The homeless modernizers

There seems to be intense anxiety within the modernizing wing of the center-left in Greece even though many insist on talking about holding a constructive discussion, others announce moves, meetings are organized, candidacies are declared and so on.

These may be symptoms of isolation and loneliness that have possibly intensified because of the summer heat.

The left has a particularity, from its orthodox side to its most modernizing and Eurocentric form. Its weakness is that it is incurably elitist. In all its forms, it is characterized by the confidence it has that it is intellectually superior to the political ideas expressed by its opponents and the people, who it tries to enlighten politically and to educate in cultural terms.

As a response to the miserable 1967-74 dictatorship of the colonels, during the first years of the post-junta era (known as the...