Cyclades - Social and Political Organization

The Cyclades are part of the state of modern Greece. They belong to the geographic region known as the Aegean Islands, which also includes the Dodecanese, Lesvos, Samos, and Chios. The Cyclades themselves form a separate administrative unit or department ( nomós ), containing eight eparchies, eight municipalities, and 109 communities ( kinóites ), each of which generally is comprised of one or more villages. The town of Ermoupolis on the island of Syros is the capital of the nomos. Greece is a parliamentary democracy and, as Greek citizens, the inhabitants of the Cyclades participate in democratic political processes of the region and nation. Each community elects its own officials, as well as voting for regional and national candidates. Many migrants remain registered to vote in their home communities and Return there on election day to cast their ballots. The Cyclades can perhaps best be described as "middle of the road" with Respect to political affiliation. In the 1985 national parliamentary elections, for example, 45.39 percent of the islanders voted for the Conservative party, Nea Dimocratia, and 48.12 percent for the main Socialist party, PASOK. (The rest voted for various leftist parties.) In elections in the summer of 1989, the vote shifted to 49.09 percent for Nea Dimocratia and 41.18 percent for PASOK.