The interview is as follows:

Professor Papadopoulos, as a renowned country branding scholar in Canada, which do you consider the primary factors for the success of Canada as a leading country brand (2nd place in Country Brands – Index 2008)?

Essentially there are two reasons. One has to do with quality of life, perceptions of people about the general level of development of the country. The other one is the perception of Canada as a peaceful country in international affairs. These two perceptions evolved partly because we are next to the United States, which makes it easy to think of us as a developed country with a very high standard of living. But the U.S. is also a very powerful country, so every time someone gets angry at them, by comparison they look of Canada as a friendlier country. Canada is like a bigger Sweden or Switzerland. It has no negatives, really. It has never done anything wrong: the peace-keeping efforts, the contribution of Canada to the solution of the Suez crisis and so on. All these things developed an image of a peaceful country that doesn’t bother anybody. The interesting thing about Canada, which is in some ways shared by Greece, is that the image of Canada doesn’t have so much content. In our research, every time we go and ask people ‘what do you think about Canada?’, the ratings are always very high. But when we ask them to tell us ‘why’, they just answer ‘nice country’. We ask ‘why is it nice?’, the answer is ‘well, I don’t know’. Yet Canada, much as Greece, has a lot of successes. Canadians have invented everything from basketball to insulin, the telephone and so on. But people don’t know that, they just like the country in a general sense. A very similar thing or even worse happens with Australia. Everybody loves Australia. There are three countries that everyone loves around the world: Australia, New Zealand, Canada. But try to ask people ‘why’… Australia has sheep, we’ve got bears, they are hot, we are cold and that’s it!

Do you think that the reputation of a country could influence the promotion of its products? Could you please elaborate on the Country of Origin Effect on Consumer Behavior?

Definitely there is an effect. Many times the effect is not direct. There are not many people who think that when consumers buy a product, they may buy it because of where it comes from. In another branch of international business, research in investment studies, there is actually a thing called the ‘liability of foreigners’. Foreigners have a disadvantage. Why? One reason is that they don’t know the local customs. However, in the case of imported products, there may be an advantage of foreigners in most countries, in that there is something exotic about them. We are doing some research at the moment where we compare how different companies present their products in advertising in different countries. We have collected about three thousand magazine advertisements from Canada and the United States, and about the same from Italy, Britain and Greece. Among other things, we find that many Greek companies advertise in Greek magazines, for Greeks, using the English language or the Italian language or French or whatever. Because there is an advantage in portraying yourself to be from somewhere else, which brings me to the country of origin. I prefer to use the term ‘country of association’. Take Wind, for example – this is a mobile network here in Greece, but the brand name is English and the country of association is Anglo-Saxon: it is English, it is American, it is British. It’s not German, it’s not Italian, it’s not French. Look, on the other hand, at L’ Oréal or any French brand of cosmetics, or Italian brands for shoes or suits for men. There are these associations between certain countries that are thought to be (and very often are) especially strong in certain product categories. So, companies try to find these perceptions and use them, even if their origin is different, by borrowing an association. So you have Greek wines that have French names. Country of association has a huge impact. Its effect doesn’t necessarily work at a conscious level. It may work subconsciously as well. You go to someone and you ask ‘why did you buy this?’ and he or she might tell you ‘oh, because it’s cheap’ or ‘because it’s the best quality’. They will give you rational reasons. But this is not the way we actually think and behave. People don’t necessarily behave rationally. Most of the time there is a combination of reason and emotion that makes us behave in a particular way, and very often the emotional side is the deciding factor.

You have supported that the key element of a successful nation-branding strategy is to provide an image of trustworthiness regarding both the country and its people at an international level. In your opinion, has Greece managed to develop such an image? Which actions should be implemented in order to enhance its trustworthiness towards public opinion?

The word ’trustworthiness’ doesn’t come up for every country. It comes up as a great strength of countries like Canada, Australia and New Zealand. People in some countries don’t trust the Americans, for example, and the ratings for France are quite low in some areas. I don’t remember where Greece might score, and I would not know to tell you because I cannot remember of any study that has used this measure for Greece. But I would not guess that this may be a characteristic of Greece.  That may not be a negative thing necessarily – or it actually could be, based on anecdotal evidence. There is an international saying, ‘beware of Greeks bearing gifts’, because of the Trojan Horse. That’s actually a very widespread feeling. Is trustworthiness important in general? Yes, it is. Because it affects tourists, it affects a lot of individual parts of behavior, if you consider things in technical terms. For example, it is very important in business-to-business relationships. Trustworthiness may at times be more important than the price charged for a product or its other characteristics. Trustworthiness translates into things like reliability, the relative value of a product. An interesting case in point is Canada. Among consumers, Canada always scores very high on trustworthiness. Yet, among business people, it does not score as highly. Canadian business exporters to business have a reputation, which they deserve to some extent, of not following through. At the first difficulty some of them give up and run back home. This kind of thing hurts trust enormously. And there are a lot of examples like this. In Canada, we have a foundation called Asia-Pacific Foundation. They did a big study in six or seven countries along the Pacific and the levels of trust they found for Canadian business people were quite low. Independent of country of origin, trust has emerged as a major issue in marketing. Domestically and internationally, it is one of the hottest topics that people study. Trust in everything: trust when you decide what product to buy, trust when you decide to buy that skirt over the other one, from one dealer over another. Trust seems to be a very central theme in human relations, particularly in our time when things are getting busier, and it’s harder to cope with the world around us. That’s why branding has become so important, since a brand is a ‘promise’ that consumers can trust that it will deliver what it says in terms of quality, satisfaction, or its other characteristics.

Which specific nation branding strategies do you believe that Greece should adopt in order to build a competitive image and streamline a clear brand name abroad? Should Greece continue to lay emphasis on its traditional competitive advantages or should it re-orientate its nation-branding policy?

