116-535: The Coalition of the Radical Left – Progressive Alliance ( Greek : Συνασπισμός Ριζοσπαστικής Αριστεράς – Προοδευτική Συμμαχία , romanized : Synaspismós Rizospastikís Aristerás – Proodeftikí Simachía ), best known by the syllabic abbreviation SYRIZA ( / ˈ s ɪ r ɪ z ə / , Greek : ΣΥΡΙΖΑ [ˈsiriza] ; a pun on the Greek adverb σύρριζα , meaning "from the roots" or "radically"),
232-464: A caretaker government was formed to lead the country to a second, snap election. In the June election , Syriza regressed to 17.83%, 2.24% lower than its May results, with ND losing only 0.23%, in an election marred by low turnout. Even though Syriza did retain second place-and official opposition status, Tsipras resigned as party leader 4 days after the election, stating that he would remain involved in
348-577: A basis for coinages: anthropology , photography , telephony , isomer , biomechanics , cinematography , etc. Together with Latin words , they form the foundation of international scientific and technical vocabulary ; for example, all words ending in -logy ('discourse'). There are many English words of Greek origin . Greek is an independent branch of the Indo-European language family. The ancient language most closely related to it may be ancient Macedonian , which, by most accounts,
464-491: A cycle of introversion is closing. In November 2023, SYRIZA was polling in third place for the first time in over eleven years. In early December 2023, those that split from the party formed the New Left party. The 2024 European parliament election was the first electoral test for Stefanos Kasselakis as leader of the party, and the first set of European Elections since Brexit . Syriza failed to increase its percentage from
580-558: A fairly stable set of consonantal contrasts . The main phonological changes occurred during the Hellenistic and Roman period (see Koine Greek phonology for details): In all its stages, the morphology of Greek shows an extensive set of productive derivational affixes , a limited but productive system of compounding and a rich inflectional system. Although its morphological categories have been fairly stable over time, morphological changes are present throughout, particularly in
696-508: A faster, more convenient cursive writing style with the use of ink and quill . The Greek alphabet consists of 24 letters, each with an uppercase ( majuscule ) and lowercase ( minuscule ) form. The letter sigma has an additional lowercase form (ς) used in the final position of a word: In addition to the letters, the Greek alphabet features a number of diacritical signs : three different accent marks ( acute , grave , and circumflex ), originally denoting different shapes of pitch accent on
812-540: A foreign language. It is also often stated that the historical changes have been relatively slight compared with some other languages. According to one estimation, " Homeric Greek is probably closer to Demotic than 12-century Middle English is to modern spoken English ". Greek is spoken today by at least 13 million people, principally in Greece and Cyprus along with a sizable Greek-speaking minority in Albania near
928-408: A lead in opinion polls, but its anti-austerity position worried investors and eurozone supporters. The party's chief economic advisor, John Milios , downplayed fears that Greece under a Syriza government would exit the eurozone while shadow development minister George Stathakis disclosed the party's intention to crack down on Greek oligarchs if it wins the election. In the election, Syriza defeated
1044-588: A municipal councillor for the municipality of Athens , as party president on 10 February 2008. Alavanos retained the parliamentary leadership of Syriza, as Tsipras was not at that time a member of parliament. Tsipras achieved considerable popularity with the Greek electorate, which led to a surge in support for Syriza in opinion polls, up to 18 percent of the vote at its peak. At the end of June 2008, Start – Socialist Internationalist Organisation (Greek: Ξεκίνημα – Σοσιαλιστική Διεθνιστική Οργάνωση, Xekínima – Sosialistiké Diethnistikí Orgánosi ) announced that it would join
1160-401: A plan to have a shared list in the next legislative election in 2027. Major supporters of this are Nikos Pappas from Syriza and Haris Doukas from PASOK. On 7 September 2024, 100 members of the party's central committee tabled a censure motion against Stefanos Kasselakis after he had rejected their initial request for new elections. The members who submitted the motion blamed the leader for
1276-601: A radical alternative, stating that "The body we are establishing is a pluralistic body, open to the existence of different ideological, historical and value sensitivities and currents of thought. It is anchored by class in the labor and wider popular movement, but also with explicit feminist and ecological goals. It is already gathering forces and currents of the communist, radical, renewalist, anti-capitalist, revolutionary and libertarian Left of all shades, left-wing socialists, democrats, forces of left-wing feminism and radical ecology. Because it respects and considers differences like
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#17327648995981392-642: A strategic alliance. The party's culture has been enriched by its active participation in the movement against the Neoliberal Capitalist Globalization." Synaspismos aspired to be a "canopy party"; where, under the party flag, one could find people of varying ideological and theoretical backgrounds. Therefore, SYN members were encouraged to form, or participate in, intra-party platforms on the basis of kinship in ideology. Platforms mounted open discussions and published magazines, but might not work against party consensus decisions. Note:
1508-584: A typical left-wing populist party, but this was disputed after its government term and its recent opposition. Syriza is the third largest party in the Hellenic Parliament . Former party chairman Alexis Tsipras served as Prime Minister of Greece from 26 January 2015 to 20 August 2015 and from 21 September 2015 to 8 July 2019. It is a member of the Party of the European Left . Following
1624-404: Is a centre-left to left-wing political party in Greece . It was founded in 2004 as a political coalition of left-wing and radical left parties, and registered as a political party in 2012. A democratic socialist , progressive party, Syriza holds a pro-European stance. Syriza also advocates for alter-globalisation , LGBT rights , and secularism . In the past, SYRIZA was described as
