Panhellenic Socialist Movement (PASOK)
범그리스 사회주의 운동
A Greek social-democratic party founded by Andreas Papandreou after the fall of the military dictatorship in 1974. It governed for most of the period from 1981 to 2004 and, with New Democracy, formed Greece's two-party system. Back in power in 2009, it faced the sovereign debt crisis and agreed the first bailout and its austerity with the Troika; its support then collapsed, and in the January 2015 election it became the smallest party in parliament with 4.68 percent. The collapse gave rise to the word "Pasokification".
In depth
The Panhellenic Socialist Movement was founded on 3 September 1974, after the fall of the military dictatorship, by Andreas Papandreou with the trade unionist Georgios Daskalakis. Its founding mottos were "National Independence, Popular Sovereignty, Social Emancipation, Democratic Process". Papandreou rejected the liberal heritage of his father Georgios Papandreou, three times prime minister, and stressed that he was a socialist, not a liberal. PASOK came third with 13.5 percent in the November 1974 election, but won 93 seats in 1977 and became the main opposition.
In the October 1981 election it won 48.1 percent and 172 seats and formed Greece's first socialist government since 1924. Papandreou had campaigned for withdrawal from NATO and the European Economic Community but changed course in office. Government spending rose sharply in his first term, but austerity measures introduced in October 1985 cut it by 4.6 percent in 1986. Amid scandals PASOK lost power to New Democracy in the elections of 1989–1990 and won again in 1993. The "modernisers" under Costas Simitis, leader from 1996, took a pro-European course, and Greece joined the eurozone in 2001.
Giorgos Papandreou, leader after the 2004 defeat, won the October 2009 election with 43.92 percent and 160 seats. The sovereign debt crisis broke out as soon as PASOK took office, and the party negotiated the first bailout with the Troika of the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the IMF, accepting harsh austerity. While it continued austerity in two coalition governments from 2011 to 2015, its vote fell to 13.18 percent in May 2012 and 12.28 percent in June, and in January 2015 it became the smallest party in parliament with 13 seats and 4.68 percent. The word "Pasokification", for a centre-left party that collapses after taking on austerity, comes from this decline.
Fofi Gennimata then formed the Democratic Alignment and in 2018 the Movement for Change (KINAL) with other centre-left parties. Under Nikos Androulakis the party won 11.84 percent in the June 2023 election and regained its place among the main parties.