Dr Christina KOULOURI Associate Professor in Cultural and Social History of Modern Greece History and Ethnology Department Democritus University of Thrace

New Challenges for the Study of Modern Greek History The science of history in Greece has the good fortune - and, at one and the same time, the misfortune - to be the oldest of the social sciences with institutionalised authority and a professional status. Since the founding of the University of Athens in 1837, history has been structured into a discipline, while, by means of the teaching and writing activities of those who have served it, the dominant historiographical canon has been formed. At the same time, of course, history also has the misfortune to be the most ideologically charged of sciences and the one most vulnerable to political uses. The consequences of this can be divided into at least two levels: 1. The university establishment which has been created is only with difficulty capable of renewal, and with even greater difficulty of being dislodged - and this fact has its influence on teaching and research (for example, at the level of postgraduate studies). 2. Controversies about history are not, as is usually the case with the other sciences, only academic; many think that they are legitimated in expressing a view - particularly in the case of events of the recent past - in which experiential testimony is put forward as more valid than the scientific viewpoint. This does not influence, in all probability, historical research as such as much as the dissemination of a knowledge of history and what we would term the historical culture of a society. The purpose of these observations is to serve as a reminder, by way of introduction, of the self-evident: that if we are to speak of 'new challenges' in modern historiography, we should not remain entrapped in a self-referential academic debate in the belief that the controversies and the different 'camps' which have taken shape are bound up exclusively or in a privileged manner with the evolution of the science of history. In this brief paper, I shall attempt to record and interpret both the extra-historiographical

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'challenges' and the challenges which arise within the bounds of historical science. I shall, nonetheless, dwell more on the latter. The extra-historiographical challenges have their origins in political and social changes at an international and a national level which have inevitably influenced the production of academic discourse and, more particularly, historiographical production. In schematic form, we can start out from the turning-point of 1974 with the fall of the dictatorship of the Colonels, go on to the turning-point of 1981 with the rise to power of the Panhellenic Socialist Movement (PASOK), and so arrive at the third turning-point of 1989 and the war in Yugoslavia which followed. The '70s and '80s can justly be seen as a period in which modern Greek historiography flourished. The fall of the anti-communist and extreme nationalist regime of 21 April 1967 opened the way for an overall revision of the way of looking at the past - a revision which was both ideological and academic. Younger historians wanted to rid Greek historiography of the ideological constructs and political uses of the dominant sociopolitical groupings after the Civil War. The rise of PASOK to power in particular produced the political conditions for the history of those defeated in the Civil War to come to the forefront, and, at the same time, for the university chairs in history to be open to younger historians with different ideological and political positions and modern academic training. In the last decade, the recrudescence of nationalism in the Balkans has had its repercussions in Greece, with consequences for historiography: new trends have been created in research interests, with more or less obvious politico-ideological commitment (more specifically, interest in Balkan history and Turkish studies, but also in European history). The traditional nationalistic historiography has taken on other aliases at this new juncture, while neo-conservative approaches have been concealed behind modern historical methods. At the same time, the historiography of leftist intellectuals, which has been predominant since 1974, was required in the 1990s to deal with the nationalist redeployment, as well as the general identity crisis of the Left.

