Panspoudastiki

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Panspoudastiki is the Communist Party of Greece's (KKE) major branch in Greek universities.

The group's aim is the preservation of the free and unified character of education in Greece, an aim complied to its communist ideology. Although the group achieved great election results in the 1970s and 1980s, it suffered great losses in the 1990s, as a result of a general fall on support of communist ideas. The group's symbol is a tree and its color is red. Its support has a broad character and is not limited only to followers of KKE but applies to other followers of left-wing ideologies as well. Its followers are called "Knites", and one of their famous slogans is "Thirty years of fight and sacrifice with Panspoudastiki in the front line". Their opponents accuse them of being authoritarian and old fashioned, but the group still enjoys considerable support inside the Greek universities. In the university elections of 2006, Panspoudastiki came third, trailing behind New Democracy's DAP and PASOK's PASP.

The group was founded shortly after the restoration of democracy in 1974 and the fall of the regime of the colonels. The newly appointed Karamanlis cabinet legalized KKE, shortly after its inauguration in 1975. KKE became a legitimate party, after a period of political isolation that lasted from 1949 to 1975. Its legitimization was also a historical reconciliation between the two opposing factions of the Greek civil war. The group's formation was compatible with the party's program and political aims. These aims included the radicalisation of the 1970s strong political movement of the country's students. This movement played a vital role in the fight against the seven years junta. The zenith of the movement came in 1973 with the students' uprising in the polytechnic university.