1740-804: Is also found in Bulgaria near the Greek-Bulgarian border. Greek is also spoken worldwide by the sizable Greek diaspora which has notable communities in the United States , Australia , Canada , South Africa , Chile , Brazil , Argentina , Russia , Ukraine , the United Kingdom , and throughout the European Union , especially in Germany . Historically, significant Greek-speaking communities and regions were found throughout
1856-773: Is an Indo-European language, constituting an independent Hellenic branch within the Indo-European language family. It is native to Greece , Cyprus , Italy (in Calabria and Salento ), southern Albania , and other regions of the Balkans , Caucasus , the Black Sea coast, Asia Minor , and the Eastern Mediterranean . It has the longest documented history of any Indo-European language, spanning at least 3,400 years of written records. Its writing system
1972-479: Is an Indo-European language, but also includes a number of borrowings from the languages of the populations that inhabited Greece before the arrival of Proto-Greeks, some documented in Mycenaean texts ; they include a large number of Greek toponyms . The form and meaning of many words have changed. Loanwords (words of foreign origin) have entered the language, mainly from Latin, Venetian , and Turkish . During
2088-519: Is protected and promoted officially as a regional and minority language in Armenia, Hungary , Romania, and Ukraine. It is recognized as a minority language and protected in Turkey by the 1923 Treaty of Lausanne . The phonology , morphology , syntax , and vocabulary of the language show both conservative and innovative tendencies across the entire attestation of the language from the ancient to
2204-845: Is sometimes called aljamiado , as when Romance languages are written in the Arabic alphabet. Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in Greek: Transcription of the example text into Latin alphabet : Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in English: Proto-Greek Mycenaean Ancient Koine Medieval Modern Synaspismos The Coalition of
2320-526: Is spoken by at least 13.5 million people today in Greece, Cyprus, Italy, Albania, Turkey , and the many other countries of the Greek diaspora . Greek roots have been widely used for centuries and continue to be widely used to coin new words in other languages; Greek and Latin are the predominant sources of international scientific vocabulary . Greek has been spoken in the Balkan peninsula since around
2436-763: Is still used internationally for the writing of Ancient Greek . In Greek, the question mark is written as the English semicolon, while the functions of the colon and semicolon are performed by a raised point (•), known as the ano teleia ( άνω τελεία ). In Greek the comma also functions as a silent letter in a handful of Greek words, principally distinguishing ό,τι ( ó,ti , 'whatever') from ότι ( óti , 'that'). Ancient Greek texts often used scriptio continua ('continuous writing'), which means that ancient authors and scribes would write word after word with no spaces or punctuation between words to differentiate or mark boundaries. Boustrophedon , or bi-directional text,
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#17327648995982552-650: Is the Greek alphabet , which has been used for approximately 2,800 years; previously, Greek was recorded in writing systems such as Linear B and the Cypriot syllabary . The alphabet arose from the Phoenician script and was in turn the basis of the Latin , Cyrillic , Coptic , Gothic , and many other writing systems. The Greek language holds a very important place in the history of the Western world. Beginning with
2668-477: The 1994 European Parliament elections . Two years later, with 5.12%, got its highest score in 1996 legislative elections . In the legislative elections of 2000 , SYN was supported by the small Renewing Communist Ecological Left (AKOA) party and a small group of ecologists. After the elections a few members of the National Committee, who were asking for approximation with the social democrats, left
2784-463: The 2023 legislative election and failed to win any provinces. Due to the fall in support for New Democracy , Syriza managed to close the difference in vote share between the two largest parties from over 20% in the legislative elections to 13.3%. The weakened position of the government and the failure of PASOK to re-establish itself as the principal opposition led to talks of a united centre-left between PASOK and Syriza, who are currently considering
2900-495: The Eastern Mediterranean , in what are today Southern Italy , Turkey , Cyprus , Syria , Lebanon , Israel , Palestine , Egypt , and Libya ; in the area of the Black Sea , in what are today Turkey, Bulgaria , Romania , Ukraine , Russia , Georgia , Armenia , and Azerbaijan ; and, to a lesser extent, in the Western Mediterranean in and around colonies such as Massalia , Monoikos , and Mainake . It
3016-516: The Indo-Iranian languages (see Graeco-Aryan ), but little definitive evidence has been found. In addition, Albanian has also been considered somewhat related to Greek and Armenian, and it has been proposed that they all form a higher-order subgroup along with other extinct languages of the ancient Balkans; this higher-order subgroup is usually termed Palaeo-Balkan , and Greek has a central position in it. Linear B , attested as early as
3132-606: The President of Greece to try to form a government but failed, as he could not muster the necessary number of parliamentarians. Subsequently, Tsipras rejected a proposal by the president to join a coalition government with the centre-right and centre-left parties. For the second legislative election held on 17 June, Syriza re-registered as a single party (adding the United Social Front moniker) as its previous coalition status would have disqualified it from receiving
3248-549: The eurozone , its chairman Alexis Tsipras has declared that the "euro is not my fetish". The Vice President of the European Parliament and Syriza MEP Dimitrios Papadimoulis stated that Greece should "be a respectable member of the European Union and the euro zone", and that "there is absolutely no case for a Grexit ". Tsipras clarified that Syriza "does not support any sort of Euroscepticism", though
3364-566: The feminist Women for Another Europe (Greek: Γυναίκες για μια Άλλη Ευρώπη, Gynaíkes gia mia Álli Evrópi ) list. The crisis ended in December 2004 with the 4th convention of Synaspismos, when a large majority within the party voted for the continuation of the coalition. This change of attitude was further intensified with the election of Alekos Alavanos, a staunch supporter of the coalition, as president of Synaspismos, after its former leader, Nikos Konstantopoulos , stepped down. The coalition
