1821-2017: The Peaceful Revolution of Women: Contribution to Culture & Development

INSTITUTE FOR THE DEVELOPMENT OF WESTERN GREECE

3^rd ActiveWomen Meeting – Greek Women Leaders of the New Economy

Contribution to Culture, Sports, Tourism, and Entrepreneurship

Patras, Saturday, October 21, 2017, Xenod. Astir

1821-2017: The Peaceful Revolution of Women: Contribution to Culture & Development

Speech by Anna Karamanou

The 200th anniversary of the Greek Revolution of 1821 provides a great opportunity to evaluate and understand our historical journey—where we started and where we are today. This is only possible through a creative dialogue between the present and the past, with the aim of deeply understanding both the past and the present (Ed. Hallet Car). Having experienced a deep and multifaceted crisis over the past 10 years, I personally often wonder: what would Greece be like today if half of its human potential had not been excluded from the economic and political life of the country from the very beginning? What would have happened if Bouboulina and Manto Mavrogenous, instead of being sidelined and slandered, had participated in the administration of the newly founded nation-state?

As historically recorded, thousands of women enlisted and contributed greatly to the liberation struggle. However, the contribution of women was not only unappreciated, but they also faced fierce opposition when, after the liberation, they demanded their fundamental human rights. The heroines of 1821 were sidelined and ignored by all the post-revolutionary Constitutions until the 1975 Constitution. Women were excluded from the political body, without rights, without the right to education, employment, or entrepreneurship, isolated in the household, under the authority of husbands, fathers, and brothers. During the same period, the Orthodox Church played a key role in maintaining traditional gender stereotypes.

Had this great injustice not occurred, essentially the disregard for the interests of the newly established state, surely the position of today’s Greece in the global competitiveness ranking of the economy (2016 data) would not be at No. 81, among 138 countries. Regarding gender equality indicators, we are ranked 92^nd, worse than countries like Brazil, Senegal, Russia, and Mexico. It is a fact that the crisis worsens the situation year by year. In 2013, Greece was ranked 81^st, and in 2010, 58^th. Every year, things get worse!

In the area of women’s rights and gender justice, even neighboring countries that share a Mediterranean/Balkan/Patriarchal culture and also lived for a long time under the Ottoman Empire have recently shown significant progress in their efforts to develop by utilizing their female workforce. Albania ranks 62nd, FYROM 73rd, Bulgaria 41st, Serbia 48th, and Slovenia 8th. Worse than us is only Turkey, at 130^th. Beyond the global ranking by the WEF, the European Institute for Gender Equality also ranks Greece last among the 28 EU countries. These rankings depict Greece as resembling the Middle East more than Europe. The latest book by Antigone Lyberaki, *Women in the Economy*, provides detailed and comparative data that confirm the country’s lag, primarily due to its deeply patriarchal structure.

However, the peaceful feminist revolution, which began as early as the Kapodistrian era with the establishment of the first school for girls in 1829 under the positive influence of European Enlightenment values, compelled the political system to recognize gender equality as a value per se. This led to changes and reforms that strengthened democratic institutions, the economy, and the level of our culture. The history of women’s rights is one of both victories and defeats.

It is worth recalling the major milestones:

1829: The first school for girls was established in Argos under Kapodistrias, with 20 female students.
1830: In Syros, the first secondary school for girls was established by the Municipality of Ermoupolis.
1831: Establishment of the Hill School, followed by the Zappeion and Arsakeion schools.
1872: Systematic efforts for vocational training in “female” crafts and combating illiteracy, led by the Ladies’ Association for Women’s Education, founded by Kalliopi Kehagia in Athens. During this period, parents who allowed their daughters to learn reading and writing were considered pioneers of progressiveness.

