Department of Political Science and Public Administration

Doctoral Dissertation in progress

«The future belongs to us: From mobilization on the Cyprus issue to the Political Spring. The conservative youth in Greece 1960-1993»

Commencement date: April 4, 2023

Abstract

The thesis will examine the Greek “conservative” youth from 1960 to 1993 and will study its emergence, formation and transformations, mainly on a political but also on a cultural level, integrating the subject into the international scientific debate on political youth. Our concern is to understand the creation and mutations of the political structures and networks of these young people, as well as their political ideology and practice. The central aim of the study is to document the ideological framing of conservative youth over time, seeking to describe the ways in which it has perceived the set of public stakes. At the same time, it will trace the differences and commonalities between this youth and their “progressive” counterparts on issues such as political intervention and action as well as everyday life, culture and gender relations. Finally, the aim of the doctoral research is to place these youth in a transnational and comparative context and to understand their relations and networks with the respective European political groups. The thesis aims to fill a gap in the study of youth activism and, more specifically, of the conservative political space, while placing the phenomenon in the contemporary historiographical discourse in relation to the Mediterranean and Southeastern Europe, as well as in the debate on transitions. To implement the research, theoretical approaches of historical and archival research will be combined with theories of social movements and the sociology of organizations. The research protocol implies a mixed method: data analysis will be quantitative and qualitative.