Here is where I will disappoint you because I don’t know, at least not on the basis of research. I don’t think anyone has done the research to find out. I participated in a conference organized by the Athens Institute for Education and Research just after the Olympics, and someone there was presenting the results of the Olympics and what might happen to the image of Greece – and yes, there was a positive image. We also had done some research here in Greece in the mid-90s, which is quite old by now – but I don’t see why anything might have changed – about investments. What we found is that even though there were a few investors who had the usual complaints (bureaucracy or whatever), there were a lot of very positive comments by current investors, by managers of companies that had already invested in Greece. I don’t know what people who are outside of Greece think. Lots of people would see Greece as what it really is in some sense, which is a point for distribution and accessing the Balkans, Eastern Europe, the European Union, the Middle East, the Mediterranean and so on. There might be other countries but Greece seems to have predominance, at least for the Balkans. The last thing I would say about Greece is that even the image about the antiquities and tourism is not necessarily the right image. How many times in Canada people come to me and say, ‘we are going to Greece, tell us where to go. Of course, we want to go to Santorini and Mykonos, we don’t want to stay in Athens at all, maybe one day to see the Acropolis and that’s it’. And I keep telling them ‘don’t even bother going to the Acropolis, you are going to be just another stupid tourist who goes and looks at just some more stupid marbles and columns which would mean nothing to you and you will leave. This way you gain nothing. If you want to enjoy the Acropolis go to Athens and stay for a week. The marbles and columns are important but to appreciate them you must ‘feel’ them. You must walk around, to more than just the Acropolis. You go, you know, to Plateia Kotzia. You look at how the antiquities are all over the place. You try to imagine how the city was, you go to the various museums’. It’s the same with tourism. Everybody goes to Santorini – ok, that’s interesting – and Mykonos – ok, I love Mykonos too – but there are so many other things. And they are not being promoted.  So as not to accuse just the Greeks, there is no country that anybody knows of, anywhere in the world, that has managed to have an overall strategy. All countries have exactly the same problem: they have a Ministry of Tourism that does one thing, there is another Ministry which does something else and so on. I was speaking, two months ago, with the Ambassador of Sweden in Canada, who participated in the development of an amazing new Swedish campaign for country branding. When I asked her ‘how do you coordinate all that’, she said ‘no way to coordinate’.  The only thing you can hope for is that the images presented by various ministries for various purposes would not be conflicting with one another. In Greece you don’t have such a problem. Because the existing images with the antiquities and tourism don’t really conflict with each other. They do hurt Greece, however, in that nobody thinks of the country as modern, industrialized, developed, which it is. In my view, Athens is one of the most beautiful capitals. I’m not saying this because I am an Athenian by birth. Everyone says that Athens is ‘lots of concrete’ and nothing else. Well, go to any city, go to New York – it doesn’t have the avenues we have, the trees in every neighborhood, and yet no says “lots of concrete” about it. Of course, London has Hyde Park and New York has Central Park – but we have the National Gardens and right next is Lykavitos and right above is Alsos Pagratiou and right below is Pedion Areos. So the city has as much green space as many others – but we let this kind of “all concrete” image persist.

Do you think that nation branding can be influenced by negative incidents of current affairs or it is something more “steady” with long term effects?

There can be a great negative effect, but how long will it last, and how bad it is going to be, depends on the nature of the event and which is the country, among other things. For example, we did a study with a colleague in Australia in 1992 and in 1995. Between those years the image of  France declined significantly because the French sank that ship of Greenpeace which was protesting against the French nuclear tests in the South Pacific. I don’t have more recent evidence of my own, but a colleague of mine did a new study in 2005 and the image of France was back to where it used to be. It took about ten years but they fixed it up. Why? Because France has a generally good image. It is a big, stable and important country. Greece is not. It starts from a negative point, partly because it is thought of as part of the Balkans, a region with quite a negative image abroad. If a country starts with such an image, it has to be running twice as fast to stay in the same place. On the other hand, for every negative aspect, there are a lot of positives that can be used to balance them. In the case of Greece, there was some positive image created because of the Olympics but it has to be capitalized on to prevent losing it.

In the future, will nation branding last or is it just a temporary trend?

I don’t think it is a temporary trend. l think it is a huge, permanent development. It is very early and a lot of the problems we just talked about occur exactly because it’s too early. It takes time for people to think things through. Nation branding has not existed for more than about 10-15 years. Marketing has been around since antiquity and still most people don’t understand it. We need to get away from the word nation branding, because ‘branding’ is only part of marketing. The correct term is ‘nation marketing’. But since many people still don’t understand what ‘marketing’ is all about, it will take us a long, long time to achieve a correct understanding of ‘nation marketing’. I will give you an example. In Canada there is a TV channel, CPAC, dealing with public affairs. They have a show called ‘The World Today” or something like this and a few years ago they invited me to participate in a discussion about Greece. They had the Greek ambassador, myself, and a lady of Greek origin, a member of the parliament in Ottawa. I said something like ‘we need to promote our country and country branding is important’ and the ambassador became really upset and said something like ‘you cannot promote a country like a detergent or soap, a country is an important sacred thing’. The journalist was a bit surprised at the level of vehemence of the ambassador, but l have had this reaction before. Half an hour later the journalist asked the ambassador what does the embassy in Canada do to attract more investment to Greece. And the ambassador replied that ‘we do a lot of promotion, a lot of advertising’ and the journalist was smiling. At the end he asked how this differs from what the professor had said before and the ambassador graciously accepted that he had been wrong. This is a typical image from people who have grown up to believe that marketing is something bad. We need another ten or twenty years to get away from that logic.

You are a member of the Greek Marketing Academy. How do Greek Marketers stand internationally?

On the practitioner side, I don’t think that there is anybody internationally who knows much about Greek marketers because Greece doesn’t export anything world-known except for a few agricultural products and some processed product brands, like Metaxa brandy. But there are many success stories on the academic side. We have a rather large number of very well-known Greek professors internationally. George Avlonitis, the president of the Greek Marketing Academy, ‘Father George’ of Greek marketing, is well known abroad. Internationally, there is myself, Adamantios Diamantopoulos, who is extremely famous and he works at the University of Vienna. There is another fellow by the name of Konstantinos Katsikeas at the University of Leeds, UK, also very, very well known, and also Antonis Simintiras, who is now in at least part of the time in Thessaloniki but he used to be full time in Britain. There are a disproportionate large number of Greek names in international marketing and international business research in general, which is good.

Public Diplomacy and Nation Branding: Is there difference between the two terms or do they mean exactly the same thing?

They are a little bit overlapping but I wouldn’t say that they are the same. I would imagine that public diplomacy would include some activities and concepts that normally one would not classify as marketing. But that depends on how one can understand public diplomacy. What is public diplomacy? l worked together with Simon Anholt when he launched a journal called Place Branding and Public Diplomacy and we had a lot of discussions about this at that time. One of our big arguments was that if you say public diplomacy and place branding, it means two different things. My view was, why don’t you leave it as ‘place branding’ and let it include everything. Many people call it ‘nation branding’, but as I said before I prefer the term ‘nation marketing’ – and the fully accurate term is ‘place marketing’, because it is not only nations, but also cities and other geographic areas that are relevant to it. Place marketing, since it is marketing, includes a lot of things that go very much beyond diplomacy and communication. Marketing includes pricing, distribution, packaging, corporate design, and so on. Therefore, I see public diplomacy as one manifestation of place marketing. Traditionally, whenever there was an attempt to apply marketing to a non-commercial field, the people in that field didn’t like it. They are always trying to find some nicer way to refer to it. In Ottawa, we have a National Arts Centre and many years ago they established a marketing department to market it – and do you know what they called it? ‘Audience development’ department. Similarly with ‘public diplomacy’, it seems to be a more agreeable term. There is an overlap if you define public diplomacy very very strictly. There would be some differences, there are some activities that diplomats would do that marketers would normally not do but that’s about it.

My compliments to the ICP Forum for another great interview! It seems Greece is finally grasping the need and importance of managing its country brand!

In fact, now the measurements count many factors besides the tourism and travel dimensions, which were the factors traditionally considered by FutureBrands’s Country Brand Index. Obviously, the inclusion of factors away from the traditional Greek strengths of travel, tourism, culture and history makes the country inevitably rank pretty worse.