1887: Publication of *The Ladies’ Newspaper* (*Η Εφημερίς των Κυριών*), from 1887 to 1918, the most influential women’s periodical of the time, by Kalliroi Parren, the prominent Greek feminist, teacher, and journalist.
1911: The constitutional revision and legislative work of Eleftherios Venizelos established a favorable institutional framework, providing fertile ground for rights advocacy. In the early 20th century, many dynamic feminist organizations were founded, following European models.
1920: The Association for Women’s Rights was established, the first organization with a distinctly feminist agenda. “We demand equal political, civil, and economic rights for women and men,” it declared. Three years later, in 1923, the Association published its magazine, *The Woman’s Struggle*, the longest-running women’s periodical in Greece. The Association played a significant role in advocating for and securing the rights of Greek women, continuing its impact into modern times.
1922: The Asia Minor Catastrophe: The Asia Minor refugee women acted as a catalyst for the progress of the feminist movement and the development of the country. The number of working women increased, thus creating the first female workforce.
February 1930: Recognition of the right to vote in municipal elections for literate women over 30 years old. In the 1934 municipal elections, only 240 women reached the polls. The restrictions on municipal voting were later eliminated by law 2159/1952, when women participated en masse in the municipal elections.
Interwar period: International women’s action: The Small Women’s “Entente” is established as a space for dialogue on international issues. It is noteworthy that during the interwar period, particularly in the 1930s, when militarism, nationalism, and aggression had reached new heights in Europe, women, through their international actions, focused on issues of peace, disarmament, peaceful settlement of disputes, and compromise solutions.
1945 and 1948: Historic decisions and declarations by the UN on gender equality. The demand for the right to vote was renewed after 1949, within the favorable framework created by the UN decisions, as well as the publication of Simone de Beauvoir’s monumental book “The Second Sex” in 1949. The status of women at that time in Greece was deplorable in all sectors.
1952: Ratification of the UN international conventions for equal political rights and equal access of genders to all public offices. With Law 2159/1952, Greek women were granted the right to vote and stand for election, and with Law 3192/1955, the right to be employed in all public services, except for the military and the church.
1957: Rome Treaty: equal pay for equal work. The legal basis for the European Gender Equality Policy was established.
1964: Educational Reform. It paved the way for the mass participation of women in education. The great philosopher and intellectual Evangelos Papanoutsos contributed significantly to the reform.
1975 Constitution: Democratization and Europeanization. The 1975 Constitution, for the first time, refers to equal rights for Greek men and women. The declaration of 1975 by the UN as the International Year of the Woman also gave a significant boost to women’s claims.
1983: New Family Law. With Greece’s accession to the European Community in 1981, a wind of modernization and Europeanization blew through the country. The reform of the Family Law brought about major changes to the existing legislation and became a decisive step towards the modernization of Civil Law. The new law was considered the most progressive in Europe. In the same year, with Law 1342/1983, the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) was ratified.
1984: Equality in Employment Relations. In 1984, international labor conventions that had been pending for decades were ratified. Laws 1423/1984 and 1424/1984 ratified ILO Conventions 122 and 111, respectively, Law 1483/1984 promoted the combination of professional and family life, and Law 1426/1984 ratified the European Social Charter. The establishment of Law 1414/1984, which implemented the principle of gender equality in employment relations, was the most significant step towards Europeanization and the incorporation of EU Directives 75/117 and 27/207 into Greek law, concerning equal pay and equal treatment in the labor market.
2000: Law 2839/2000, establishing gender quotas. in local and national elections, in service and administrative councils or other collective bodies, as well as in the staffing of research and technology committees.
2001: Constitutional revision and the addition of paragraph 2 to Article 116, which clarifies that taking positive measures to promote equality between men and women does not constitute discrimination based on gender. And most importantly, that the state must ensure the removal of inequalities that exist in practice.
2007 & 2008: Presidential Decree 96/2007 and Law 3636/2008 complement the legislation on gender quotas, stipulating that for the declaration of electoral lists of political parties, the number of candidates from each gender must be at least one-third of the total number of candidates.
Today, we demand 50/50 quotas in all democratic institutions, as well as in all businesses and organizations.

Despite undeniable progress, the gender gap remains, undermining the country’s development: inequalities and discrimination in employment, underrepresentation in politics and public offices, unequal distribution of family responsibilities and caregiving obligations, gender-based violence.

Political will has mainly been expressed through the Europeanization of legislation, as a country obligation, but the political system does not wish to modernize and confront the constraints of tradition and the symbolism of patriarchy, insisting on the “Greek exceptionality.” I believe that neither gender equality, nor development, nor true Europeanization/modernization can be achieved without overturning the cultural foundations of the country. I remain a supporter of the theory that the crisis is, primarily, cultural, and secondarily, economic.

The de facto implementation of gender equality requires: a) strong political will from the entire political system, b) mass mobilization of women themselves and pressure through civil society for a fair redistribution of roles and responsibilities between the sexes in both the public and private spheres, and c) systematic and planned intervention in culture and cultural constraints, through the education system, humanities education, and the media.

The today’s conference, with its thematic focus, excellent organization, and the participation of so many distinguished speakers, contributes positively toward this direction.