source:crisis-scape.net

by Kostas Tsiambaos

Over the last three years Greece has been facing one of its worst crises since the 1950s, a crisis which most understand to be a financial one. The word crisis (from the Greek κρ?σις) has a double meaning in the Greek language. Its first meaning indicates a radical — usually negative — change in the sum of conditions or flow of events, while its second refers to an opinion, a theory, a personal judgment or point of view towards a specific subject. I will argue that the current crisis is not just financial, but deeply cultural. An examination of the history of architectural discourse in Greece will help us better understand the cultural identity of the recent crisis by illuminating its core: the ambivalent relationship between Greece and Europe, from the establishment of the Greek state until today.

One of the major debates concerning the Greek crisis is the economic relationship between Greece and Europe. The debate on the causes of the crisis, and suggestions on how to overcome it, revolves around the status of the country’s relationship with the European Union. Should we blame our participation in the EU for the current recession? Should the Greek state become more ‘European’ in order to overcome this crisis? Should the country abandon the common currency in order to become productive again?

A study of the history of architectural discourse in Greece will show that an analogous debate was established at its very core many decades ago, and is still a dominant issue today.1 The question regarding the status of Greece as a part of Europe, a debate on the country’s identity related to the question of how Greece is, and should be, associated with the rest of Europe, has been encountered by architects and theorists of architecture on numerous occasions throughout the 19th and the 20th centuries. It was considered a key issue long before it emerged in current discussions about the relationship between Greece, in its current economic crisis, and the European Union....Continue Reading

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