3480-492: The nominal and verbal systems. The major change in the nominal morphology since the classical stage was the disuse of the dative case (its functions being largely taken over by the genitive ). The verbal system has lost the infinitive , the synthetically -formed future, and perfect tenses and the optative mood . Many have been replaced by periphrastic ( analytical ) forms. Pronouns show distinctions in person (1st, 2nd, and 3rd), number (singular, dual , and plural in
3596-593: The 1st Congress of European Left (29–30 October 2005), which formulated the Athens Declaration of the European Left as the manifesto of the European Left party. Well-known executive members of Synaspismos were: Alexis Tsipras , Alekos Alavanos , Giannis Dragasakis , Nikos Konstantopoulos , Panagiotis Lafazanis et al. Synaspismos was closely connected with the following: The structure of SYN consists of three levels: SYN's youth organisation
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3712-473: The 3% threshold and had no parliamentary representation. Tsipras renewed Syriza's previous coalition agreement with ANEL, giving the new government 155 seats out of 300 in parliament. On 26 May, following losses in the 2019 European Parliament election and the concurrent local elections, Tsipras announced a snap election . During the legislative election in September, the party was defeated by ND. Following
3828-470: The 3rd millennium BC, or possibly earlier. The earliest written evidence is a Linear B clay tablet found in Messenia that dates to between 1450 and 1350 BC, making Greek the world's oldest recorded living language . Among the Indo-European languages, its date of earliest written attestation is matched only by the now-extinct Anatolian languages . The Greek language is conventionally divided into
3944-456: The 50 "bonus" seats given to the largest polling party under the Greek electoral system. Although Syriza increased its share of the vote to just under 27%, ND polled 29.8% and claimed the bonus. With 71 seats, Syriza became the main opposition party to a coalition government composed of ND, PASOK, and DIMAR. Tsipras subsequently formed a Shadow Cabinet in July 2012. In July 2013, a Syriza congress
4060-1017: The Coalition of the Radical Left in January 2004. The parties that had formed the Coalition of the Radical Left in January 2004 were the Coalition of Left, of Movements and Ecology (Synaspismos or SYN), the Renewing Communist Ecological Left (AKOA), the Internationalist Workers Left (DEA), the Movement for the United in Action Left (KEDA), which was a splinter group of the Communist Party of Greece (KKE), Active Citizens, which
4176-486: The Greek alphabet since approximately the 9th century BC. It was created by modifying the Phoenician alphabet , with the innovation of adopting certain letters to represent the vowels. The variant of the alphabet in use today is essentially the late Ionic variant, introduced for writing classical Attic in 403 BC. In classical Greek, as in classical Latin, only upper-case letters existed. The lower-case Greek letters were developed much later by medieval scribes to permit
4292-425: The Greek language are often emphasized. Although Greek has undergone morphological and phonological changes comparable to those seen in other languages, never since classical antiquity has its cultural, literary, and orthographic tradition been interrupted to the extent that one can speak of a new language emerging. Greek speakers today still tend to regard literary works of ancient Greek as part of their own rather than
4408-495: The Greek language was the Cypriot syllabary (also a descendant of Linear A via the intermediate Cypro-Minoan syllabary ), which is closely related to Linear B but uses somewhat different syllabic conventions to represent phoneme sequences. The Cypriot syllabary is attested in Cyprus from the 11th century BC until its gradual abandonment in the late Classical period, in favor of the standard Greek alphabet. Greek has been written in
4524-567: The Greek parliament, a resignation that was withdrawn a few days later. In the 2009 Greek legislative election held on 4 October, Syriza won 4.6% of the vote (slightly below its 2007 showing), returning thirteen MPs to the Hellenic Parliament. The incoming MPs included Tsipras, who took over as Syriza's parliamentary leader. In June 2010, Ananeotiki (Reformist Wing) of radical social democrats in Synapsismós split away from
4640-629: The Greek verb have likewise remained largely the same over the course of the language's history but with significant changes in the number of distinctions within each category and their morphological expression. Greek verbs have synthetic inflectional forms for: Many aspects of the syntax of Greek have remained constant: verbs agree with their subject only, the use of the surviving cases is largely intact (nominative for subjects and predicates, accusative for objects of most verbs and many prepositions, genitive for possessors), articles precede nouns, adpositions are largely prepositional, relative clauses follow
4756-685: The Greek-Albanian border. A significant percentage of Albania's population has knowledge of the Greek language due in part to the Albanian wave of immigration to Greece in the 1980s and '90s and the Greek community in the country. Prior to the Greco-Turkish War and the resulting population exchange in 1923 a very large population of Greek-speakers also existed in Turkey , though very few remain today. A small Greek-speaking community
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4872-679: The Left Platform (Greek: Αριστερή Πλάτφορμα, Aristerí Plátforma ) led by Panayiotis Lafazanis, which wanted to leave the door open to quitting the euro, secured 30% (60) of the seats on Syriza's central committee. A modest success was also claimed by the Communist Platform (Greek section of the International Marxist Tendency ), who managed to get two members elected to the party's central committee. In its founding declaration, Syriza presented itself as
4988-466: The Left and Progress ( Greek : Συνασπισμός της Αριστεράς και της Προόδου , Synaspismós tīs Aristerás kai tīs Proódou ) until 2003. In 2004 SYN was a founding member of the Party of the European Left . SYN was the largest party of the left-wing coalition formed in 2004 called Coalition of the Radical Left (SYRIZA). SYN was dissolved in 2013. Synaspismos emerged initially as an electoral coalition at