Greece only appears twice in the top-ten ranks, in the Art & Culture and History categories, which remain Greece’s country brand stronghold:

More information on the Country Brands Index 2008

The report is based upon the tone of the mention every UNO country gets every time in leading world media. With algorithms, EastWest can analyze whether the mention’s tone is positive or negative. According to EastWest, the algorithm not only uses a vast lexicon comprising 16,000 words and phrases, but also analyzes grammatical connections, not just word proximity. I’ve done a bit larger mention of this new report on my website on Nation Branding.

Here are the top-27 results for Q2 2008:

Not a bad place for Greece, considering that 192 countries were analyzed, but I guess there’s room for improvement.

Greece ranked 5th for overall country branding according to the second annual Country Brand Index 2006 (CBI). The Index was released in London at the World Trade Market, an annual exhibition held for the global travel trade. This is the official release text:

The CBI identifies countries as “brands” and emerging global travel trends in terms of foreign exchange earnings and job creation. The world’s fastest economic sector pertaining to country branding is travel and tourism and accounts for more than 1 of every 11 jobs worldwide.Greece ranked very high in a number of categories, reflecting the country’s exquisite historical and natural resources, wide variety of holiday options, and the all important “enjoyment” factor. The categories in which Greece excelled are:

• Value for Money
• History
• Art and Culture
• Resort/Lodging Options
• Rest/Relaxation
• Beach
• Natural Beauty
• Nightlife

The summation quote by the branding experts is “Greece: Friendly people with great surroundings and great food.”The international study of country branding was developed by FutureBrand, a leading global brand consulting firm in co-operation with Weber Shandwick’s Global Travel Practice, a public relations firm. It focused on more than 1,500 international travelers, recruited from a globally diverse sample including the Americas, Europe, Asia, South America and the Middle East and screened to include only frequent international travelers who travel internationally more than once a year- between the ages of 21 and 65, with a balanced split between men and women. Business and leisure travelers were both included, as well as travel industry experts and hospitality professionals. The study examined how nations can be branded and ranked according to key criteria, such as emerging trends, travel motivations, challenges and opportunities within the world of travel and country branding.According to the CBI report, new trends for travel and tourism are emerging and unique criteria are making a big impact on the average traveler who is no longer satisfied with the ordinary. Some of those trends include the emergence of people who write on blogs and countless websites about their own travel experiences.With new trends in the travel industry and an ever expanding travel community, come new audiences, all with different needs and expectations during their time away from home. They crave the exotic, “feel at home” accommodations, and want to make weddings, anniversaries and reunions an unforgettable and special time when abroad, wherever their destination may be.Other contenders who ranked on this year’s CBI list were Australia (1) and the United States (2) and Italy (3). In addition to the top 10 rankings, the top three “rising star” countries that are likely to be major tourism destinations in the next five years are China, Croatia, and the United Arab Emirates.For a complete list of country ranks and a look at the Country Brand Index 2006, visit: www.webershandwick.com

This is the new “Greek identity” that emerges after the successful hosting of the Games, as perceived by citizens in five major countries (USA, UK, Spain, Germany, France) and reflected in the results of a large public opinion survey conducted in these countries on behalf of ATHENS 2004 immediately after the Games by the consortium consisting of MRB, VPRC and RESEARCH INTERNATIONAL.

More specifically, the survey was carried out in the period from 1 to 22 September 2004 in the USA (1001 respondents), Spain (502 respondents), Germany (507 respondents), the UK (519 respondents) and France (502 respondents). It was a telephone survey conducted using the special telephone interview system. The respondents were selected at random from among the adult members of every household, following a random calling process. The survey was conducted in accordance with the Codes of Practice laid down by the Association of Greek Market & Opinion Research Companies (SEDEA) and ESOMAR.

The survey results show that the majority of respondents felt positive about Greece after the Games, based on what they saw or heard during that period. Indeed, 38.7% of Americans expressed their intention to visit Greece in the future, ranking Greece as the second most popular destination after Italy. In terms of their intention to travel to Greece for their holidays, Germans represent the largest ‘client base’ for Greece.

Regarding the Olympic Games, the largest percentage of respondents showed great to extremely great interest, with access to relevant information being achieved through television channels, magazines and advertising.

The Olympic Games of Athens were characterised as successful by 90% of Americans and 93% of Europeans, while 40% of all respondents considered the Athens Games to be the best Games ever organised in the history of the modern Olympic Games.

More in particular, the survey results showed the following:

Increase in positive opinions about Greece after the Games, based on what respondents saw and heard (table 1)*:

• USA: +23%
• Europe: +7%
• UK: +11%
• Germany: +2%
• Spain: +1.7%
• France:+10.5%

Positive feelings about Greece after the Games (table 2)*:

• USA: +9%
• Europe: +3.9%
• UK: +3%
• Germany: +0,8%
• Spain: +3%
• France: +7.7%

Likelihood to visit Greece for holidays (table 3)*:

a) US residents

• Greece: 38.7%
• Italy: 50.2%
• Spain: 37.2%
• Turkey: 7.8%
• Croatia: 5.2%

b) Europeans

• Greece: 49.2%
• Italy: 49.9%
• Spain: 42%
• Turkey: 17.2%
• Croatia: 19.1%

The above data allow the conclusion to be drawn that after the success of the Games Greece is strengthened compared to its competitors in tourism, outranking even Spain in the US market , while in the European market it ranks very close to Italy and is well ahead of Spain.

On average, 30% of respondents showed great interest for the Olympic Games (table 4)*.
Sources of information regarding the Olympic Games (table 5)*:

• USA: 36.5% programmes or newscasts on TV
• Europe: 46.1% programmes or newscasts on TV
• UK 50.9% advertising
• Germany 58% programmes or newscasts on TV
• Spain 45.3% advertising
• France 64% programmes or newscasts on TV

How successful did the respondents believe that the Olympic Games were (table 6)*:

• USA: 35% successful, 59.3% very successful
• Europe: 52.8% successful, 44% very successful
• UK: 38% successful, 59% very successful
• Germany: 62.7% successful, 32.5% very successful
• Spain: 58.4% successful, 38.8% very successful
• France: 53% successful, 45.2% very successful

A total of 40% of the respondents believe the Olympic Games of Athens to be the best ever organised to this date (table 7)*

Viewers who watched the Opening Ceremony. From the data of table 8*, it follows that 41.3% in the USA and an average 48% in Europe watched the Opening Ceremony of the Athens Olympic Games on television, which made ratings skyrocket.

• USA: 41.3%
• Europe: 48%
• UK: 50.5%
• Germany: 50.5%
• Spain: 48.4%
• France: 42.4%

People liked the Opening Ceremony very much in the USA (65%) and in Europe (61.1% on average). Of particular interest are the high percentages recorded in positive responses in Spain (68%), Germany (64.8%) and France (62.9%). (table 9)*:

• USA: 65%
• Europe: 61.1%
• UK: 49.2%
• Germany: 64.8%
• Spain: 68%
• France: 62.9%

Athletics and Swimming are very popular sports and attracted a large number of viewers. In the USA, 59.4% of viewers watched the Swimming disciplines with great interest, while an average 61.6% of European viewers watched the Athletics sports, with the UK representing the highest number of viewers (table 10)*:

• USA: 59.4% Swimming
• Europe: 61.6% Athletics
• UK: 74.2% Athletics
• Germany: 60.4% Swimming
• Spain: 52.8% Athletics
• France: 59.4% Athletics

Greece is a “safe destination”, a “modern European Country” that organised “technically excellent” Olympic Games with a “human dimension”. The following results were recorded after the Games emerge (tables 11-14)*:

• Athens – safe destination: 74.6%
• Greece – European country: 72.3%
• Human dimension of the Games: 66.2%
• Greece – modern country: 63.5%
• Games – technically excellent: 64.6%

Something amazing happened on August 13, when, at the opening ceremonies of the 2004 Olympics, Athens 2004 president Gianna Angelopoulos-Daskalaki welcomed the world to the Greek capital, declaring to a live audience of 72,000 and a TV audience estimated at 4 billion, “Greece is going to fire the world’s imagination.”

