Greece

Greece's long history of heavy emigration whose rate at times and especially between the 1950s and the 1960s, exceeded the country's population growth rate, lasted until the mid to late 70's. It is estimated that 15-20 per cent of the total economic activity in Greece is attributable to the tourist industry. Societal reactions, most importantly to state administration responses, provided the general framework within which the phenomenon of racist victimization emerged in Greece. At the societal level, prejudice, discrimination, xenophobia and racism as well as fear of immigrant criminality emerged as dominant among the public attitudes towards immigrants. The international oil crisis of 1973, the restoration of Democracy in 1974 and the adoption of restrictive migration policies by the European countries led to a reduction of Greek outflow migration. European Union funding and cooperation between non govermental organisation's (NGOs), public and private organizations had an impact in including matters of racism, xenophobia, human and civil rights into the public agenda.