5104-518: The Left into disunion, and the traditional majority within KKE purged all non-hardliners from the party—almost 45% of the Central Committee members, including ex-general secretary Grigoris Farakos , and majorities in many Local Committees (named by the KKE majority as revisionists and by the press as the renewers ). At this time KKE also left the coalition. After that, the other parties of
5220-402: The Left, of Movements and Ecology ( Greek : Συνασπισμός της Αριστεράς των Κινημάτων και της Οικολογίας , Synaspismós tīs Aristerás tōn Kinīmátōn kai tīs Oikologías ), commonly known as Synaspismos ( Greek : Συνασπισμός , Synaspismós , "Coalition") and abbreviated to SYN (ΣΥΝ), was a Greek political party of the radical New Left . It was founded in 1991 and was known as the Coalition of
5336-788: The National and European Parliament . After having survived the crisis of not achieving parliamentary representation in 1993, Synaspismos had, since 1996, been the fourth party in the Greek Parliament, and the third party (in terms of representation) in local government. In the European Parliament SYN was a member of the European United Left - Nordic Green Left group, and also a member of the European Social Forum . Moreover, SYN hosted
5452-574: The Radical Left (SYRIZA), but contested the Euro-elections of the same year on its own, because of ideological disagreements within the party. The alliance with the smaller parties was formed again at the end of 2005, when chairman Alekos Alavanos proposed the 30-year-old Alexis Tsipras as candidate mayor of Athens for the Municipal Election of 2006, proclaiming the party's "overture to a younger generation". The Tsipras candidacy
5568-761: The SYRIZA parliamentary group. The 6th Congress of Synaspismos took place in June 2010. The "renewing wing" led by Fotis Kouvelis , in disagreement with the party's participation in SYRIZA , left the party and founding Democratic Left . Fotis Kouvelis was followed by three more MPs, that left the party caucus. Both in the May 2012 Greek Legislative election and in the June 2012 Greek Legislative election , SYRIZA came second, electing 52 and 71 MPs, accordingly, of which 45 and 55 were part of Synaspismos. In July 2013, right before
5684-491: The Syriza Central Committee who resigned following the announcement of the snap elections in September 2015. Since 2015, the group has been the main internal opposition to Tsipras' leadership, and has also used an alternative name, the "Umbrella". On 11 November 2023, after a very tense meeting of the Central Committee, 45 members of the Central Committee belonging to Umbrella announced their withdrawal from
5800-444: The above to be its wealth, it recognizes the possibility of different political considerations and provides ground for both these sensitivities and these considerations to be cultivated seamlessly and represented in the internal democracy, always aiming at promotional compositions. The organization we are establishing is an organization that systematically takes care of the theoretical understanding of social and historical development and
5916-440: The action of these terrorist organizations. No one has been terrorized by the 17 November Group . On the contrary, the Greek people have been terrified by too many other policies". SYRIZA and Dritsas retracted that statement later on. On the issue of SYRIZA's stance towards the terrorist organization 17N , the party has also been criticised as people who are or were affiliated with the party have testified as defense witnesses during
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#17327648995986032-404: The acute during the late 20th century, and it has only been retained in typography . After the writing reform of 1982, most diacritics are no longer used. Since then, Greek has been written mostly in the simplified monotonic orthography (or monotonic system), which employs only the acute accent and the diaeresis. The traditional system, now called the polytonic orthography (or polytonic system),
6148-402: The ancient language; singular and plural alone in later stages), and gender (masculine, feminine, and neuter), and decline for case (from six cases in the earliest forms attested to four in the modern language). Nouns, articles, and adjectives show all the distinctions except for a person. Both attributive and predicative adjectives agree with the noun. The inflectional categories of
6264-498: The coalition and the renewing part of KKE decided to convert the alliance into a political party (1991). Although the 'experiment' seemed to have great potential, serious ideological conflicts were afflicting the new party. At the legislative elections of 1993 , SYN failed by 2,000 votes to pass the limit of 3% and enter the National Parliament. But next year, Synaspismos got its highest national 'score' ever (6.26%) in
6380-631: The coalition on 22 August 2007. On 2 September, the Areios Pagos refused to include the title of DIKKI in the Syriza electoral alliance, saying that the internal procedures followed by DIKKI were flawed. This was criticized by Syriza and DIKKI as inappropriate interference by the courts in party political activity. On 27 November 2007, Alavanos announced that, for private reasons, he would not be seeking to renew his presidency of Synaspismos. The 5th party congress of Synaspismos elected Alexis Tsipras ,
6496-405: The coalition. During the run-up to the 2009 European Parliament election in Greece , Syriza, amid turbulent internal developments, saw its poll share decrease to 4.7%, with the result that only one Syriza candidate (Nikos Hountis) was elected to the European Parliament. This caused renewed internal strife, leading to the resignation of former Synaspismos president Alekos Alavanos from his seat in
6612-413: The coalition. The frame of the crisis within SYRIZA was the reluctance of Synaspismos to adopt and maintain the political agreement for a clear denial of centre-left politics . Three months after the 2004 legislative election, Synaspismos chose to run independently from the rest of the coalition for the 2004 European Parliament election in Greece and some of the smaller parties of the coalition supported
6728-404: The early 19th century that was used for literary and official purposes in the newly formed Greek state. In 1976, Dimotiki was declared the official language of Greece, after having incorporated features of Katharevousa and thus giving birth to Standard Modern Greek , used today for all official purposes and in education . The historical unity and continuing identity between the various stages of
