Eleftherios Venizelos was the main protagonist of this period, who continued to hold the leading part also in much of the following, inter-war period.

Venizelos had consistently served the demands of the country to be rid of under-development and the old party system and to pursue urban modernization. At the same time, in direct relation to the previous objective, he pursued the national integration of Greece, identifying it with the policy of irredentism and the assimilation into the nation state of the New Territories and their inhabitants.
A charismatic leader, he was idolized by his supporters and fanatically hated by his opponents. His personal clash with King Constantine represented dissension in the field of domestic and foreign policy.
Venizelos managed to take advantage of the international conjunction of circumstances rendering the irredentist vision of the 'Greater Greece of the two continents and of the five seas' almost feasible, especially with the signing of the Treaty of Sevres. At the same time, during his own term of office, measures were taken to modernize Greek society.