When Byron first encountered Greece in the opening years of the 19th century he wrote a famous but chilling poem, in which he described the physical beauty of the place as the sublime serenity of a fresh corpse before decomposition has robbed it of the harmonious features it possessed when it was still alive. Since that time the political independence of the country was restored in a general insurrection that seemed to indicate, not least to Byron himself, that some spark of soul had been preserved in the depths of depravity and demoralization that was both the cause and the effect of its centuries long disappearance into a darkness of oppression.
The protagonists of that movement made declarations that swore allegiance to the values of civilized Europe and established institutions that seemed to reflect that commitment. The constitution which they voted was republican with strong elements of democratic decentralization and popular enfranchisement. But as the most discerning of the historians of that time noted, this institutional democracy of the revolutionary period reflected the fact that the society was fragmented into a multitude of factions which could not singly impose their absolute rule on the rest. Democracy and the rule of law was simply a facade to cover up these internecine hatreds that, on the ground, amounted to an unstable equalibrium of local despotisms and politicals cabals.
Soon enough the newly established kingdom reverted to authoritarianism, which attempted to homogenize this anarchy of particularistic interests into some form of functional statehood by using despotism from above. The initial flush of Enlightenment aspirations was spent. And, although the political superstructure still incorporated the principles of liberalism (especially after the revolution of 1843 and the change of dynasty in 1861), the society danced to a different tune of religiously spiked nationalism. That liberalism survived on paper was indeed something of a valuable achievement and some exceptional minds still aimed to make it work in practice. But the storm of wars that overtook the country from the end of the 19th century through the 20th made this impossible both on the cultural and the social level. Their legacy was a slew of closed and intolerant ideologies that have flooded, and corrupted, every department of public life (the schools, the press and the political class).
Today, thirty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, fully half of the electorate is committed to some form of Stalinism. And most of the rest do not really know what exactly is flapping around between their ears. Two hundred years or so after Byron wrote that blood-curdling piece of verse the physical face of the country has been viciously deformed by the most egregious form of building "development", largely destroying both the rustic and the neoclassical aesthetic of previous decades. And as for democracy it is still the facade behind which the absolutist pursuits of private economic and political interest are hiding. It is true that the constitutional forms have been preserved so far, and this I repeat is an achievement. But at the end of the day, what good are the mere wrappings around an empty box.......
The protagonists of that movement made declarations that swore allegiance to the values of civilized Europe and established institutions that seemed to reflect that commitment. The constitution which they voted was republican with strong elements of democratic decentralization and popular enfranchisement. But as the most discerning of the historians of that time noted, this institutional democracy of the revolutionary period reflected the fact that the society was fragmented into a multitude of factions which could not singly impose their absolute rule on the rest. Democracy and the rule of law was simply a facade to cover up these internecine hatreds that, on the ground, amounted to an unstable equalibrium of local despotisms and politicals cabals.
Soon enough the newly established kingdom reverted to authoritarianism, which attempted to homogenize this anarchy of particularistic interests into some form of functional statehood by using despotism from above. The initial flush of Enlightenment aspirations was spent. And, although the political superstructure still incorporated the principles of liberalism (especially after the revolution of 1843 and the change of dynasty in 1861), the society danced to a different tune of religiously spiked nationalism. That liberalism survived on paper was indeed something of a valuable achievement and some exceptional minds still aimed to make it work in practice. But the storm of wars that overtook the country from the end of the 19th century through the 20th made this impossible both on the cultural and the social level. Their legacy was a slew of closed and intolerant ideologies that have flooded, and corrupted, every department of public life (the schools, the press and the political class).
Today, thirty years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, fully half of the electorate is committed to some form of Stalinism. And most of the rest do not really know what exactly is flapping around between their ears. Two hundred years or so after Byron wrote that blood-curdling piece of verse the physical face of the country has been viciously deformed by the most egregious form of building "development", largely destroying both the rustic and the neoclassical aesthetic of previous decades. And as for democracy it is still the facade behind which the absolutist pursuits of private economic and political interest are hiding. It is true that the constitutional forms have been preserved so far, and this I repeat is an achievement. But at the end of the day, what good are the mere wrappings around an empty box.......
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