6844-618: The epics of Homer , ancient Greek literature includes many works of lasting importance in the European canon . Greek is also the language in which many of the foundational texts in science and philosophy were originally composed. The New Testament of the Christian Bible was also originally written in Greek. Together with the Latin texts and traditions of the Roman world , the Greek texts and Greek societies of antiquity constitute
6960-405: The exact word used is "τάσεις" ("tendencies"), but the term platform is more fitting in English. The role of the platforms was vital especially in congresses, because each of them proposed a thesis on party strategy and presented its own ballot of candidates for the National Committee. In the National Committee elected by the last Congress (5 February 2008), the rank (in terms of representation)
7076-423: The failure on June 2023 Greek legislative elections , leader Alexis Tsipras resigned, elections were held , and Stefanos Kasselakis assumed the presidency in September 2023. Dissatisfaction with Kasselakis led the party to a prolonged internal crisis, resulting in a motion of no confidence and new elections scheduled for November 2024. Although Syriza was launched in 2004, before that year's legislative election,
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#17327648995987192-456: The first Congress of SYRIZA , the final congress of Synaspismos took place, that overwhelmingly voted to disestablish Synaspismos and to merge with SYRIZA . SYN described itself as "a radical left party, inspired by the ideas of the renewal of the communist and broader left movement in Greece and in Europe. It also fights for the merging of the ecological movement along with the left, to form
7308-562: The following election and outlined the basis for the political alliance. The coalition of 2007 has also expanded from its original composition in 2004. On 20 June 2007, the KOE announced its participation into the coalition. On 21 August, the environmentalist Ecological Intervention (Greek: Οικολογική Παρέμβαση, Oikologikí Parémvasi ) also joined, and the Democratic Social Movement (DIKKI) also announced its participation in
7424-452: The following periods: In the modern era, the Greek language entered a state of diglossia : the coexistence of vernacular and archaizing written forms of the language. What came to be known as the Greek language question was a polarization between two competing varieties of Modern Greek: Dimotiki , the vernacular form of Modern Greek proper, and Katharevousa , meaning 'purified', a compromise between Dimotiki and Ancient Greek developed in
7540-455: The incumbent ND and became the largest party in the Hellenic Parliament, receiving 36.3% of the vote and 149 out of 300 seats. Tsipras was congratulated by French president François Hollande who stressed Greco-French friendship, as well as by leftist leaders all over Europe, including Pablo Iglesias Turrión of Spain's Podemos and Katja Kipping of Germany's Die Linke . German government official Hans-Peter Friedrich said: "The Greeks have
7656-439: The infinitive entirely (employing a raft of new periphrastic constructions instead) and uses participles more restrictively. The loss of the dative led to a rise of prepositional indirect objects (and the use of the genitive to directly mark these as well). Ancient Greek tended to be verb-final, but neutral word order in the modern language is VSO or SVO. Modern Greek inherits most of its vocabulary from Ancient Greek, which in turn
7772-536: The larger European Social Forum , the Space also provided the ground from which several of the member parties and organizations launched the Greek Social Forum. The defining moment for the birth of Syriza came in the 2004 legislative election. Most of the participants of the Space sought to develop a common platform that could potentially lead to an electoral alliance . This led to the eventual formation of
7888-501: The largest of the coalition parties, which led to a lot of tension within the coalition. After the 2004 legislative election, the smaller parties accused Synaspismos of not honoring an agreement to have one of its members of parliament resign so that Yannis Banias of the AKOA could take his seat. Tension built up and resulted in the split of the Internationalist Workers Left and the formation of Kokkino (Red), both of which remained within
8004-467: The late 15th century BC, was the first script used to write Greek. It is basically a syllabary , which was finally deciphered by Michael Ventris and John Chadwick in the 1950s (its precursor, Linear A , has not been deciphered and most likely encodes a non-Greek language). The language of the Linear B texts, Mycenaean Greek , is the earliest known form of Greek. Another similar system used to write
8120-633: The late 1980s, with the pro-Soviet Communist Party of Greece (KKE) and the Greek Left , one of the successors of the eurocommunist KKE Interior , as its largest constituents. The Party of Democratic Socialism , a splinter from the Union of the Democratic Centre which occupied a similar position to PASOK , was the largest non- Communist member party. The disintegration of the USSR brought
8236-444: The late 1990s, such as the Kosovo War , privatizations of state businesses , and social and civil rights. The Space provided the ground from which participating parties could work together on issues such as their opposition to the neoliberal reform of the pension and social security systems, and the new anti-terrorism legislation , a review of the role of the European Union and a redetermination of Greece's position in it, and
8352-645: The latter the official opposition . The main constituent element of the original coalition was Synaspismos , a democratic socialist party, but Syriza was founded with a goal of uniting left-wing and radical left groups. Syriza is influenced by the democratic road to socialism associated with Nicos Poulantzas , but is broadly inclusive of various schools of democratic socialist thought intersecting with Marxism , market socialism , and Trotskyism ; as well as social democrats , Maoists and Marxist-Leninists . Additionally, despite its secular ideology, many members are Christians who are anti-clerical and opposed to
8468-544: The local elections was less clear-cut, due to the number of non-party local tickets and independents contending for office. Syriza's main success was the election of Rena Dourou to the Attica Regional governorship with 50.8% of the second-round vote over the incumbent Yiannis Sgouros. Its biggest disappointment was the failure of Gabriel Sakellaridis to win the Athens Mayoralty election, being beaten in