Against the odds, it did.

Suddenly, the intense skepticism that had built up in the media for months – about Athens’ preparedness, security, etc. – transformed into a sense that one of the most anticipated and doubted Olympic spectacles in history might just turn out to be one of the best.

Perceptions were shifted dramatically. It was as if the world had agreed that the moral of the 2004 Athens Olympic story would not be the familiar caution coined by 6th century BC Greek fable writer Aesop – “Look before you leap” – but rather his lesser-known enjoinder: “The greater the risk, the greater the honor” (an ancient version of Nike’s “Just do it”?).

Or perhaps: “He laughs best who laughs last.”

Another bout of skepticism quickly ensued over attendance and TV viewership – but once again the Olympics appear to have met, even exceeded, expectations. Early coverage focused on empty arena seats, raising questions about whether TV viewers would in turn tune out.

As of press time, Athens 2004 was close to its sales target of 3.4 million tickets. Attendance was lower than in the last (pre-recession, pre-9/11) Summer Games, but comparable to that of Barcelona in 1992 (3 million) and Seoul in 1988 (3.3 million).

Even more important, TV viewership was up 18% compared to Sydney, according to NBC. That increase is striking. Since 2000, the challenges to securing a mass TV audience have become far more onerous, but Athens delivered an even more massive mind share.

Rebranding Greece

One can still argue that the Olympics continue to be among the most prominent platforms for branding on the planet. Despite the challenges and expense of organizing, hosting, securing, and sponsoring the Olympics in an increasingly complex, post-9/11 world, the Games remain a powerful way for brands to make broad connections with deep impact.

Arguably, the brand that had the most at stake in this summer’s Olympics was the country of Greece itself. Hosting the Olympics can help countries boost tourism, attract investment, and create new infrastructure. With 11 million people, Greece is the smallest country to host the Games since Finland in 1952. Since 2000, its economy has expanded by 4% annually, with the Olympics contributing an estimated quarter of that total.

Perhaps the most valuable and enduring benefit for Greece, however, is the opportunity the Olympics provided to influence perceptions and redress negative stereotypes. Hosting the Games gave Greece a priceless, once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to “re-brand” itself on a world stage.

When construction delays began to cause concerns about Athens’ readiness as far back as 2000, it looked as if the old stereotype of Greece as a nation of friendly procrastinators might be reinforced. Particularly following 9/11 and the scrutiny on Athens as the Summer Games’ first host following the attacks, the skepticism escalated, reaching a fever pitch in the months before the opening.

(Indeed, a Turnkey Sports Poll of 400 senior-level sports-industry executives in the US conducted in July found the biggest perceived threats to a successful summer Olympics in Athens were terrorism [55.7%] and unfinished facilities [24%], far outpacing concerns about scandals relating to performance-enhancing drugs [3.6%].)

The opening ceremonies (which were produced by our firm) defied stereotypes and broadcasted a positive image of Greece to a global TV audience, merging pride in the country’s ancient past with a new image of its contemporary place in the world. According to NBC, which holds US broadcast rights, they were the most-watched non-US opening ceremonies, with a 14.6 rating/27 household share. It is no exaggeration to say that the ceremonies – which in 2000 were the most-watched event during the entire two-week Sydney Games – are the biggest three-hour ad a country could have.

Greece is on the warm side, no question. You can get there in about two hours, there are lots of packages and it’s not wildly expensive. And this year they’re doing the Olympics, one of those national Great Leap Forward things.

But everyone’s as anxious about Greece getting the Olympic Village built in time as they might have been about Bobby Acropolis having his new hotel in Rhodes finished when they’d got 200 couples from Blackburn booked.

Is Greece in Europe? On every conventional snobbish European criterion it sort of is. From Ancient Greece on – what middle-class baby-boomer didn’t have “the Glory that was Greece” in the childhood kit, along with the key classic translations in those purple Penguins – it seemed to hit the cultural buttons. And Robert Graves with his olives and ouzo was a pre-Tuscany ad for ex-pats.

But the reality of post-war Greece – the dodgy politics, the never-quite- made-it economy, and the food – made you wonder whether it was really in Europe or somewhere altogether hairier. Individual Greeks – Golden Greek entrepreneurs on their yachts and my enterprising friends in Wood Green – seemed modern and adaptable, but overwhelmingly they were somewhere else, runaways.

There are monographs about this sort of thing (“The Greek Paradox: promise vs performance” sums it up). And the clever people at the Future Foundation, re-thinking European alignments post-accession, seem to think Greece is a problem; whichever way they segment Europe, Greece is an oddity, out there on its own, a funny single-country sector.

The Greek National Tourist Office commercial does all the usual stuff, beaches and amphitheatres, with shafts of sunlight everywhere. They’re on about having the most sunshine in Europe, combined with silly stuff about how long people stand amazed at ancient sites or how quickly they forget work when they dive off a white boat into blue-green water. “Your best time yet,” they say. The re-branding is calling it Greece 2004, meaning Olympic Greece.

It isn’t enough, in fact it’s positively anxious-making. They should be concentrating on something a bit less commoditised than sun and ancient ruins.

For the first time in its modern history, Greece has embarked on a systematic effort to understand how the country is viewed abroad.The results are not pretty. Now the government is planning to spend $4 million this year to turn the tide. Odyssey secured a copy of the top-secret image study and asked Andrew Apostolou to analyze it.

The Greek government has decided to change Greece’s poor image abroad.

This is not a direct result of the Ocalan affair, though the incompetence of high-ranking officials, and of the bureaucracy in general, damaged both the government and the country’s standing abroad; nor is it linked to Greece’s friendship with the Serbs, a relationship that will surely come under greater scrutiny and stress following the start of NATO bombing of Yugoslavia on March 24. Instead, three years ago the ministry of press and media noticed something that anybody who follows international media had long been aware of-that Greece is rarely mentioned and that, when it is, the coverage is far from positive.

The irony is that the way the ministry is trying to change the image will simply confirm many of the hostile perceptions that so many foreigners, and Greeks, have of Greece.

In the aftermath of Greece’s 1996 general elections the press ministry spent an undisclosed sum to survey foreign “opinion leaders” and “decision makers” in Britain, the United States, France, and Germany.

