Dukakis Center Spring 2013

The Dukakis Center hosted a variety of events and developed new capacities during the spring 2013 semester at ACT. Building on the success of the December 2012 Business and Politics Forum, and the November 2011 Dukakis International Symposium, the Center hosted a trio of distinguished seminar series lecturers on the theme of reform in Greek politics.

Stelios Kouvelis, former Deputy Foreign Minister, Dimitrios Katsoudas, former Secretary General of European Affairs at the Foreign Ministry, and historian Stan Draenos all visited the AT Conference Room at one moment or another in the term for presentations on the state of reform in Greek governments past and present.

Meanwhile, thanks to the efforts of Ruth Sutton and Laura Strieth, the Inspiration Exchange team was also busy, organizing three innovative workshops, one an on-campus happening coinciding with “One Billion Rising,” a second a celebration of International Women’s Day entitled “Big changes start with small solutions,” and the third on activist journalism. The latter event featured Athens-based journalists and bloggers Kostas Kallergis and Damian Mac Con Uladh.

The semester’s Dukakis Lecture was delivered by historian and classicist Angelos Chaniotis on the theme “Graffiti in ancient cities – Images and voices of daily life.” Chaniotis, Professor of Ancient History and Classics at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, spoke to a standing room only audience of more than 80 people in one of the Bissell Library lounges, thanks in large part to the efforts of Anatolia colleague Haido Samara.

The Dukakis Center co-sponsored Maria Kyriakidou’s annual gender and citizenship conference, this year on the theme “Arts, Aesthetics and Power” The conference gathered several leading local and regional scholars, including keynote speaker Nayia Kamenou of the University of Cyprus.

The spring semester also featured a few novel events. In February, the Dukakis Center hosted a small delegation of journalists and civil society leaders from Kosovo for an informal round table discussion on the state of Kosovar five years after the declaration of statehood. The speakers included Fliaka Surroi, Ilir Deda, Armend Muja, and Berat Rukiqi, who appeared courtesy of Eliamep and Kipred, leading think tanks in Athens and Pristina, respectively.

In June Anatolia alumnus Harris Mylonas presented his new book on “The Politics of Nation-Building: Making Co-Nationals, Refugees, and Minorities (Cambridge University Press, 2013). Mylonas, Assistant Professor at The Elliot School, George Washington University, was accompanied by Professors George Th. Mavrogordatos, Elpida Vogli, and Othon Anastasakis at Ianos Bookstore on Aristotle Square.
Professor Anastasakis, in Thessaloniki again for the Dukakis Center’s annual summer Seesox Salonica Seminar, also took part in a briefing on the Greek sovereign debt crisis and its implications for southeast Europe, with local businessman Nikos Efthimiadis, for the benefit of ten German Marshal Fund Memorial Fellows, hosted by Elizabeth Phocas of Eliamep. The Fellows are mid-career Americans in both the private and public sectors who are chosen and funded by the GMF, a German institution, to travel throughout Europe. This is the fourth time ACT has collaborated with Eliamep to brief fellows travelling through Thessaloniki.