8584-576: The membership of Greece and Cyprus in the European Union, Greek is one of the organization's 24 official languages . Greek is recognized as a minority language in Albania, and used co-officially in some of its municipalities, in the districts of Gjirokastër and Sarandë . It is also an official minority language in the regions of Apulia and Calabria in Italy. In the framework of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages , Greek
8700-441: The modern period. The division into conventional periods is, as with all such periodizations, relatively arbitrary, especially because, in all periods, Ancient Greek has enjoyed high prestige, and the literate borrowed heavily from it. Across its history, the syllabic structure of Greek has varied little: Greek shows a mixed syllable structure, permitting complex syllabic onsets but very restricted codas. It has only oral vowels and
8816-399: The noun they modify and relative pronouns are clause-initial. However, the morphological changes also have their counterparts in the syntax, and there are also significant differences between the syntax of the ancient and that of the modern form of the language . Ancient Greek made great use of participial constructions and of constructions involving the infinitive, and the modern variety lacks
8932-536: The objects of study of the discipline of Classics . During antiquity , Greek was by far the most widely spoken lingua franca in the Mediterranean world . It eventually became the official language of the Byzantine Empire and developed into Medieval Greek . In its modern form , Greek is the official language of Greece and Cyprus and one of the 24 official languages of the European Union . It
9048-706: The older periods of Greek, loanwords into Greek acquired Greek inflections, thus leaving only a foreign root word. Modern borrowings (from the 20th century on), especially from French and English, are typically not inflected; other modern borrowings are derived from Albanian , South Slavic ( Macedonian / Bulgarian ) and Eastern Romance languages ( Aromanian and Megleno-Romanian ). Greek words have been widely borrowed into other languages, including English. Example words include: mathematics , physics , astronomy , democracy , philosophy , athletics , theatre, rhetoric , baptism , evangelist , etc. Moreover, Greek words and word elements continue to be productive as
9164-463: The organization's trial. In 2021, the party drew criticism again as fifteen of its members published a declaration supporting 17N's leading member Dimitris Koufontinas, after he went on a hunger strike as a result of his demanding to be moved to another prison facility. Greek language Greek ( Modern Greek : Ελληνικά , romanized : Elliniká , [eliniˈka] ; Ancient Greek : Ἑλληνική , romanized : Hellēnikḗ )
9280-517: The party accusing the majority of neo-communist turn and created the short-lived party AEKA. AEKA was first split and little later disbanded in some months, when the head of the party became an Undersecretary in the socialdemocratic administration of Kostas Simitis . In the legislative elections of 2004 , Synaspismos, together with several smaller parties (AKOA, Movement for the United in Action Left (KEDA), Internationalist Workers Left (DEA, Active Citizens)), formed an alliance called Coalition of
9396-440: The party and formed Popular Unity to contest the snap elections. The grouping was led by former energy minister Panagiotis Lafazanis . Syriza as a unitary party was formed through the merger of the following parties. The order of presentation is chronological based on the year of joining SYRIZA. Thodoris Dritsas , a member of SYRIZA and ex-minister, drew criticism when he declared that "no one has been terrorized, I believe, by
9512-476: The party betrayed its voters and those abroad who had seen a radical promise in the party. Author and communist activist Helena Sheehan wrote that "Syriza was a horizon of hope. Now it is a vortex of despair." Having lost his majority in parliament, Tsipras resigned as Prime Minister on 20 August 2015, and called for fresh elections on September 20. Although polls suggested a close contest between Syriza and ND, Syriza led ND by 7%, winning 145 seats; LE polled below
9628-507: The party was seen by some observers as a soft Eurosceptic force for advocating another Europe free of austerity and neoliberalism . Since governing, the party took a more pro-Europeanist stance, saying that its regulatory reforms, while remaining in the Eurozone, enabled the government, in the words of Filippa Chatzistavrou, "to better address negative externalities and spillovers between Greece and other EU Member States." By 2019, Syriza
9744-403: The party with the intention of founding a Green party , later founding the party Kosmos . On 23 November 2023, nine MPs, one MEP, and 57 central committee members announced their withdrawal from the party. Among them, were former minister Efi Achtsioglou , the main opponent of Kasselakis in the internal party elections, and other former ministers. Commenting on the split, Kasselakis stressed that
9860-422: The party's internal opposition called him alt-right, Donald Trump and Pepe Grillo, leading to their expulsion from the party. At the Central Committee meeting, Kasselakis again attacked the party organs and the entire internal opposition, leading to the departure of Umbrella, the party's left-wing tendency, 45 Central Committee members, and two MPs. On 16 November, MEP Petros S. Kokkalis announced his departure from
9976-442: The party's shift to the right and further electoral decline. The next day the proposal was supported by 163 members out of a total of 300 and Stefanos Kasselakis was declared out of office. New Syriza leadership elections will be held on 24 November 2024. As of 9 November, the leadership candidates are MP Pavlos Polakis , Sokratis Famellos , MEP Nikolas Farantouris and former mayor/actor Apostolos Gletsos . After his candidature
10092-538: The party, at the same time leaving Syriza. This reduced Syriza's parliamentary group to nine MPs. The four MPs who left formed a new party, the Democratic Left (DIMAR). In a move of voters away from the parties which participated in the coalition government under the premiership of Lucas Papademos in November 2011, Syriza gained popular support in the opinion polls, as did the KKE and DIMAR. Opinion polls in
10208-403: The party. Stefanos Kasselakis was elected leader, defeating Efi Achtsioglou in the second round. After winning the leadership election, Kasselakis said that he wanted Syriza to emulate the U.S. Democratic Party and move to the centre-left . Upon taking office, Kasselakis began a redefinition of the party's positions. He rejected many of the old leftist positions of the party and formulated
