Understanding the Greek Communist Party

During the months preceding the last two Greek parliamentary elections of 6 May and 17 June 2012, for many on the left hopes ran high for a substantive challenge to neoliberal discourse and practice that could potentially revert EU economic policy itself. Except from the strictly partisan, most of these wished good results for both of the main parts of the Greek radical left – the Coalition of the Radical Left (SYRIZA) and the Greek Communist Party (KKE). At the end, only the former triumphed, while the latter experienced initially a less than modest rise of 0.94% (in the first election) and then (in the second election) a decrease of 3.98% and the lowest result in its history (4.50%). While SYRIZA’s ascent has already attracted much analysis, the KKE’s descent has been either dismissed as unimportant, or hastily explained with references to rhetorical boxes – dogmatism, left extremism, irrationality, sectarianism – devoid of theoretical reflection. Yet, a closer look suggests otherwise, as well as invites questions over communist and radical left party strategy in periods of economic crisis

The European Radical Left

Is today’s left really new? How has the European radical left evolved? Giorgos Charalambous answers these questions by looking at three moments of rapid political change - the late 1960s to late 1970s; the turn of the millennium; and post-2008. He challenges the conventional understanding of a 'new left', drawing out continuities with earlier movements and parties. Charalambous examines the 'Long '68', symbolised by the May uprisings in France, which saw the rise of new left forces and the widespread criticism by younger radical activists of traditional communist and socialist parties. He puts this side by side with the turn of the millennium when the Global Justice Movement rose to prominence and changed the face of the international left, and also the period after the financial crash of 2008 and the rise of anti-austerity politics which initiated the most recent wave of new left parties such as Podemos in Spain and Syriza in Greece. With a unique 'two-level' perspective, Charalambous approaches the left through both social movements and party politics, looking at identities, rhetoric and organisation, and bringing a fresh new approach to radical history, as well as assessing challenges for both activists and scholars

Fragmented we fight: what's Left in Greece in 2015?

No abstract available

(Il)liberal Organisation? Internal Party Democracy on the European Radical Left

The relationship between the European radical left and democracy has come into attention due to the electoral surges of some such parties and their participation in government. Its scrutiny, however, remains ambivalent, at a time contemporary democracies are experiencing historic disruptions affecting how people engage with parties. This study offers an organisational perspective of the European radical left in order to map out and elaborate on patterns of democratic practice in this party family, as measured against a broadly liberal benchmark. Using a modified version of the internal party democracy (IPD) index developed by Rahat and Shapira (2017), the study compares fifteen parliamentary radical left parties (RLPs) from eleven European countries – Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Finland, Germany, Greece, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal and Spain – across the dimensions of participation, representation, competition, responsiveness and transparency. Specifically, the study outlines patterns across the IPD dimensions and investigates the extent of variation within the party family, juxtaposing it against ideological and structural distinctions among RLPs

On the (non) distinctiveness of Marxism-Leninism: The Portuguese and Greek communist parties compared

The study of parties that label themselves as Marxist-Leninist has, for the most part been subsumed in the exploration of the broader radical (or, far) left tradition in the post-1989 period. In an attempt to bridge this gap in the recent literature on radical left parties, this article attempts to uncover the (non) distinctiveness of Marxism-Leninism by studying empirically two European parties that are self-labeled as Marxist-Leninist – the Greek (KKE) and Portuguese (PCP) Communist parties. The central question we explore is whether there are significant similarities between these parties, so as to allow us to speak of Marxism-Leninism’s distinctiveness today. Overall, the two parties studied here have enough in common to testify to Marxism-Leninism’s ongoing distinctiveness with several qualifications, especially concerning ideology

Barriers in Access to Pharmaceutical Care in Greece: The Case Study of the Out-of-Hospital Management of Patients With Acute Asthma

Aim: The objectives of this study were to evaluate the effectiveness of information and administrative assistance regarding patient adherence to asthma guidelines and investigate the nature of the barriers in access to pharmaceutical care in Greece based on the case study of the out-of-hospital management of patients with acute asthma.Materials and Methods: The sample of the study consisted of 100 patients with acute asthma who visited the Emergency Department of a General Hospital of Athens. A comparative cross-sectional study using convenience sampling was conducted during October 2014 and June 2015 regarding the adherence to the follow up.Results: Patients who complied with the follow up visit constituted 61% of the total sample (82% of the patients from the intervention group and 40% from the control group) and for those for whom the follow up visit had been scheduled by the researchers had been compliant with the physician's instructions more often than patients for whom the follow up had not been scheduled by the researchers (OR = 8.2, 95%CI = 2.9–23.2). Patients with increased hospitalization days during the previous year and who did not consume the appropriate medication prescribed for asthma due to lack of a prescription, visited the ED more frequently than the rest of the patients (OR = 271.47, 95%CI = 14.53–5070.8). More than one out of three patients (36.4%) reported that they had not bought their asthma medications because they had no prescription while almost one out of five stated that they had purchased their medications but had used them with savings in doses. Patients who had not taken their asthma medication due to lack of prescription, visited more than once the ED, resulting in non-admission, when compared to patients who had a prescription for their medications. (OR = 3.5, 95%CI = 1.3–9.3).Discussion–Conclusions: Out-of-hospital management of asthma in Greece presents significant gaps and shortcomings, mainly due to important unresolved issues regarding availability, accessibility and use of services. The findings of the present study confirm the cause-effect relationship between ineffective out-of-hospital management of asthma and the increase in the frequency of the use of hospital emergency departments, resulting in an increase in health costs

Mobile citizenship, states of exception and (non)border regimes in the pandemic and post-Covid19 Cyprus

This study examined the impact of the emergency measures on community relations, fundamental rights, and mobility rights during the Covid19 pandemic in de facto divided Cyprus. It explored states of exception, as well as solidarity aiming to counter those restrictions. Internal and external borders were mobilised to separate ‘us’ from ‘them’, shaped by the pandemic policies and media discourses via a hygiene emergency with suspension of rights, hitting severely the most vulnerable, often migrants and asylum-seekers. The hostile and securitised climate was generated by the political elites and the media and was built on the ‘Cypriot states of exception’ and colonial laws by extending old and generating new bordering processes. An illiberal policy frame towards migrants and asylum-seekers was manifested in form of a state exception of immobility, which affects the relations between the two communities, the division of Cyprus, peace-keeping and peace-making. Contra this hostile environment and given the welfare state crisis, acts for citizenship have generated praxis-based solidarity. Via digital networking, we observed processes of reorganisation of activism. This is prefiguring a potential for reassembling socialities, paving ways for social imaginaries of a mobile citizenship transcending old and new divisions of Cyprus and the world

Dimensionality, ideology and party positions towards European integration

<p>The rise of political contestation over European integration has led many scholars to examine the role that broader ideological positions play in structuring party attitudes towards European integration. This article extends the existing approaches in two important ways. First, it shows that whether the dimensionality of politics is imagined in a one-dimensional ‘general left‒right’ form or a two-dimensional ‘economic left‒right/social liberal-conservative’ form leads to very different understandings of the way ideology has structured attitudes towards European integration, with the two-dimensional approach offering greater explanatory power. Second, existing approaches have modelled the influence of ideology on attitudes towards European integration as a static process. This article shows that the relationship between ideology and European integration has changed substantially over the history of European integration: divisions over social issues have replaced economic concerns as the main driver of party attitudes towards European integration.</p