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Women’s political participation in Greece
The year is 2020. If you are standing before the Greek Parliament entrance, the politicians you will see going are almost all men. Only 16% of Greek parliamentarians are women, according to EIGE (The Gender Equality Index published by the European Institute for Gender Equality). Looking further into the current government, out of the 22 cabinet ministers, only two are women. When asked by Zeinab Badawi, a BBC journalist, about the lack of women representation in the government, the Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis responded: “Unfortunately, we don’t have that many women who are interested in stepping into politics.”
The feminist movement in Greece
We often hear the saying that “feminism is the radical notion that women are people.” In Greece, over the last couple of years, the feminist movement has been struggling to demonstrate that and working on making itself more heard. It has indeed gained more visibility and is now growing bigger and bigger. A multitude and diversity of people are participating in feminist protests. The classical patriarchal discourse is often challenged in the public sphere. Women, non-binary and LGBTQI+ persons have managed to transform the fear and systemic oppression into a fight for their rights. TV channels, magazines and different active groups have started deploying the gender equality lens and feminist terminology more often. For example, while it used to be the norm to read in the front page of a newspaper a headline like “He killed her because he loved her”, at present, such headlines are rare, and it seems that a larger part of mainstream media have begun mentioning the phenomena of femicide, patriarchy and toxic masculinity -though, of course, that is not always the case.
The feminist movement in Greece hasn’t always been a front-page issue. Quite the opposite. When changemakers called for a demonstration, the streets were often empty, and only a bunch of activists would picket in front of the parliament (in some cases they got arrested for no reason). The public and media discourse often described feminists as aggressive and extreme. Konstantinos Bogdanos, a far-right politician, said in 2019, “there is a group of “satanist wiccas, pagan witches who want to impose their vegan lesbianism.”
The momentum changed in 2017, when the #MeToo erupted in the US. It reached Greece more tangibly in January 2020, when Sofia Bekatorou, an Olympic champion in sailing, spoke up about being raped by the former vice president of the Hellenic Sailing Federation. Since then, more women have been speaking up about rape and sexual abuse.
The rise of gender-based violence incidents contributed to the kindling of the feminist movement in Greece. An increasing number of people have acknowledged the existence of gender-based discrimination and patriarchal abuse. Thus, feminist collectives and organizations multiplied and became more vocal and vivid, with feminist social media platforms and groups getting more attention by the day. Migrant and refugee women also play an active role in the feminist movement in Greece, demanding their rights, and driving many groups and organizations to adopt a more intersectional approach to feminism.
The Greek #MeNowMeToo platform is giving voice to women who want to speak up, whenever they wish to do so, anonymously and in a spirit of solidarity, with the aim of recording the #MeToo experiences in Greece, raise awareness, and empower women around the country.
Forms of discrimination against women
The Greek parliament acts as a mirror of the societal structure and dynamics as well as of the extent to which the long-held stereotypes dictate people’s lives. A few days after the neo-conservative party Nea Dimokratia came into power in July 2019, the ‘General Secretariat for Gender Equality’ was renamed the ‘General Secretariat for Family Planning and Gender Equality’, and along with the Research Centre for Gender Equality (KETHI), they were transferred to the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs; a move characterized by its employees, as well as by feminist groups, as a serious setback. In 2021, the name changed again into the ‘General Secretariat for Demography and Family Planning and Gender Equality’. The questionable hierarchical choice of words offers a first glimpse on the country’s current approach towards gender equality; it is last on the list of priorities, and the discrimination emerges officially from the top.
A serious hinder to the progress towards a more equal and just society was also the change in the Family Law regarding compulsory co-parenting, a law that, according to two UN rapporteurs who sent letters to the Greek Parliament, is contrary to the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women. The proposal had provoked numerous protests around the country. Following the global trend, the anti-abortion movement gained traction over the last couple of years and several problematic posters popped up in public places and misogynistic portrayals found their way to front-pages.
Moreover, the General Secretariat for Primary, Secondary Education and Special Education, which falls under the direct supervision of the Minister of Education and Religious Affairs, recently approved a blatantly sexist and unscientific program entitled "Sexuality, Fertility and Parenthood: an inseparable unit" aimed at secondary school students. Following the harsh criticism of this "pedagogical material" for its anti-abortion statements, it was recalled by the Institute for Educational Policy. The Hellenic Society for Prenatal Education, which produced this material, is included in the list of para-religious groups.
Statistics
The Gender Equality Index published by the European Institute for Gender Equality (EIGE) rated Greece with 52.5 out of 100 and placed it once again in the last position of the ranking in the European Union. Since 2010, Greece has remained almost stagnant in terms of gender equality in the following areas: time, money, health, power, education and employment.
Greece performs best in the field of health. Yet, it ranks 20th in the EU and is 3rd in the list of percentages of women suffering from mental disorders, after Spain and Portugal. The gap between the employment of men and women is also shrinking, although this is mainly due to the large reduction in the employment of men in Greece from 2010 to 2019.
The biggest inequalities are found in the field of power, where Greece ranks 26th in the EU - the sub-sector in which we have the lowest score is that of economic decision-making. On the positive end is the female representation on the boards of the companies, which seems to be increasing (at 15%).
Violence against women
When talking about discriminations, one has to always remember that the most profound and blatant proof of their existence is the violence that’s continuously inflicted upon women and LGBTQI+ persons, varying from verbal abuse and sexist comments to rape, assaults and femicides. With regards to the rise of gender-based violence cases, the 24-hour hotline received 5.405 calls in 2021. 3.182 of them were about domestic violence (from January 2021 till October 2021). Moreover, in 2021, 18 femicides were reported. There is a challenge in reporting femicides, as it has not been legally recognized as a crime and there is huge invisibility of those murders because of social stigma.
In 2019, the Greek parliament ratified the Council of Europe Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence against Women and Domestic Violence (Istanbul Convention). In November 2020, the 1st annual report on violence against women was published. It referred to the period between 1st November 2019 until 31st October 2020. During this period, 4.872 women survivors of gender-based violence were supported by the state’s facilities. 269 women and 270 children were hosted in the guest houses (in total 539 people).
These guest houses are part of a nationwide network of 63 facilities provided by the state that deal with gender-based violence. More specifically, there is a nationwide 24-hour telephone line “SOS 15900”, 42 counseling centers and 20 guest houses that host women survivors of domestic violence. This is a resource-deprived and understaffed network that is not by any means sufficient for the number of women in need across the country, especially in rural areas.
However, on a more positive note, the Greek #MeNowMeToo platform is giving voice to women who want to speak up, whenever they wish to do so, anonymously and in a spirit of solidarity, with the aim of the recording the #MeToo experiences in Greece, raise awareness, and empower women around the country. Hundreds of women are now coming forward and raising their voices.