The ministry hired the US research firm Peter D. Hart Research Associates, which conducted one-on-one interviews and focus groups in New York, Washington, Atlanta, Seattle, Chicago, and Los Angeles. The firm spoke to 13 leaders in political circles, 19 in information and communications, 17 in academia, and 32 economists. The British research firm IRB International-Opinion Leader Research used in-depth interviews and focus groups in London with 19 members of Parliament, eight economists, and five leaders of the media industry. In France, the research was undertaken by the BVA-Institut d’etudes de marches et d’opinion and in Germany by the Institut fur Demoskopie Allensbach, both of which employed a mix of interviews and focus groups. All the surveys were conducted in 1997. Their cost is estimated by New York-based industry professionals to have been $50,000-$60,000 per country, for a grand total of $200,000-$240,000.

Sleepy & Low-Tech

The results of these surveys were hardly a surprise-interviewees generally had a negative image of Greece.

As every Athenian taxi driver knows, Greece is viewed abroad as being either troublesome or marginal. Many of those interviewed knew little about Greece, cared less, and did not want to know more. The ministry received pages upon pages of slickly presented slides listing in great detail Greece’s failings. The results of the surveys, along with the press ministry’s analysis of them, were digested into a confidential report for the prime minister in September 1997. Odyssey has obtained a copy of this report.

True to form, the foreign research firms simply told the ministry of press what anybody who reads just one Greek newspaper a year already knows-that Greece is mired in considerable political and economic problems.

The opinion leaders were particularly unimpressed by the Greek economy. The 81 US opinion leaders associated Greece with a low-tech economy exporting agricultural products-an accurate perception given that 21 percent of Greece’s exports in 1996 were food and beverages. Greece was also seen to be lagging behind its EU partners-again not a surprise as Greece was the only country that wanted to qualify for the first round of European Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) but failed to do so.

One of the French politicians interviewed contrasted the impressive pace of change and infrastructure investment in Portugal to slower development in Greece, commenting that Greece seemed “asleep” on this issue. This observation is confirmed by European Commission statistics. Greece has a very low take-up of the EU structural funds for which it is eligible-just 44 percent by the end of 1997, one of the lowest in the EU. Foreign investors also tend to give Greece a miss, despite the record-setting days on the Athens Stock Exchange.

Even though Greece does not make full use of its EU entitlement, the country’s reputation is so low that there is resentment at misuse of this money. All the foreign opinion leaders felt that relying on EU money was bad for Greece and the abuse of that EU money was worse.

Troublemaker

Unsurprisingly, Greece’s foreign policy attracted the most criticism. Consistently, the opinion leaders did not want their countries to get drawn into the Greco-Turkish conflict, though the Americans admitted to knowing little of the background.

German opinion leaders were a little more sympathetic to Greece than to Turkey-though that appears to have more to do with anti-Turkish prejudice than pro-Greek feelings. For foreigners, the Greco-Turkish dispute shows the two countries are backward-looking and nationalistic. Of German opinion leaders, 63 percent blamed both Greece and Turkey for their dispute. The Britons resented the way the Greek government involves the EU in the conflict.

Two other foreign-policy issues cropped up: the Macedonia name dispute and Greece’s support for the Serbs. The Americans were unhappy at Greece’s stance on the Macedonia issue, seeing it as an example of how Greece is a troublemaker. One of the Britons agreed, commenting characteristically on “all that fuss about a name.”

More damaging has been the perception that Greece is pro-Serb. The result is that Greece’s attempt to claim the moral high ground in its disputes with Turkey, and especially over Cyprus, is greatly compromised. The French criticized Greece’s pro-Serb stance and breaching of the anti-Serb economic embargo, though the French were also somewhat indulgent given Greece’s unique position as the only Orthodox country in NATO and the EU. Although the Simitis government has largely rejected its predecessors’ pro-Serb views, the damage of consorting with those who Richard Holbrooke described as “the worst war criminals in Europe since Himmler” has been done. By contrast, Philip Spyropoulos of the American Hellenic Media Project, argues that some coverage of Greece in the US press aims at the “Serbianization” of Greece-by which he means portraying Greece as utterly hostile to US interests.

One British political source, speaking on condition of anonymity, illustrated the damage done by supporting the Serbs. In early 1995, the Cypriot foreign minister arrived in London for what should have been a straightforward meeting with a group of reliably pro-Greek Cypriot MPs. The session proved to be stormy.

The MPs were furious at Greek and Cypriot support for the Serbs, in particular breaches of the UN embargo. These pro-Greek Cypriot MPs were finding it hard to argue for the implementation of UN resolutions on Cyprus when Cyprus itself was undermining a UN embargo against Serbia.

Undiplomatic Diplomats

The conduct of Greek foreign policy also drew fire. Many of the Britons identified Greece as “paranoid,” “untrustworthy,” and unable to appreciate how others felt. Greece is not seen as a team player and its prickliness, according to the Britons, “shows a lack of confidence.”

One of the most powerful images created by any country abroad is by its political leaders. Andreas Papandreou was well known abroad-he just was not well liked abroad. Margaret Thatcher-the opposite of Papandreou in that she was loathed at home but loved abroad-commented that Papandreou was privately charming but publicly impossible. Prime Minister Costas Simitis has made positive changes in some aspects of economic policy-French opinion leaders were particularly impressed with him. Simitis is, however, internationally invisible. During the Ocalan crisis in February, CNN, referred to Simitis as Greece’s foreign minister.

Meanwhile, Greece’s former foreign minister, Theodore Pangalos, was well known-but for the wrong reasons. Pangalos loved to make outrageous comments. During a visit to Skopje in December 1998, he said that those who had tried to set up an ethnic Macedonian party in Greece were “Stalinists and homosexuals.” In a more puerile mood, Pangalos asked Holbrooke, who was visiting Athens on a private trip, when the last time Madeleine Albright had had sex.

British Philhellenism

One issue highlighted by the opinion leaders was corruption. Among the Britons, the overall impression was negative and nobody had “good stories” about experiences with Greece, with corruption cited as one of the causes. None of this will surprise anybody in Greece, a country afflicted by the sfrangikratia-the tyranny of the official stamp. Most Greek documents require some form of official stamp that allows the official holding the stamp to extract an informal tax (better known as a bribe). Another frequent complaint in Greece is that procedures for tenders are often murky and open to abuse.

More worrying than the criticism was the constant claim that Greece was simply marginal. Aside from those with a special interest, few leaders cared much about Greece. Said one French journalist: “This is because Greece is a small country and we have no reason to talk about it any more often than Portugal or Denmark, except for hot political issues such as relations with Albania or Turkey.”

As many Germans, 44 percent, felt that Greece was removed from them as was close to them. Indeed most of the Germans, 58 percent, associated Greece with holidays, 52 percent with antiquity, 23 percent with business problems, and 18 percent with the Greco-Turkish conflict. One small consolation was that when Germans were asked which EU country was most unstable politically, Greece could not compete with Italy, which outpolled it 55 percent to 40 percent.

Contrary to Greek prejudices, the most positive sentiments came from the Britons. Many Greeks regard Britain with distrust due to its role as the dominant power in the Mediterranean during the 19th and early 20th centuries. Among British opinion leaders there was a core that were very knowledgeable about Greece. The Britons tended to sympathize with Greece against Turkey-not because they think Greece is right, but because of closer historical and cultural links to Greece. The Britons also believed that Greece has a “good entrepreneurial spirit.”

