Interest Representation and Modernization Policies in Greece: Lessons Learned from the Study of Labor and Farmers

Modernization strategies in Greece have traditionally incorporated lower class interests, notably those of trade unions and farmers' associations. The political crisis of the 1960s demonstrated the inadequacies of these strategies. Demands for participation increased enormously as soon as the seven-year dictatorship collapsed. When PASOK was in opposition it took advantage of this situation in order to attract lower-class interests by sponsoring a radical syndicalism. Once it assumed power, however, it aspired to subject these interests to its own control. This system of incorporation retained some old practices but was also based on the conveyance of controlled liberties and on redistribution. Initially it appeared successful; yet the system was challenged after the government abandoned the Keynesian program it had employed in the early 1980s. The neoliberal New Democracy party then tried to ameliorate these problems but its social project clashed with the traditions of post-dictatorship Greece. PASOK, on its return to power, appeared aware of the inadequacies of former state strategies and also of neoliberal ones. In effect, a more consensual form of interest representation was announced. But it still has not become clear whether Greece can pursue the path already followed by some advanced industrial democracies. Certainly more substantial reforms in industrial relations and interest representation must be made to justify claims that this sort of modernization has occurred. Beyond this, the new arrangements in Greece must not ignore certain useful concepts found in comparative theory.