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If we want to formulate some general observations on the evolution of modern Greek historiography in these three decades, we could, schematically, draw attention to the following: 1. The capacity of the 'historian' has taken on a professional character, so that it is now clearly distinguished from the overarching and dominating capacity of the 'philologist'. Thus a distinct professional group has been created which includes those who teach history at the universities and researchers at the appropriate research centres. The intellectual product of this group, which we could call 'professional historiography' is distinct from the studies of amateur historians and the public, popularising uses of history. These public uses - among which we can include supplements on historical subjects in newspapers, which have increased at an inflationary rate in recent years - are, nevertheless, a new challenge for professional historians to the extent that they themselves play a role in them or have to deal with them. 2. History has established communications with the other social sciences within a framework of inter-disciplinary dialogue, dictated by international developments in the field of the social sciences. Indeed, in the 1970s, important works on modern Greek history came not from historians but from sociologists, political scientists, and economists. In the 1990s, moreover, history encountered anthropology and literary criticism. These encounters did not always lead to successful forms of osmosis: social scientists - economists and sociologists, for example - have produced a-historical 'schemata' for modern Greek history, while historians have not managed an organic integration of the tools of the sciences with which they share boundaries in their own studies. At the same time, demarcations of a corporate type have made their re-appearance in an effort at entrenchment of particular professional fields. 3. The history which developed from the 1970s onwards was termed 'New Greek History' by analogy with the French school of 'New History' of the Annales, which, moreover, also had a decisive influence on the relevant Greek production. One result of this influence was the dominance of economic and social history and the history of mentalities. In the '90s, by way of contrast, an interest in the study of identities and cultural history developed, while economic history went into decline.

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4. In spite of the ideological and academic re-orientations to which we have referred, historiographical production has remained Hellenocentric - without this necessarily also meaning ethnocentric. The subjects for study are almost exclusively Greek, and a comparative approach at regional or European level is rarely adopted. Traditional historiography, moreover, has bequeathed a series of mental tools which often indirectly undermine innovative approaches. What I have in mind here are the division into periods and the terminology of Greek history. For example, the selection of key events such as the Fall of Constantinople and of terms such as 'Turkish Rule' (Turkokratia) perpetuate independently of the authors - stereotyped views of the collective past. Similarly, Ottoman studies, as these have developed in Greece, have to do with the study of the period of Ottoman rule chiefly in Greek regions and only secondarily in the rest of the Balkans and in Asia Minor. Thus the Ottoman Empire is studied within the context of the narration of national history. Hellenocentrism can also be identified in the organisation of university history curricula, in which subjects for study which lie outside the field of national history clearly occupy a marginal position. An evaluation of Greek historiographical production in the last 30 years was undertaken a few months ago. In November 2002, the Centre for Modern Greek Studies of the National Research Foundation held a major conference in Athens on 'The Historiography of Modern and Contemporary Greece, 1833 - 2002'. At this conference, a mapping and an evaluation of progress up to the present were carried out under six headings, which I think it important to quote: (1) the structuring of national historiography; (2) cultural history - history of education; (3) social history; (4) economic history; (5) history of institutions and of the Greek state; (6) historiographical debates: these included the subjects of the Greek Revolution of 1821, the Occupation - Resistance - Civil War period, and the post-War period. The selections made in this last unit suggest that while there are countless studies on the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and down to 1922, very little has been written on the critical period of the Civil War and on post-War history. It was generally agreed that the conference was an outstanding success; it attracted large audiences beyond all expectations and revealed the potential of the science of 4

history today. It was also successful because it elicited a scholarly dialogue which showed the quality of Greek historical studies. The ex post facto presentations of the conference and the discussions which took place inside and outside the conference hall converged on the conclusion that Greek historiography is today at a 'crossroads', is faced with 'new challenges', while some regarded the conference as the 'swansong of the Left'. However, the evaluations which found expression or the intensity of the discussions were undoubtedly disproportionate to the actual seriousness of the changes. I shall attempt here to set down some observations arising out of this conference, which some of you perhaps attended; these, together with what I have already explained, may be regarded as comments on the 'challenges' which Greek historiography faces today: 1. Visible gaps can be identified in the research into both periods and subjects of modern Greek history. Social history, as traditionally understood as a history of the labour movement, is absent. Also absent is the history of the Greek bourgeois class. Post-War history has been studied by historians minimally or not at all, though, on the other hand, it has been the subject of research for other social sciences. Strangely enough, the War of Independence of 1821 is also a neglected subject. For these gaps, there are, of course, historical explanations. For example, the absence of the War of 1821, the 'supreme' event of modern Greek history, can be attributed to a whole series of reasons, which were cited at the conference by Professor Christos Loukos: the identification of the Revolution with political, diplomatic and military history, its intensive ideological use, and a turn towards more recent history have discouraged younger historians. 2. The picture given by the conference as to the state of historiography is accurate only in part. It certainly brought to light the fact that what was up to 30 years ago marginal has now become dominant. And this is, in my opinion, the greatest change that has taken place. Nevertheless, the traditional historiography of the publication of sources without commentary or of a descriptive, positivist, narration, and ethnocentric or even nationalistic historical narrative continue on their own way in universities and research centres. This kind of history is usually absent from academic conferences such as that of the Centre for Modern Greek