Indeed, the Britons also had “a fund of good will and affection” toward Greece-the only respondents to have such feelings. This was based on an appreciation of the achievements of ancient Greece and modern Greece’s role in the Second World War-a sentiment not likely to be shared by Germans. The philhellenic Britons also expressed concern that the modern Greeks were “squandering” their heritage.

Modern Greek Wisdom

The ministry of press seems to have been uncertain what to do with these survey results. Its initial comments are contradictory.

The ministry report admitted that many developments of the last decade have been to blame for Greece’s poor image abroad. Then the ministry tried to console itself by saying that at first glance many of the foreigners’ views seemed to rely on prejudice and stereotypes. The final ministry response, which took more than a year to formulate, was to counter this “negative image” with a publicity campaign abroad.

But the ministry’s study is based on a misunderstanding, namely its claim that “many contemporary states-the US, Germany, Japan, the UK, France, etc.-are carrying out image studies over a series of years and at regular intervals.”

Actually, they don’t. The closest parallel is the British study on the image of Britain abroad, Panel 2000, which was started six months after the Greek ministry of press surveys.

The differences between Britain’s Panel 2000 and the Greek surveys are revealing. The most obvious difference is money.

While the Greek government wants to spend millions on an advertising campaign, the British government generated publicity and debate at virtually no cost. This is because the British exercise was carried out in public, unlike the Greek surveys which were confidential and costly. Britain’s Panel 2000 was able to draw on information from the Foreign Office, British companies, and research firms-virtually for free.

Britain’s Panel 2000 had a clear goal-”to look at all aspects of the projection of the UK overseas” and clearly defined areas of investigation. The motive was clearly commercial: “Everyone has a stake in the way that Britain is seen overseas. Our ability to influence other countries, to sell them our goods and services, and to win job-creating investment depends in part on how we are perceived.”

Panel 2000 took just eight months and two weeks from start to finish. It was publicly launched on April 1, 1998, and published its consultation paper (available on the Internet) on September 10, 1998, with two months added for public comments.

By contrast, the Greek ministry of press has moved at the slow pace for which the Greek bureaucracy is notorious. The process began in November 1996, the surveys ended in July 1997, the ministry’s report was written in September 1997, the publicity campaign tender was announced in December 1998, with the winner to be named this coming April-29 months and the campaign has still not been launched. American-based industry sources say that the data is now so old as to be useless. They also add that it is unclear as to why it is the ministry of press, as opposed to the foreign ministry, which is undertaking this work.

Above all Panel 2000 was both public and inclusive, as befits any debate on the national image. Panel 2000 had 32 members, none of whom received a fee. Of the 32, half were from the government. The other half included broadcasters, business leaders, an independent MP, an athlete, a representative from Amnesty International, and members of the opposition. The British government also made a point of including ethnic minorities, three from the private sector and one from government; indeed, minorities were over-represented, as one in eight of Panel 2000 was an ethnic minority, compared to one in 18 for the British population as a whole.

Such behavior would be unthinkable in Greece. Indeed one of the French journalists quoted in the Greek surveys was shocked by the way that those who are not Greek Orthodox are not treated as fully Greek citizens. The Greek government does not deny that there are ethnic and religious minorities in Greece, but it does refuse to give ethnic minorities any form of legal recognition.

This puts Greece on the defensive when dealing with countries like Britain and the US which are avowedly multi-ethnic and where there is open debate about the treatment of minorities. As one US diplomat with Greek connections noted, if Greek Americans were treated by the US government in the same way that the Greek government treats its minorities, then there would be a scandal. The fact that Greece’s treatment of minorities is better than Turkey’s cuts little ice.

Uncool Britannia!

Yet for all the smooth organization, the whole Panel 2000 exercise was widely ridiculed in Britain. The press viciously dubbed it “Cool Britannia.” The consultation paper was chock full of high-sounding slogans such as: “by working together we can make a bigger impact than an individual firm or government department could ensure on its own.” Panel 2000 also resorted to well-worn cliches: “Britain stands for values and qualities that are respected across the world-integrity, the rule of law, free speech, fair play, creativity.”

The British government’s attempts to show off British technology were equally silly. The day after Panel 2000 was launched, Prime Minister Tony Blair opened an exhibition called “Powerhouse UK” in the center of London. Powerhouse UK was supposed to show that Britain was still at the leading edge of technology, but the inflatable tents which housed vacuum cleaners and other technological wizardry looked like bouncy castles in a circus.

A more striking example, this time of wasted money, is the Turkish government’s repeated attempts to attract more investment. One advertising campaign was run with the snappy slogan “Turkey, the Key” emphasizing Turkey’s important location. Large multinationals remain very interested in Turkey, but rarely actually invest. The complaints are similar to those for Greece: corruption, lack of transparency, and an impenetrable, hostile bureaucracy-issues that slick advertising cannot solve.

Glasgow Became Miles Better

The dangers of spending money on advertisements that do not correspond to reality are obvious.

As one Athens market research source pointed out, the problem was not that the foreigners had a wrong negative image of Greece, they had an accurate negative image. This source was surprised that the foreigners surveyed on behalf of the Greek ministry of press were so well informed.

Meanwhile, Spyros Paschentis, a leading management consultant who runs the Athens-based Orco Group, says “the more convincing are the measures that you take to sort out the real problems, the more fruitful your public-relations campaign will be.” A prominent Athens business source is even blunter, warning that without real changes a publicity campaign will be “built on lies.” Signs of a superficial response are already evident. One foreign journalist who recently visited Greece to write about the 2004 Olympic Games remarked that Olympic committee officials were so insistently invoking “transparency,” that they seeded doubt about how transparent the staffing and bidding related to the Games actually are.

Perhaps the most useful example for Greece is also the most unlikely: the Scottish city of Glasgow.

Once an important industrial center whose population peaked at 1.1 million during the last war, Glasgow went through a period of economic and social decline with its large industrial base collapsing. The city became dirty, violent, and poor. The population nearly halved. Then in the early 1980s the Thatcher government and the city council poured in public money and attracted private investment. The soot-covered apartment blocks were cleaned to reveal sand-and-rose-colored stone that had been hidden for decades. Tourism, financial services, and conferences took off-the city is fed by three privately owned international airports.

During the city’s transformation, a PR campaign paid for with public and private money, “Glasgow’s Miles Better,” was launched. The aim was simple: to communicate to outsiders that their old image of Glasgow was now wrong, that Glasgow was going through a renaissance. It worked. Nearly 20 years of persistence have paid off. From being one of Europe’s least-likely tourism destinations, Glasgow now gets 500,000 foreign visitors per year and is Britain’s third-largest destination.

When Greece starts its renaissance, then it is time to let the world know.

As 2004 approaches, Greeks are preparing for a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to showcase their culture and country to the world. The image projected during the Olympic Games will stay with the world for decades. But what should that image be?

When the songs vying to represent Greece at the 2002 Eurovision Song Contest were announced in March, an especially turbulent tempest broke out in the Greek teacup

The furor erupted over the number of entries with non-Greek lyrics as the Eurovision hopefuls bid to match the success of last year’s third-place showing by Antique (the children of Greek migrants to Sweden). The pop-muzak concoctions with their ersatz English were vehemently denounced as a debasement of Greek culture by a parade of pundits who argued that the song contest should be used to showcase the true Greek politismos.

