The Department of European Studies and International Relations would like to invite you to a Research Seminar on: Economics and Large Problems in Cyprus: Similarities and Differences between 1931 and 2013 by Dr. Alexandros Apostolides, European University Cyprus Wednesday, 6 March 2013, 11:30-13:00 M115 Conference Room, Millennium Building (1st floor), University of Nicosia Seminar Coordinator: Craig Webster Abstract During the interwar period Cyprus faced a small deficit, yet the inflexibility of the colonial finance structure created a political impasse. As a result the disagreements between the Colonial government and the Cypriot elected members of the islands legislative assembly sparked violence against the regime. Such violence would not have been possible if the already aggrieved political and economic situation allowed those with nationalistic agenda to undermine the legitimacy of the colonial regime. Although the traditional argument indicates that the 1931 riots were a purely nationalistic act, the disagreements of the colonial government and the actions of the leaders of the largest communities have to be understood within the sense of increasing crisis caused by the continual fall GDP. At the same time, the political situation was paralysed to react in a severe economic depression in part due to the disagreements between the Governor and the colonial office in London on one hand and the internal struggles for control within the Turkish and Greek communities. As a result the tinder for the violence in 1931 may have been nationalistic, but the fuel was provided by the prolonged economic crisis in Cyprus. In 2013 the island faces a rather different economic crisis, but some of the choices made by the present government and the then colonial government are similar. The similarities are shown to be linked to the size of the island, and suggestion how to reduce vulnerability will be addressed. R.S.V.P. Tel: 22841600, Email: cceia@unic.ac.cy