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Studies, but it makes its appearance at others, while it is in admirable accord with public uses of history. 3. The dialogue which predominated at the conference took place - at least, thus it would appear at a first level - between the representatives, on the one hand, of an earlier Marxist historiography and, on the other, of a later postmodernism. This confrontation seemed to give expression to a controversy between generations of historians, and at the same time appeared to be a front for political and ideological confrontations which go beyond the field of scholarship. To schematise a little: it seemed that the one party had the ideological legitimation of the political 'correctness' of left-wing positions, while the other had the scientific legitimation of international historiographical trends. In neither case were the groups homogeneous, nor were their political commitments necessarily aligned with those of their scholarship. The critique of postmodernism in fact belonged within a critique of late capitalism, while at the same time it gave expression to the anti-Americanism which predominates in Greek society. As became apparent from the dialogue, postmodernism was attacked as a trend of American origin and of a neo-liberal tinge. At the same time, the value of archival research was extolled; this, according to the critics of postmodernism, has been abandoned because "priority has been given to appearances rather than to reality". In this latter case, postmodernism was criticised within a spirit of defence of scientific rationalism and of critical discourse. Consequently, the polemics against postmodernism brought together two groups and two types of critique - the 'political' trend, on the one hand, and the 'scientific', on the other. Nevertheless, these polemics were not based on a knowledge of postmodernism either as an academic tendency, or as to its political identity. The debate was transposed and adapted to the Greek situation. The change in the academic paradigm was personalised and politicised in a way which went beyond the bounds of a dialogue internal to historiography. Perhaps it would be no exaggeration to say that the debate on postmodernism was the pretext which provided the cover for broader changes and conflicts in the world of left-wing intellectuals, on the one hand, and in the corporatism of historians, on the other. This view is strengthened by the fact that 6

postmodernism is minimally represented in modern Greek historiography by specific works or by organised groups. It is pervasive in discussions, but not in historical method. Indeed, as a distinguished representative of economic history put it at the conference, "it's a passing fashion", and he went so far as to compare it with the 'fashion' of economic history which had gone before it ! To sum up: There is a reflexivity mechanism taking place on the part of Greek historians as to their identity - not only their academic, but also their political identity. While in the '70s and '80s, the boundaries with 'traditional' historiography were clear and the definition of 'progressive' and 'conservative' seemed pre-determined by Greece's postWar history, from around the mid '90s, boundaries and definitions have seemed equally confused. The delineation of postmodernism provides a particularly eloquent example in this regard: what is postmodernism, progressive or conservative? Since the debate takes place within the ranks of the Left, both supporters and opponents of postmodernism define themselves as 'progressives' and lay equal claim to the leftist political identity. This discussion is, nevertheless, exceptionally introvert and seems to ignore the human geography of the production and consumption of historical knowledge. A simple review of Greece's departments of history would reveal the marginality of the debate and would demonstrate both the continuity of traditional historiography and that the historiographical expression of the neo-liberal tendency is now in the ascendant. The new challenges, then, for Greek historiography today come from a convergence of many factors: the decline of 'New History' of French origin, the abundance of historical publications - academic and popularising - the political, social and economic

upheaval

in

the

neighbouring

Balkans,

international

trends

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historiography, ideological developments in Greek society. And the response of historians to these challenges cannot be defensive.

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