But amid all the rage and rancor over what most of the rest of Europe views as a laughable, albeit loveable, cultural forum, not a single critic touched upon the issue of what Greek culture was-other than to imply that it was somehow superior to pop ditties with English lyrics. The country’s culture was thus defined by what it was not: Greece’s Eurovision entry, the uninspired, but impressively tacky, “S.A.G.A.P.O.,” (I love you) written and performed by ageing rocker Mihalis Rakintzis.

C.U.L.T.U.R.E. is a serious, often somber, subject in Greece-and at times it is almost a national issue. (In 1981, culture was Greece’s ticket into the then-European Economic Community as Constantine Karamanlis played on European sensitivities that the “cradle of democracy” never again be vulnerable to dictatorship.) Indeed, the Greek language does not distinguish between “culture” and “civilization,” making it virtually impossible to describe a modern pop culture. The result is a segregation in the arts between the artistic (quality) and the commercial (mass appeal), and a rather curious inference that the two are mutually exclusive.

How Greece approaches this question will determine, to a large degree, the benefits that accrue to the country from the Olympic Games Athens will host in 2004. “It is the single most important event for Greece in the next 10-20 years,” says Denis Oswald, who heads the International Olympic Committee’s coordinating committee for Athens 2004. “The games established Barcelona and Sydney in the world’s eye; and all the ingredients are there to re-establish Athens.”

Media attention on the Athens 2004 Olympics has focused on progress in building or refurbishing athletic facilities and infrastructure. Equally intensive and far-reaching are the preparations for less tangible aspects of hosting the Games. As officials for the Athens Organizing Committee emphasize, it is simply not an issue of physically getting people from venue A to venue B, but of the mood and impressions set during that move. And what it boils down to is image: one that will likely stay with Greece for decades.

“A successful games is not just about making stadia work,” argues a Greek sports marketing executive closely involved with 2004. “It’s a projection of the whole country. The image will be vital. Greece has a wealth of cultural capital to draw on. Blow it, and the country will have lost the chance of a generation.”

High Brow vs Low Brow

But what is the nature of this cultural capital, and how should it be invested for the maximum return? It seems that Greeks are aware of the political and commercial value of “Greek culture,” but no one can define precisely what that is. Moreover, in a nation not renowned for strategic thinking or the ability to pull in one direction at the same time, can Greece’s cultural institutions transcend their distaste for anything “commercial” and rise to the task of selling Greece to the rest of the world?

“When we speak of Greek culture, it is assumed that we are speaking of ancient Greece-Pericles, the Parthenon, Knossos, drama at Epidaurus, Homer, mythology,” says a senior advertising executive, who asked not to be named. “These are the images conjured by such ‘Greek’ symbols as temples with columns, sandals, clay jugs.”

Pericles and the Parthenon are symbols of the high end of Greek culture. But Greek intellectuals tend to frown on leather-sandalled cartoon characters like Hercules, or television adaptations like Xena, Warrior Princess, who might represent a trivialization of the ancient Greeks but do at least show how deeply ingrained these symbols and ideas are on the Western psyche. Such disdain underscores Greeks’ proprietary attitude to ancient Greek civilization. And, sometimes, this official proclivity for the weighty yields mixed results, as seen with the recently unveiled mascots for the 2004 Games, Athena and Phevos (see sidebar).

“Up until a couple of decades ago, the heavy artillery of what we call culture were ‘our ancient ancestors’, a legacy that we monopolize as if those who live in Greece have the sole right to this heritage,” says ethnomusicologist Nikos Dionyssopoulos.

Whose Lion is it Anyway?

By effectively consecrating its antiquities and ancient heritage, Greece has also made it remote from the Greeks themselves. High-handed approaches such as a ban on having your picture taken next to monuments such as the Delos lions for fear of “degrading” them alienates them from Greeks and non-Greeks alike. As a result of this didactic approach, many Greeks are bored by antiquities and show little interest in consuming “their own” culture.

“It is not enough to call yourself Greek to be the sole manager of this heritage,” Dionyssopoulos says.

Often, possessiveness about Ancient Greece is expressed in ways that make Greeks seem petulant, even when they have a point. Examples abound, from the furious reaction to fashion designer Calvin Klein’s application a few years ago to stage a show at either the Herod Atticus Odeon or the Agora, to the use of Parthenon or column outlines in advertising campaigns for soft drinks and alcoholic beverages. But at the same time that Greece officially wrinkles its nose in disgust at any commercial exploitation of these “sacred” monuments, the state collects millions of euros each year from museum admission fees, merchandise, and licensing fees (which does, it should be said, contribute to the upkeep of these monuments).

The official fixation on antiquities has tended to obliterate all other forms of Greek culture. “Antiquity has certainly been at the center of Greek cultural promotion,” says Angelos Delivorrias, curator of the Benaki Museum in Athens. “Much less [attention has been trained] on the Byzantine era, while the period of foreign rule-from the fall of Constantinople to the creation of the modern Greek state-is almost unknown. Equally unknown is modern and contemporary culture, including the 19th century.”

It is only since the 1980s that Byzantine culture and traditional or folk art, including music, have received any attention or state support.

Ironically, this cultural focus on antiquities was not necessarily a conscious choice of the Greeks, but was

foisted upon them through the romanticism that spurred the Greek revival in which the founding of the Modern Greek State was rooted.

“The conditions [for this focus] have existed outside Greece from the 19th century as Greek classical culture had been studied and assimilated,” Delivorrias adds.

In Europe and America, which also provided support to the Greek revolution, “Greek culture” was thus defined even before Greeks had gained independence from the Ottoman Turks.

Identity Crisis

This image was potent enough to seduce successive generations of writers, poets, painters, and travelers from Lord Byron to Henry Miller and Lawrence Durrell. Byron, who gave his life for the Greek cause, branded the image of Ancient Greece as the cradle of democracy in the Western cultural consciousness. Miller and Durrell, who arrived on a quest for that purity, grafted that romanticism onto a new, more modern stereotype that partly spurred the tourism boom of the 60s and 70s.

“You enter Greece as one might enter a dark crystal; the form of things becomes irregular, refracted. Other countries may offer you discoveries in manners or lore or landscape; Greece offers you something harder-the discovery of yourself,” Durrell wrote in Prospero’s Cell.

Self-discovery was also the theme of two films that put modern Greece on the tourist map-Mihalis Cacoyiannis’ Zorba, based on the novel by Nikos Kazantzakis, and Jules Dassin’s Never on Sunday. Fact and fiction were thus entwined, with the “Greek psyche” now embodied by the larger-than-life figures of Zorba, Melina Mercouri, Aristotle Onassis, and Maria Callas.

Tacked on to the icon of Greece as the font of Western culture was the image of Greece as a land of sun and fun.

“There has been a systematic effort to create the impression in the West of Greece as the land of sun, clean beaches, and hospitality. But that image is contrived-although that doesn’t mean that it has no substance,” says Dionyssopoulos, who coordinated the cultural program at the Frankfurt Book Fair last October, where Greece was the honored country. “It is an invented image because the reality is that this is a country that is trying very hard to assimilate into Western culture. This idyllic image of Greece exists at the level of advertising but doesn’t always reflect reality.”

