Success, therefore, would depend mostly on the attributes of the personalities who were placed, by choice or chance, in the key posts of power. This view of politics naturally placed the burden of state management on the persons in power, rather than on the system of politics. He was therefore less concerned with the political system than with its actual operation. His own inclination was toward the Aristotelian division of politics into pure and corrupt versions. Venizelos was less devoted than Trikoupis to the principle of the superiority of parliamentary politics over all other forms of democratic governance. Kitromilides, 2006, 2008 and the chapters their several authors, 2006, 2008. © editorial matter and organisation Paschalis M. The book is based on extensive scholarship but it is eminently readable and it should appeal to all those interested in twentieth-century history, politics and biography, offering a vivid sense of the hopes and tragedies of Greek and European history in the age of the Great War and of the interwar crisis. Five further essays appraise in depth some critical aspects of his policies, while a final chapter offers some glimpses into a great statesman's personal and intellectual world. The complex and often dramatic trajectory of Venizelos' career from Cretan rebel to an admired European statesman is chartered out in a sequence of chapters that survey his meteoric rise and great achievements in Greek and European politics in the early decades of the twentieth century, amidst violent passions and tragic conflicts. The entire project is oriented toward placing the study of Venizelos' leadership in the broad setting of twentieth-century politics and diplomacy. The book draws on considerable new research that has appeared in Greek in the last quarter century, but does not confine the treatment of the subject in a purely Greek or even Balkan context. The aspiration of the present book is to fill this lacuna by bringing together the concerted research effort of twelve experts on Greek history and politics. Yet the last book-length study discussing the man, his politics and his broader role in twentieth-century history has appeared in English more than fifty years ago. The last section discusses the Baltic states' security policies and possible future security arrangements, accentuating the need for a subregional solution including all coastal states on the Baltic Sea.Įleftherios Venizelos, Prime Minister of Greece, 32, could be considered from many points of view the creator of contemporary Greece and one of the main actors in European diplomacy in the period 1910-1935. Today the unintegrated Russian-speaking and Polish minorities contribute to domestic instability, which easily spills over into foreign affairs. The achievement of independence in September 1991 brought a concentration on domestic concerns. Four phases of alternating confrontation and negotiation characterized Moscow-Baltic relations in the period up to the aborted coup. After March 1990, an `interregnum period' followed, with internal strife about the proper direction of foreign policy. Between the wars, what governed their foreign policies, besides their lack of appreciation of great power politics, was a concentration on their own local affairs. Only Lithuania drew on the Soviet Union as a partner. None used the Western powers to counter-balance the Soviet Union or Germany. In the interwar years none of the Baltic states seemed to appreciate that their situation necessitated such thinking and such choices. Above all, rim states must pay attention to great-power diplomacy. The general argument is that small states located near a great power can choose between alliance with their more powerful neighbor, alliance with his chief rival, or some kind of neutrality. The article surveys and analyzes the foreign policies and relevant domestic political conditions of the Baltic states since 1918, emphasizing the period after 11 March 1990.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |