Andreas Papandreou The Making of a Greek Democrat and Political Maverick

The roots of Greece's current economic crisis can arguably be traced back to Andreas Papandreou, Greece's socialist Prime Minister and one of Europe's most divisive post-war politicians. Returning to Athens in 1959 after 20 years in the US where he had been a rising member of the American liberal establishment, Papandreou forged a social reform-oriented, nationalist politics in Greece that ultimately put him at odds with US foreign policy and made him the target of a pro-American military coup in 1967. Venerated by his admirers and despised by his detractors, the Harvard-educated Papandreou left in his wake no clear-cut answer to the question of who he was and what he stood for. Stan Draenos here chronicles the events, struggles and ideas that defined Papandreou's dramatic, intrigue-filled transformation from Kennedy-era modernizer to Cold War maverick. In the process Draenos examines the making of one of Greece's most complex politicians and assesses the explosive interplay of character and circumstance that generated Papandreou's contentious, but powerfully consequential politics.