As an example, Dionyssopoulos cites what most foreigners consider Greece’s “national dance,” the syrtaki.

“Tourists are probably amazed when they realize that this dance does not exist beyond the Athens-by-night circuit because it is an artificial dance. A Greek who hears the music knows it is not directed at him but at tourists who come here to consume a certain tourist destination.”

Greece has certainly sought to capitalize on these images, as successive campaigns by the Greek National Tourism Organization have played off the antiquities and fun-in-the-sun stereotypes. “These are potent images, and deeply ingrained. Why even try to change them when they work and when you have no contemporary symbols to counterbalance the Acropolis or Zorba,” says the advertising executive.

The GNTO’s latest TV campaign, with the unwittingly ambiguous slogan “Greece: Beyond Words,” illustrates the intellectual confusion over the country’s cultural identity. Using a technique popularized by the Vodafone commercials, the spots superimpose various buzzwords over images of monuments, museums, drama performances, and-of course-beaches. The campaign, as with most others launched by the GNTO, is aimed at a foreign audience, but speaks to Greece’s “official” view of itself and its culture.

Olympic Challenge

Greece’s cultural image is being reshaped at home and abroad by a new, potentially more powerful, influence: the Olympic Games, which will return to Athens for the first time since being revived by Pierrie de Coubertin in 1896. From August 13-29, the 2004 Games will be a massive, continuous international advertising campaign for the country in the print and electronic media. It may well be a watershed for Greece; its first experience with, and attempt at, developing a cogent marketing strategy.

“The Olympic Games will give [Greece] tremendous visibility,” says Costas Bakouris, a former managing director of the Athens 2004 Organizing Committee and present chairman of the Hellenic Center for Investment (ELKE). “[The Games] will highlight our infrastructure, transportation, other facilities-and hopefully a good image that things can be organized in a professional manner.”

The emblem for the 2004 Games is perhaps the first time the country has attempted to craft a Greece “brand,” so vital in this commercially-driven era. And as any marketing executive will tell you, when developing a brand, you go with your strengths.

“Yes, Greece’s antiquities are a strong point. No one can hide their past, especially when it is so significant. The question is what context you put that past in,” says Claudius Koenig, senior consultant with Wolff Olins, the British-based brand consultancy that together with Red Design developed the logo and brand identity of the Athens 2004 Games.

The logo-a hand-drawn white olive wreath, a dual symbol of peace and victory in the ancient Olympics, against a liquid blue background-is the centerpiece of a carefully controlled brand identity reinforced through symbols and colors. The brand palette is centered on shades of blue and white, the colors traditionally associated with Greece.

“When we developed [this logo] we thought more about the future than the past. In this media-driven world, you cannot take people’s participation for granted, and so the symbol is actually meant to show an embracing of humanity,” says Koenig.

Selling Greece

Wolff-Olins and their Greek partner, Red Design, beat 242 other companies who had entered the competition for designing the logo for Athens 2004. What the organizing committee sought was a symbol that could carry the cultural baggage of the Games’ return to Greece.

“The central idea is that the Athens Games are unique games on a human scale,” says Theodora Mantzaris-Kindel, image and identity manager for Athens 2004. The four elements that define these Games, she adds, are participation, celebration, humanity, and heritage: “The emblem, the olive wreath, reflect these values.”

The ideas are embodied in catch-phrases like “ethos,” “fair play,” and “heritage,” as well as the theme of the 2004 Olympics: a “unique” Games on a human scale-a dig at the hyper-commercialization of the Olympic Games. Thus far, however, the definition of “unique” does not seem to stretch beyond the mere fact of the Olympics’ return to Greece for the first time since 1896.

“This is definitely not an ‘American’ Olympics symbol-or rather, it is not how [Olympic logos] have typically looked since the 1960s,” says Koenig.

Facelift

The Athens 2004 emblem also symbolizes the “Olympic look,” which, like a magic wand waved over the city, has already begun to transform the Greek capital. The formula for this transformation has already been tried and tested in the capital’s new underground mass transit system, or metro-a working example of how modern infrastructure can highlight heritage.

“As the organizing committee we must achieve a ‘spirit of celebration’ during the Games,” says Elina Dallas, who heads the program of the Olympic Look of the City for Athens 2004. “Of course, to put forth a good image during the Games, we need to have from the agencies involved with public works the best possible infrastructure.”

This work ranges from cosmetic touches, such as painting building facades and removing unlicensed billboards, to more radical interventions such as re-designing public spaces and planting trees and flowerbeds. Athens 2004 does not undertake any of these projects itself, but works with state and municipal agencies as an advisor.

“We want visitors and locals to have fun, but also to transform Athens to a special city. We shouldn’t forget the history of Athens. People who come to these Games will come precisely for that,” says Dallas.

History and culture are the main buzzwords of the Athens 2004 Games, but the mere act of hosting the world’s premiere sporting competition-one of the most logistically demanding events in the world-will subtly boost Greece’s image in a vital area: the economy. Short-term benefits include the increase in tourist arrivals in the years before and after the Olympics. A far larger dividend from the 2004 Games would be increased confidence and credibility in Greece as a place to do business.

“The country has to think of culture not just as heritage, but also as something to build a future from-and that is business,” says Koenig. He adds that one way “culture” can create a link between heritage and foreign investment is by playing up the ingenuity and creativity embodied by successful Greeks, from El Greco to Onassis, EasyJet founder Stelios Hadjioannou, and the composer Vangelis.

“Outside Greece, everyone, including the IOC, wants heritage to play a major role in [these] Games,” says Bakouris. “Greeks, from the outset, don’t want to portray just the past, but wanted to show that Greece is a modern country with all the pre-requisites to become effective and competitive in the global market.”

To reinforce this aspect of the Games, ELKE has initiated the Olympic Business Project and the Athens Business Club to take advantage of the “once-in-a-lifetime exposure” of the Games to highlight investment opportunities in Greece.

“I don’t think there is a conflict [between Greece's cultural image and promoting business]. Greece has a heritage. And it is a country that has innovative people,” adds Bakouris. “The Greek entrepreneurial spirit and business acumen continues to be prevail even today as the essential ingredients for success.”

One sector where the Greek stereotype and business mesh is, of course, tourism. Bakouris says the Games can give the sector a boost beyond simple bookings by laying the foundations for developing more specialized, year-round tourism options such as golf and conventions. Another area where the Games can have a direct impact on Greece’s image is the services sector.

The focus on image as a centerpiece of the Athens 2004 Games will illustrate how Greece can deploy its heritage to its advantage.

“At the rhetorical level, Greek culture and heritage are definitely acknowledged as assets. But at the level of truly supporting culture-whether to promote national interests or simply as a process to educate people and increase their aesthetic sensibilities-I believe little is actually being done,” says Dionyssopoulos.

Delivorrias concurs. “Greece doesn’t follow the examples of France, Italy, and Germany in using the communicative powers of culture as the arsenal for its foreign policy,” he says. “For Greece to have a dynamic presence, a clearer strategy that does not evaluate [specific historical] periods is needed.”