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Article Excerpt
From the late nineteenth century to the late twentieth century, Greeks in large numbers left Greece to come to the United States. The numerous obstacles placed before them did not deter many of them from achieving success. Their success in the United States and their desire to remain connected to Greece much contributed to involvement in Greek affairs. Successive Greek governments also attempted to maintain a relationship with diaspora Greeks in the United States, a problematic relationship which persists even today despite the declining numbers of Greek-Americans.
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The summer of 1974 and the immediate period after 1974 was most critical for modern Greece at many levels: the northern part of Cyprus was invaded by Turkish troops, which much contributed to the fall of the Greek junta; Karamanlis was invited back to Greece from his self-imposed exile to restore democracy; democracy gained widespread acceptance in Greece; and the number of Greeks coming to the United States declined dramatically as a result of Greek democratization and better economic conditions, which in part resulted from European Union (EU) membership. Unlike previous periods, the number of immigrants to the United States was evenly balanced between men and women, and some families included young children for the first time in Greek immigrant history. The year 1980 signifies the beginning of declining migration. This is an important development considering that Greece "has always been a country of emigration." After 1973 and the resulting economic crisis because of the oil embargo, unemployment in the United States and Western Europe skyrocketed. Thousands of Greeks living in West Germany and other Western European countries [as well as in the United States] decided to return to Greece. (1) "During the 1980s approximately 2,500 Greeks annually were coming to America. In the 1990s the figure dropped to 1,500. Factoring in the probable number of returnees, there is no longer any net Greek increase in this country from immigration. Also to be noted, since the 1960s, a low birth rate means the American-born generations have not been replacing themselves. With no renewal of immigration in sight and with little likelihood of a rise in the birthrate, the Greek-American population will shrink in the years to come." (2) See Tables 1 and 2. Yet Greek-Americans, despite their declining numbers, continue to play an important role in the United States as well as Greece.
Table 1: Greek Immigration To The United States Era Approximate Approximate Total Annual average Early migration 1873-1899 15,000 500 Creat wave 1900-1917 450,000 25,000 Last exodus 1918-1924 70,000 10,000 Closed door 1925-1945 30,000 1,300 Postwar migration 1945-1965 75,000 4,000 New wave 1966-1979 160,000 11,000 Declining migration 1980-present 35,000 2,000 Source: C. Moskos, "The Greeks in the United States," in R. Clogg (cd.) The Greek Diaspora in the Twentieth Century, St. Martin's Press, New York, 1999, p. 105. Table 2: Greek Immigration To The United States By Decades to 1998 Decade Number 1. 1881-1890 2,308 2. 1891-1900 15,979 3. 1901-1910 167,519 4. 1911-1920 184,201 5. 1921-1930 51,084 6. 1931-1940 9,119 7. 1941-1950 8,973 8. 1951-1960 47,608 9. 1961-1970 58,969 10. 1971-1980 92,369 11. 1981-1990 38,377 12. 1991-2000 17,560 Source: Found in Y. Papadopoulos, "Prejudice and its Relationship to Acculturation for Greek Immigrants in the United States," in S. D. Orfanos (ed.) Reading Greek America: Studies in the Experience of Greeks in the United States, Pella Publishing Company, 2002, p. 349.
DECISION BY GREEK-AMERICANS TO RETURN TO GREECE
Mass repatriation in recent years has increased for numerous reasons. "First, there are those who had only temporarily emigrated to western Europe in the first place, of whom 13.9 percent of those who left between 1968 and 1970 have returned, 21.6 percent of those who left between 1970 and 1974, and 27.4 percent of those who left between 1970 and 1976. These figures represent not so much the classic repatriation of Greek Americans and Greek Canadians as the experimental return of Greek Australian families, the permanent repatriation of 20,000 or so political refugees from the Civil War, the return of Greeks from northern and particularly central and southern Africa, and finally the Greek government's efforts to procure the return of a large number of the Pontic Greeks in the USSR (of whom there are 336,869, according to Soviet statistics of 1970). Today in Greece the main problem is not that people are emigrating in search of work, but that the returning emigres have to adapt to contemporary Greek economic, social, and educational reality." (3) After the election of Andreas Papandreou as prime minister, many Greek-Americans teaching at leading institutions of higher education were invited to return to Greece and teach at Greek universities. They have helped to modernize the Greek university system, although much more work is necessary. They have also helped to establish think tanks which regrettably are still in their infancy and not fully self-sustaining. The more problematic segment of the returning emigres is the members of the lower middle class who are characterized by a "conservative ethos." Their long stay in the United States has led to a static view of Greece and the resulting affect of having difficulties understanding changes in Greece as well as the rest of the European Union. Their more conservative and unprogressive inclinations could prove an obstacle to effectively managing the forces of globalization and to introducing the necessary policy adjustments to successfully deal with problems at home and to overcome problems with neighbors including Turkey. Democratization of Greece and better economic conditions resulting primarily from European Union membership are among the other important factors that provided the impetus for many Greek-Americans to return to Greece.
