AHC: Modern Greece is the source of a scientific, ideological, artistic or cultural trend

raharris1973

Gone Fishin'
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Have the "Greek school" of whatever be the promoter of a globally influential physical or social scientific theory, political ideology, artistic or literary technique or have a successful niche in highbrow or lowbrow culture. The main cultural export of modern Greece seems to be its food ways (gyros, yogurt) - let's add more dimensions to this.
 
Have the "Greek school" of whatever be the promoter of a globally influential physical or social scientific theory, political ideology, artistic or literary technique or have a successful niche in highbrow or lowbrow culture. The main cultural export of modern Greece seems to be its food ways (gyros, yogurt) - let's add more dimensions to this.

There was an idea in the "DBWI: Single American Nation" thread that could work for this, if in a dark sense. It was called "Melianism". Basically, a relatively influential political philosophy coming from the Melian Dialogue. In the Melian Dialogue, the Athenians attempt to convince the neutral party of Melos to join them against the Spartans. This goes poorly. The Melians try to argue from the heart and from the head, though the Athenians respond with "The strong do as they will, the weak suffer what they must." If you took a bit of Stirnerism, maybe a bit of Nietzche, and mixed it with that, you could probably get a pretty popular alternate ideology, especially if one of the perennial Greek military leaders managed to adopt it.

It's certainly possible, if a bit sketchy.
 
Have the "Greek school" of whatever be the promoter of a globally influential physical or social scientific theory, political ideology, artistic or literary technique or have a successful niche in highbrow or lowbrow culture. The main cultural export of modern Greece seems to be its food ways (gyros, yogurt) - let's add more dimensions to this.

Ok to put this in perspective. What is the equivalent school born out of a country the size of say Sweden, Holland or Australia (The latter two being a rough comparison to what a much more successful modern Greece, might be realistically in population and economic terms). For that matter what is the equivalent coming out of Canada or Spain?
 
Ok to put this in perspective. What is the equivalent school born out of a country the size of say Sweden, Holland or Australia (The latter two being a rough comparison to what a much more successful modern Greece, might be realistically in population and economic terms). For that matter what is the equivalent coming out of Canada or Spain?
denmark invented the nordic model, inspiring the other nordic bloc countries to join. you've got austrian economics (to be fair austria was petty big when they came along) jamica started cultural trend like ska and regaee. so despite being relatively small, we can
i see three ways this can happen:1.early greece being way more succseful, becoming a mid sized power like for say, the netherland or sweden, that has a good, on par with western standards, academic base, and from there getting lucky by having somone who happened to write a signifcant writing in a specfic subject, receving an intellectual niche inspired by a modern greek person.
2.Greece maneging to pull of an economic miracle using some kind of new and innovative model like s.korea, denmark, singapore and even israel to some extent did. boom, greek model.
3.Greek music manages to sneak in to modern global culture,maybe fused with some other genres like punk and rock, kind off like how celtic music managed to get relatively mainstream both in its original form with bands like riverdance and in its various fusion genres, like celtic punk or rock.
thats my 2 cent anyway.
 
denmark invented the nordic model, inspiring the other nordic bloc countries to join. you've got austrian economics (to be fair austria was petty big when they came along) jamica started cultural trend like ska and regaee. so despite being relatively small, we can
i see three ways this can happen:1.early greece being way more succseful, becoming a mid sized power like for say, the netherland or sweden, that has a good, on par with western standards, academic base, and from there getting lucky by having somone who happened to write a signifcant writing in a specfic subject, receving an intellectual niche inspired by a modern greek person.
2.Greece maneging to pull of an economic miracle using some kind of new and innovative model like s.korea, denmark, singapore and even israel to some extent did. boom, greek model.
3.Greek music manages to sneak in to modern global culture,maybe fused with some other genres like punk and rock, kind off like how celtic music managed to get relatively mainstream both in its original form with bands like riverdance and in its various fusion genres, like celtic punk or rock.
thats my 2 cent anyway.

Economics wise since this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_economic_miracle didn't manage to create a school or anything, we can leave it aside I think, even if Greece doesn't have a lost decade in the 1980s. Physics and engineering... Christofilos fusion reactors was not likely to work. You could reasonably posit Greece as a leading power in renewables or a Greek Nokia for what's worth without any extreme POD.

Post that rembetiko crosspolinating with jazz and secondarily rock to get out in the world, this has potential I think. Now you just need to put a US army in Greece arround 1942-43 for said crosspolination to happen.
 
Economics wise since this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_economic_miracle didn't manage to create a school or anything, we can leave it aside I think, even if Greece doesn't have a lost decade in the 1980s. Physics and engineering... Christofilos fusion reactors was not likely to work. You could reasonably posit Greece as a leading power in renewables or a Greek Nokia for what's worth without any extreme POD.

