THE POLITICAL PARTIES IN GREECE

How many parties exist in Greece? Nowadays, there are many political parties. However, only 5 of them participate in the Greek parliament. These are the ones that usually get the most votes. Thereby, these 5 will be analyzed below…

Communist Party of Greece (KKE) Founded in 1918, the Communist Party of Greece , is a far-left party, and the oldest one  on the Greek political scene   KKE is a force in the Greek political scene, rallying a significant amount of support within the organized working-class movement. KKE is currently trying to mold a loose and rather disorganized international communist movement along a purely Marxist-Leninist line. KKE's youth organization is the Communist Youth of Greece, KNE, which closely supports KKE's goals and strategic targets. It publishes the daily newspaper Rizospastis. It also publishes the political and theoretical journal Komounistiki Epitheorisi (Communist Review) every two months and a journal covering educational issues, Themata Paideias (Education issues). It also owns the 902 TV and radio station. Every year the youth organizes the annual festival of KNE, where many well-known music artists give concerts.

Coalition of the Radical Left (SYRIZA) The Coalition of the Radical Left, is a coalition of left political parties in Greece, which emerged in 2004 from smaller left parties.   Its ideology is democratic socialism, anti-capitalism, and eco-socialism. It is a member party of the European Left. Just like KKE, SYRIZA’s Youth, called Neolaia Synaispismou (youth coalition) , organizes its own music festival.

Panhellenic Socialist Movement (PASOK) It is a social democratic party, founded in 1974, exactly after the collapse of the military dictatorship, by Andreas Papandreou. It was the first left party in the Greek history to win the elections in 1981 with 48%. It remained in power for lots of years, from 1981 to 1989, then from 1993 to 2004 and finally from 2009 until present. In 2010, the Prime Minister and leader of PASOK, adopted neoliberal policies, allegedly under the pressure of the European Union, like further privatization of state enterprises, salary cuts and heavier taxation of working and middle class citizens.  

New Democracy (ND) New Democracy is the main centre-right political party and one of the two major parties in Greece. It was founded in 1974 by Konstantinos Karamanlis and it was the first party to rule Greece after the fall of the military dictatorship. Its ideology is conservatism, liberal conservatism and Christian democracy, and its political position is centre-right. New Democracy is now the main opposition party in the Hellenic Parliament, after its smashing defeat in the 2009 Greek elections in which they recorded their historical lowest percentage of votes.

Popular Orthodox Rally (LAOS) It was founded and led by journalist Georgios Karatzaferis. He formed LAOS in 2000, a few months after he was expelled from the centre-right New Democracy. The party claims to consist of radically diverse groups that span the entire Left-Right political spectrum.  Its ideology is mainly Greek nationalism and National Conservatism. It is a Right-Wing political party. It has a youth called “NEOS”, which means “young” in Greek