ROLE OF THE GREEK-AMERICAN LOBBY
On November 25, 1973, Papadopoulos and his government were overthrown in a bloodless coup by the hard-liners led by Dimitrios Ioannidis who believed that Papadopoulos "had adulterated the principles of April 21,1967" (4) and for excessive leniency" regarding the revolting students at the Polytechnic School. (5) Ioannidis also believed that he was preventing the Revolution from digressing into corruption. Lieutenant-General Gizikis was chosen as President and Androutsopoulos as Prime Minister. The events of November 17, when the junta brutally suppressed the students who had occupied the Polytechnic School in Athens, surprised everyone and no authority, including the government, expected the events that had just transpired. On November 25 at 10:00 am, the public was notified that the President of the Republic would make a statement. To the surprise of many, the person who spoke to them at 11:15 am was not Papadopoulos but the unknown Gizikis. At first, many Greeks, unaware of Ioannidis, believed that the purpose of the coup was not the cancellation but the acceleration of the time-table for elections. They expected not the establishment of an even more powerful but a less powerful President, and not the military control of the masses but the reconciliation between the military and the people of Greece. The people's expectations were crushed as soon as Ioannidis spoke to journalists' questions regarding the relationship between the media and government. He responded by saying that although he could do his job without them, he would allow them to publish newspapers under certain conditions. It was then realized that Ioannidis was the de facto powerful ruler.
The developments of November 1973 coincided with the deterioration of relations with Turkey caused primarily by the discovery of oil near the northern Aegean island of Thasos. The Turkish government claimed the right to explore for oil in the Aegean. "Against the background of the dispute in the Aegean, the Ioannidis regime adopted an increasingly menacing line toward Cyprus, seeking to force a reluctant President Makarios to accept Athens as the national center of Hellenism" (6) and to force Makarios to accept union with Greece. In early July 1974, President Makarios demanded the removal of the Greek officers in the Cyprus National Guard. Ioannidis, desiring to improve his standing among the Greeks, initiated a Sampson-led coup under the code-name "Aphrodite" against Makarios who was forced to flee the island. On July 15, Sampson was sworn in as President. Sampson played an important role during the struggle for Cypriot independence from Great Britain and he was a significant member of EOKA-B (National organization of Cypriot Fighters). He was a right-wing journalist, a passionate supporter of Grivas and an opponent of Makarios. International pubilc opinion as well as pubic opinion in Greece and Turkey did not back Sampson as President of the Cypriot Republic. Nicos Sampson carried out a reign of terror. Five days after his installment as President, the Turkish government under the pretext that the coup was a prelude to union with Greece and for the purpose of establishing "constitutional order" on the island, decided on July 20, 1974 to invade the northern part of Cyprus. Before the invasion of Cyprus, the Prime Minister of Turkey Bulent Ecevit visited London in an apparent attempt to convince the British government to join Turkey as coguarantor power under Article IV of the Treaty of Guarantee. Britain refused to join Turkey and Ecevit argued that the Treaty of Guarantee was authority that he needed to intervene in Cyprus. (7) For the benefit of world opinion Ecevit stated that: "This morning the Turkish Armed Forces began the peacekeeping operation in Cyprus. This is not an invasion. This must not be considered an act of aggression. We have come as peacekeepers, to safeguard the independence and the territorial integrity of Cyprus, and to restore constitutionality." (8) The invasion "finally drove the nail into the coffin of the Colonels' dictatorship." (9)
The Turkish government argued that the Turkish community in Cyprus (about 18 percent of the Cypriot population) was in danger and looking for an opportunity to expand...
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