10324-639: The party. Among them are former ministers such as Euclid Tsakalotos , Nikos Filis , Dimitris Vitsas , Panos Skourletis , Thodoris Dritsas , Andreas Xanthos , and the former Speaker of the Hellenic Parliament Nikos Voutsis . The majority (9 MPs 1 MEP) of which later formed the New Left Party The Left Platform were a faction within Syriza, positioned ideologically on the far-left of the party. In August 2015, 25 Left Platform MPs within Syriza left
10440-414: The preparation of the Greek participation at the 27th G8 summit in 2001. Even though it was not a political organization, but rather an effort to bring together the parties and organizations that attended, the Space gave birth to some electoral alliances for the 2002 Greek local elections , the most successful being the one led by Manolis Glezos for the super-prefecture of Athens - Piraeus . As part of
10556-416: The previous PASOK governments, in particular the party's outlook from 1974 to 1981. The Group of 53, also known as 53+, are a faction within Syriza. The group was founded in mid-2014 and stands ideologically between the Left Platform and Tsipras's core backers. Both Euclid Tsakalotos and Gabriel Sakellaridis are members of the group. Another member of the group was Tassos Koronakis, the former secretary of
10672-511: The privileges of the state-sponsored Church of Greece . From 2013, the coalition became a unitary party, although it retained its name with the addition of United Social Front. Syriza had been characterized as an anti-establishment party, whose success had sent "shock-waves across the EU ". Although it has abandoned its old identity, that of a hard-left protest voice, becoming more left-wing populist in character, and stating that it would not abandon
10788-414: The result, Syriza moved into opposition . Following a full, four year term as the official opposition and despite polls suggesting a difference of 6 to 7% between Syriza and ND, Syriza lost the May election by a wide margin of 20.7%, retaining second position. As ND was unable to form a parliamentary majority, owing to the simple proportionality system passed by Syriza in 2016 that required 47% or more,
10904-659: The right to vote for whomever they want. We have the right to no longer finance Greek debt." The Financial Times and Radio Free Europe reported on Syriza's ties with Russia and extensive correspondence with the Russian political scientist Aleksandr Dugin . Early in the SYRIZA-led government of Greece, the Russian President Vladimir Putin and Tsipras concluded a face-to-face meeting by announcing an agreement on boosting investment ties between
11020-601: The roots of the process that led to its formation can be traced back to the Space for Dialogue for the Unity and Common Action of the Left (Greek: Χώρος Διαλόγου για την Ενότητα και Κοινή Δράση της Αριστεράς, Chóros Dialógou gia tin Enótita kai Koiní Drási tis Aristerás ) in 2001. It was made up of various organizations of the Greek political left , that, despite different ideological and historical backgrounds, held common ground in several important issues that had arisen in Greece in
11136-502: The run-up to the May 2012 election showed Syriza with 10–12% support. The minor Unitary Movement (a PASOK splinter group) also joined the coalition in March 2012. In the first legislative election held on 6 May, the party polled over 16% and quadrupled its number of seats, becoming the second largest party in parliament, behind New Democracy (ND). After the election, Tsipras was invited by
11252-492: The second ballot by Giorgos Kaminis with 51.4% to his 48.6%. On 13 September 2014, Syriza unveiled the Thessaloniki Programme, a set of policy proposals containing its central demands for economic and political restructuring. The Hellenic Parliament failed to elect a new President of State by 29 December 2014, and was dissolved. A snap legislative election was scheduled for 25 January 2015. Syriza had
11368-437: The stressed vowel; the so-called breathing marks ( rough and smooth breathing ), originally used to signal presence or absence of word-initial /h/; and the diaeresis , used to mark the full syllabic value of a vowel that would otherwise be read as part of a diphthong. These marks were introduced during the course of the Hellenistic period. Actual usage of the grave in handwriting saw a rapid decline in favor of uniform usage of
11484-438: The theoretical education of its members. It draws on Marxist and more broadly emancipatory thought and its history and tries to elaborate it further, making use of every important theoretical contribution." Local elections and elections to the European Parliament were held in May 2014. In the 2014 European Parliament election in Greece on 25 May, Syriza reached first place with 26.5% of vote, ahead of ND at 22.7%. The position in
11600-649: The two nations. Tsipras also said that Greece would seek to mend ties between Russia and European Union through European institutions. Tsipras also said that Greece was not in favor of international sanctions imposed on Russia, adding that it risked the start of another Cold War . On 26 January 2015, Tsipras and Independent Greeks (ANEL) leader Panos Kammenos agreed to form a coalition government of Syriza and ANEL, with Tsipras becoming Prime Minister of Greece and Greek-Australian economist Yanis Varoufakis appointed Minister of Finance and Panos Kammenos appointed Minister of Defence . In July 2015, Yanis Varoufakis
11716-496: The view of a modern, patriotic, leftist party. He set himself the goal of unmediated contact with voters, bypassing the party organs. Kasselakis accused many members of the party organs of being bureaucrats who exclude grassroots communication with the party. His business background, his lightning-fast rise, and the publication of his earlier writings supporting Kyriakos Mitsotakis and New Democracy have brought him into conflict with prominent party members and former ministers. Members of
11832-504: Was SYN Youth (Νεολαία ΣΥΝ, SYN Youth), which was autonomous from the party structure. Until the late 1990s they were called "Left Youth League" (Ένωση Αριστερών Νέων). N-SYN had their own membership and executive bodies, but in general their decisions and activity were similar to the ones of the party. Their power was noteworthy in most Student Councils all around Greece, through the AR.EN.(Αριστερή Ενότητα, "Left Unity"). N-SYN also participated in
