The history of the Communist Party in Cyprus: colonialism, class and the Cypriot left,

摘要

Nearly a century after its foundation, the history of the Communist Party of Cyprus (CPC; 1926-1944) has still lessons to teach the Intelligence Community (IC). If not for IC's failures1 directly, at least for its biases in grasping the evolution and impact of one of the most effective communist parties of Europe, whose legacy has produced the only communist president of a member state of the European Union in 2008. The History of the Communist Party in Cyprus: Colonialism, Class and the Cypriot Left succeeds in elucidating the political process of a leftist movement in Cyprus that was fighting a multi-front 'war'against (British) colonialism, (Orthodox) clericalism and (ethnic) nationalism. Cyprus, the so-called 'unsinkable aircraft carrier'of the Eastern Mediterranean, in the 1920s and onwards was experiencing a transition, like much of the globe today. Colonialism was on the wane, nationalism on the rise, and colonial Britain, despite its Labour Party, was still hanging on the idea of retaining its empire by the skin of its teeth. Against this backdrop, how the tightly monitored and persecuted communists managed to become a force to be reckoned by outsmarting both their local enemies and imperial Britain is part of the story this monograph illuminates. The book is admirable for its analytical clarity, good prose and common-sensical strategic approach to the survival, massification and fall of the CPC. However, the usefulness of Marxism as an analytical approach has its limitations. Engaging with the literature on contentious politics might have been compatible with the work at hand and more useful for the IC.