PADE coalition, comprising the Progressives of Spyros Markezi-nis, the Agrarians of Alexander Bal-tadzis, the Democratic Party of Working People headed by Stelios Alamanis, and the remnants of the Plastiras group under Savvas Papa-politis...
...The governing Radicals pointed with pride, while the Liberals presented a voluminous program...
...So far, the circumstances have all favored the interests of the privileged classes, whose sole care has been further self-enrichment...
...In the past two years, the Government under Karamanlis has—thanks to economic stability and fortunate circumstances—managed to assure political peace...
...The Communists, though they are now appealing to all sectors of the population, have a genuine social base: the workers, small businessmen and intelligentsia...
...Its proportion of the vote has declined from 49.6 per cent in 1952 to 47.4 in 1956 to 41 per cent this month...
...The Right has regrouped itself four times—under Constantine Tsal-daris in 1946, Marshal Alexander Papagos in 1952, and under Constantine Karamanlis in 1956 and again this year—even though since 1952 it has lost significant strength...
...the crisis which provoked the resignation of Karamanlis and thus brought on the election was engineered from within the Government...
...In this election, four political groups took part: • The National Radical Union, the Government party headed by Karamanlis...
...OF POPULAR VOTE Parties 1951 1952 1956 1958 Right 37 49 47 41 Center 42 37 21 48* Communist 11 10 24 Others 10 4 5 13 * Popular Front As for the Liberals, apart from their permanent internal crisis marked by repeated splits and reunifications since 1946, they represent the sort of liberalism which throughout Europe has lost its old prestige and given nay to new social forces...
...The interests of the workers, artisans and employees have been constantly sacrificed to "stabilization...
...Nothing points to an immediate crisis now, either...
...The conduct of the politicians all these years has been tragic...
...But Greece is the only free European country where all progressive activity is subject to Communist influence, and is thus a weak link in the defense of democracy...
...Communism seeks to fill the void thus created, and the May 2 elections show that a great step has been taken in that direction...
...The Rightist regimes in power have given the former everything they want, while demanding only sacrifice from the latter...
...It does not show abstentions, which in this month's election were unusually high...
...From the so-called Right to the so-called Center to the Communist Left, there has been a permanent circulation of politicians, concerned only with their seats in Parliament and the promotion of personal interests...
...The sole exception was the liberal EPEK movement of General Nicholas Plastiras between 1950 and 1952, which did not survive the death of its leader...
...In Greece, the Liberal party since the occupation has been losing its conservative elements to the Right, while its popular base has been slowly eroded (in the absence of a democratic Socialist movement) by the Communists...
...The crisis through which the nation has been evolving since the war is characterized by the long domination of Rightist parties and the gradual swelling of the Communist vote—which now has reached 24 per cent of the electorate...
Vol. 41 • May 1958 • No. 21
