ABSTRACT

This book examines the international dimensions of the Greek military dictatorship of 1967 to 1974 and uses it as a case study to evaluate the major shifts occurring in the international system during a period of rapid change.

The policies of the major nation-states in both East and West were determined by realistic Cold War considerations. At the same time, the Greek junta, a profoundly anti-modernist force, failed to cope with an evolving international agenda and the movement towards international cooperation. Denouncing it became a rallying point both for international organizations and for human rights activists, and it enabled the EEC to underscore the notion that democracy was an integral characteristic of the European identity.

This volume is an original in-depth study of an under-researched subject and the multiple interactions of a complex era. It is divided into three sections: Part I deals with the interaction of the Colonels with state actors; Part II deals with the responses of international organizations and the rising transnational human rights agenda for which the Greek junta became a totemic rallying point; and Part III compares and contrasts the transitions to democracy in Southern Europe, and analyses the different models of transition and region-building, and how they intersected with attempts to foster a European identity. The Greek dictatorship may have been a parochial military regime, but its rise and fall interacted with signifi cant international trends and can therefore serve as a salient case study for promoting a better understanding of international and European trends during the 1960s and 1970s.

This book will be of much interest to students of Cold War studies, international history, foreign policy, transatlantic relations and International Relations, in general.

part I|73 pages

International actors

chapter 2|14 pages

‘Papandreou Derangement Syndrome’?

The United States and the April 1967 coup

chapter 3|12 pages

Greece in the tapes

Nixon and the junta

chapter 4|9 pages

France and the Greek Colonels

chapter 7|13 pages

Beyond the bi-polar world

Greece’s relations with China, Israel and Africa, 1967–73

part II|79 pages

International institutions and transnational processes

chapter 8|23 pages

A clash of cultures?

The UN, the Council of Europe and the Greek dictators

chapter 9|14 pages

Taking a stance

The European Community and the Greek junta

chapter 10|13 pages

The challenges of modernism

Greece, environmentalism and the NATO Committee on the Challenges of Modern Society, 1969–79

chapter 11|12 pages

‘The situation in Greece’

American human rights activism in the wake of the 1967 coup*

chapter 12|15 pages

The Beckets vs. the Colonels

A study in the micro-evolution of global human rights activism in the ‘long 1960s’

part III|79 pages

Transitions in Southern Europe

chapter 14|24 pages

International dimensions of democratization

Revisiting the Spanish case

chapter 15|12 pages

The Cold War and the Portuguese Revolution

Three paradigms of an exemplary case study

chapter 16|13 pages

The Greek transition to democracy

chapter 17|16 pages

Praetorian military regimes

The Greek case

part |10 pages

Conclusions

chapter 18|8 pages

The Colonels’ dictatorship 1967–74

Bringing in the international