Abstract
The case of the Greek Orthodox refugees transferred from Turkey to Greece after 1923 is unique as the first obligatory exchange of populations in world history. Overall, the Greek government succeeded in incorporating these refugees economically and politically into the extant population. This paper explores rural refugee settlement as a productive force on the domestic economy and examines its impact on the rural markets of Greece. It also investigates how a poor, war-weary country with a population barely over five million provided land and employment in a largely successful effort to integrate almost six hundred thousand refugees into its agricultural labor market. The author further evaluates how Greece preempted the potential radicalization of the refugee vote through reform, repression, and the involvement of refugees in the hierarchical Greek political system.
