INTRODUCTION

Eleftherios Venizelos' vision of state, politics and society was by no means constrained by nineteenth-century conceptions of laisser-faire liberalism. He was fully aware that the state, were it to accomplish its national mission, had to be active and effective, undertaking a wide range of initiatives and responsibilities and pursuing policies that extended into many fields of national life. Such a state required, however, the rational and efficient organisation of its institutions. Understanding this is crucial in our effort to reconstruct an internally coherent constitutional philosophy out of his positions on various issues and problems. But a constitutional philosophy depends on the consistent endorsement of certain political principles, as much as it relies on a sensitive and insightful perception of political realities.

Eleftherios Venizelos was not an ideologue, but he certainly was a man of ideas. As N. Alivizatos has shown, Venizelos' constitutional programme was marked by three constant priorities: the rationalisation of the parliamentary system, the guarantee of the non-abusive exercise of individual liberties under the constitution, and the facilitation of the interventionist role of the state in the economy. This article follows Alivizatos' analysis, but it adopts a slightly different and more abstract formulation of the statesman's fixed constitutional ideals. Accordingly, popular sovereignty, the rule of law and effective government were the three pillars of Venizelos' constitutional edifice. Depending on the exigencies of the time, he did on occasion compromise these principles, but he never abandoned them.