ABSTRACT
Chapter 6 focuses on the Greeks who remained in Istanbul after the signing of the Treaty of Lausanne (July 1923). First, the chapter describes the international legal framework set by the clauses of the treaty for the protection of the rights of the minority. Afterwards, it presents the responses of different communal elites to the nation-building and secularization policies of the Turkish state, while their relations with the representatives of the Greek state are also explored. The key argument is that the remaining Greek Orthodox minority faced a double challenge: They were forced to deal with the consequences of the political choices of their former nationalist communal leadership while at the same time adjusting to the new conditions created in post-1923 Turkey. In this context, the chapter draws attention to their efforts to maintain a level of self-administration and examines the ensuing intra-communal power struggle in relation to the issues of the patriarchal election, the renunciation of Article 42 of the Lausanne Treaty and the adoption of a new constitutional charter for the minority.
