For a Greek version of these (and more) firsts of modern Greece, see here.
1. Greece was the first of the lands of the Ottoman Empire in Europe to not only revolt against the Porte (this first goes to the Serbs) but also, in 1830, to win her independence as a national state (Serbia became an independent kingdom as late as 1878).
2. In 1844, Greece became the first European nation and second worldwide (only to the Kingdom of Hawaii) to grand electoral suffrage to all male Greek citizens with no income or other restrictions. For comparison, France and Switzerland introduced universal male suffrage in 1848, Germany in 1871, Austria in 1896, Spain in 1890, Italy in 1912, and the UK in 1918.
3. In 1896, Greece organized the first international Olympic Games held in modern history with the participation of 14 nations and 241, all male, athletes. Greek Spyros Louis (pictured above while parading in the Olympic Stadium in Athens) won the first modern Marathon race.
4. In 1923, Greece (and Turkey) handled the first compulsory exchange of populations in history. Greece, at the time with a population of just over 5 million, received more than 1.3 million refugees from Asia Minor and successfully integrated them in her society and politics. For many decades to follow, Greece remained perhaps the most ethnically and culturally homogenous nation in Europe (together with Portugal). This changed only in the 1990s after the influx in Greece of non-ethnic refugees from the Balkans and Eastern Europe.
5. In October 1940, after it was invaded by the Italian army, Greece, not only was able to halt the invasion, but also achieved a counter-offensive (known in Greece as the Epic of ΄40) which was the first Axis military setback on European soil. The next Allied victories came only in 1941 by the British army in Ethiopia and north Africa.
6. After the end of WWII, Greece was the first and only country in Europe that continued the fight a war of her own. In December 1944, the Communist Party chose a strategy of conflict with the British-supported Greek national army forces, which evolved into a civil war that ended in 1949 with the defeat of communists. Many historians have described it as the first act of the forthcoming Cold War.
7. Beginning almost immediately after the end of civil war, Greece entered a period of sustained economic growth (lasting from 1950 to the first oil crisis in 1973), which was characterized as “the Greek economic miracle”! During this period, the Greek economy enjoyed the fastest growth in Europe and the second fast in the world (behind Japan).
8. In October 1981, Greece became the first country in postwar Europe which saw an authentic populist party, PASOK, winning state power singlehandedly. It would take more than a decade for another populist party to win elections in a European country (Italy) and yet another one for a third populist party to win office (in Hungary).
9. In May 2010, lest it default, Greece received a bailout package of 110 billion euro. As noted by C. Reinhart and K. Rogoff (in their book “This Time is Different”), Greece has spent more than half the years since Independence in default, the highest negative score in the world.
10. In January 2015, Greece became the first democracy in the world to be governed by a coalition of left populist and right populist parties. The coalition was renewed after a repeat election in September 2015, and thereafter survived with no major internal frictions until January 2019.
To be continued with more Greek firsts in the near future, perhaps:-)