Post that rembetiko crosspolinating with jazz and secondarily rock to get out in the world, this has potential I think. Now you just need to put a US army in Greece arround 1942-43 for said crosspolination to happen.
As to the economic miracle, i see two reasons why there is no "greek model":
1.their modern economic situation is pretty shity, so its hard to imagine somone. Trying to go to greece as inspiration on how to run an economy
2.the methods they used werent extraordinary. They didnt have a distinct flair like the s.korean chaebols or the nordic combination of capitalist and socialist values. Its hard to make a model around that.
As for the music, i thought of it while listening to a folk punk band's latest album, which has a balkan inspired song that made me think:"why isnt this a thing yet".can still happen
 
If they started charging royalties every time there is a classical reference in culture, they'd be an Asian TigerX100.

Especially if they asserted ownership over the Roman knock-offs. Valentine's Day alone would be enough to buy the EU.
 
If negotiations between ELAS and the Greek government in exile break down in 1944, the British might find themselves too late to prevent mainland Greece from becoming a communist state in late 1944. Given that this would have occurred despite Stalin's explicit instructions, I'd wager that the Greek communist government might go it's own way. Whether this is a more extreme or more moderate form of Communism depends on which personalities end up on top, but either way "Greek style communism" is certainly a possibility.
 
3.Greek music manages to sneak in to modern global culture,maybe fused with some other genres like punk and rock, kind off like how celtic music managed to get relatively mainstream both in its original form with bands like riverdance and in its various fusion genres, like celtic punk or rock.
thats my 2 cent anyway.

Vangelis (among the most famous Greek musicians internationally) has collaborated with Greek actress and folk singer Irene Papas on multiple occasions. Although it's nice sounding, it might be difficult to get "traditional Greek music" marketed the way Celtic music did (which would be in that syrupy new age sense which someone like Vangelis would be disgusted by I'm sure).

Modernist composer Iannis Xenakis is also pretty noteworthy in terms of 20th century classical music so that count for something.
 

raharris1973

Gone Fishin'
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Given that this would have occurred despite Stalin's explicit instructions, I'd wager that the Greek communist government might go it's own way.

If they somehow win, Stalin will retrofit his instructions and say "attaboy". That's what he did in China. And Greece needs great power help, so it's going to forgive and forget Soviet non-support of the initial takeover, at least until reconstruction from wartime damages is completed.
 
If they somehow win, Stalin will retrofit his instructions and say "attaboy". That's what he did in China. And Greece needs great power help, so it's going to forgive and forget Soviet non-support of the initial takeover, at least until reconstruction from wartime damages is completed.

I definitely agree. That being said, I think the nature of their rise to power and popular support would eventually lead them to break with Stalin. What form that takes is anyone's guess...
 

MrP

Banned
When the Olympic Games are resurrected in the late 19th century, Greece might obtain that Athens be the permanent host city. This could create a strong association between Greece and athletic sports in popular culture.

The 1896 Olympics were regarded as a great success. The Games had the largest international participation of any sporting event to that date. The Panathenaic Stadium, the only Olympic stadium used in the 1800s, overflowed with the largest crowd ever to watch a sporting event.[3] After the Games, Coubertin and the IOC were petitioned by several prominent figures, including Greece's King George and some of the American competitors in Athens, to hold all the following Games in Athens. However, the 1900 Summer Olympics were already planned for Paris and, except for the Intercalated Games of 1906, the Olympics did not return to Greece until the 2004 Summer Olympics, 108 years later.
 
If they somehow win, Stalin will retrofit his instructions and say "attaboy". That's what he did in China. And Greece needs great power help, so it's going to forgive and forget Soviet non-support of the initial takeover, at least until reconstruction from wartime damages is completed.
I am sure he and his successors would also look at it as a way of keeping "Titoists" (as a trend, not just the Yugoslavs) down. Well, not sure. Technically it would be Titoists in charge of Greece, though does Titoism require a main leader who unified the country under communism? Either way, the Russians might try playing them off against the Yugoslavs and Albanians if either of them don't play ball. And while there will obviously be loads of butterflies, I do wonder if the Americans would agree to withdraw missiles from Turkey like they did during the Cuban Missile Crisis (though in private, with JFK making the promise and waiting a while before carrying it out so no one knew a deal was struck). ahhh, and the Middle East is going to get even more attention than ever in this world. Egypt will have people falling over themselves to get their favor. Suppose who is in charge then might depend on who lost the war in Greece, though. Maybe the Middle East gets even more the feeling than IOTL that British supported kings are weak and the only way to save themselves from defeat, public humiliation, and communists is to go into a strictly nationalist route. And any of you have opinions on how similar Baathism might be to Kemalism?


Wait, this thread was about something else than what I was thinking. Hmmm.
 
A Greek person comes up with Friedman’s ideas, resulting in the “Austrian school” coming from Greece.
 
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