11948-574: Was a distinct dialect of Greek itself. Aside from the Macedonian question, current consensus regards Phrygian as the closest relative of Greek, since they share a number of phonological, morphological and lexical isoglosses , with some being exclusive between them. Scholars have proposed a Graeco-Phrygian subgroup out of which Greek and Phrygian originated. Among living languages, some Indo-Europeanists suggest that Greek may be most closely related to Armenian (see Graeco-Armenian ) or
12064-504: Was a political organisation associated with Manolis Glezos , and other independent left-wing groups or activists. Although the Communist Organisation of Greece (KOE) had participated in the Space, it decided not to take part in the Coalition of the Radical Left. In the legislative election, the coalition gathered 241,539 votes (3.3% of the total) and elected six members to parliament. All six were members of Synaspismos,
12180-568: Was also used as the official language of government and religion in the Christian Nubian kingdoms , for most of their history. Greek, in its modern form, is the official language of Greece, where it is spoken by almost the entire population. It is also the official language of Cyprus (nominally alongside Turkish ) and the British Overseas Territory of Akrotiri and Dhekelia (alongside English ). Because of
12296-557: Was also used in Ancient Greek. Greek has occasionally been written in the Latin script , especially in areas under Venetian rule or by Greek Catholics . The term Frankolevantinika / Φραγκολεβαντίνικα applies when the Latin script is used to write Greek in the cultural ambit of Catholicism (because Frankos / Φράγκος is an older Greek term for West-European dating to when most of (Roman Catholic Christian) West Europe
12412-407: Was expected to make significant gains in the election, with predictions ranging from 4% to 5% of the electorate. On 16 September, it gained 5.0% of the vote in the 2007 legislative election. Prior to the election, the participating parties had agreed on a common declaration by 22 June. The signed Declaration of the Coalition of the Radical Left outlined the common platform on which it would compete in
12528-552: Was further strengthened by the organization in May 2006 of the 4th European Social Forum in Athens , and by a number of largely successful election campaigns, such as those in Athens and Piraeus, during the 2006 Greek local elections . The coalition ticket in the municipality of Athens was headed by Alexis Tsipras , proposed by Alavanos who declared Synaspismos' "opening to the new generation". Opinion polls had indicated that Syriza
12644-412: Was held to discuss the organisation of the party. Important outcomes included a decision in principle to dissolve the participating parties in Syriza in favour of a unitary party. However, implementation was deferred for three months to allow time for four of the parties which were reluctant to dissolve to consider their positions. Tsipras was confirmed as chairman with 74% of the vote. Delegates supporting
12760-471: Was received well, especially so by younger voters, and formed the party's springboard for its good 2007 parliamentary elections showing. On 10 February 2008 Alexis Tsipras was elected party president, replacing Alavanos, who stepped down citing private reasons. At that time Tsipras did not hold a parliamentary seat, so Alavanos remained leader of the parliamentary group. After the legislative elections in 2009 , Tsipras entered Parliament and became leader of
12876-554: Was rejected by the Central Committee and the Extraordinary Congress, Kasselakis exited Syriza and announced the creation of a new party, founding the Movement for Democracy prompting the immediate withdrawal of 4 MPs from Syriza's parliamentary group (Petros Pappas, Kyriaki Malama, Rallia Christidou , Alexandros Avlonitis ), while Theodora Tzakri has also hinted at withdrawal; such a move would leave Syriza with less MPs than PASOK – Movement for Change , rendering
12992-592: Was replaced by Euclid Tsakalotos as Minister of Finance. Following the acceptance of the third memorandum with the institutions on Greece's debt by Tsipras and the Syriza government, 25 Syriza MPs who rejected the terms of the bailout, including the party's Left Platform and the Internationalist Workers Left faction, split to form a new party Popular Unity (Greek: Λαϊκή Ενότητα, Laïkí Enótita , LE). They were led by Panagiotis Lafazanis . Many other activists left Syriza at this time. International supporters of Syriza were divided, as some of its erstwhile backers felt that
13108-670: Was said to have become a mainstream centre-left party, taking advantage of the traditional centre-left PASOK 's collapse. Tsipras stated that his goal was to build a broad progressive front without abandoning the party's core ideology and left-wing coalition. During the party's time in government, SYRIZA practised a soft neoliberal policy of austerity, despite its vocal anti-neoliberalism , which contradicted its pre-electoral pledges, ideological outlook, political practice, and its own history, being stuck in populist rhetoric and what are termed "symbolic politics", unable to preserve its radicalism. Observers' analysis has revealed similarities with
13224-636: Was the following: "Left Current" (mainstream western Marxism, party center-left), "Renewing Wing" (radical social democracy, party right), the "Red-green Network" (eco-Marxism, party left) and the "Initiative" (eurosceptic Marxism, party extreme left). Since 2004 the Left Stream, the Red-greens and the Initiative formed the so-called Left Majority , which was responsible for moving the party to more radical leftist positions. The party had members in
13340-580: Was under the control of the Frankish Empire ). Frankochiotika / Φραγκοχιώτικα (meaning 'Catholic Chiot') alludes to the significant presence of Catholic missionaries based on the island of Chios . Additionally, the term Greeklish is often used when the Greek language is written in a Latin script in online communications. The Latin script is nowadays used by the Greek-speaking communities of Southern Italy . The Yevanic dialect
13456-673: Was written by Romaniote and Constantinopolitan Karaite Jews using the Hebrew Alphabet . In a tradition, that in modern time, has come to be known as Greek Aljamiado , some Greek Muslims from Crete wrote their Cretan Greek in the Arabic alphabet . The same happened among Epirote Muslims in Ioannina . This also happened among Arabic-speaking Byzantine rite Christians in the Levant ( Lebanon , Palestine, and Syria ). This usage
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