Door Dimitris Pavlopoulos – Arbeidssocioloog VU

Landelijke staking tegen de nieuwe bezuinigingen - Athene , 17 mei 2017

Het Griekse drama gaat onvermijdelijk door. De Griekse regering heeft met de Trojka een nieuwe bezuinigings- en hervormingsronde afgesproken. Dat is de vierde op rij sinds 2010 toen de schuldencrisis uitbrak. De meeste media berichten gaan meer over de daling van de rente van de Griekse obligaties verschenen – vanwege de gemaakte afspraken – dan over de inhoud van de afspraken zelf.

In de afgelopen 1,5 jaar, sinds de capitulatie van de SYRIZA-regering voor de eisen van de Trojka, is de kwestie Griekenland bijna verdwenen uit het nieuws. Nu Tsipras geen opstandeling meer is tegen het Brussel-Schauble establishment lijkt het niet meer de moeite waard om over de crisis in Griekenland te berichten. Recentelijk was er zelfs begrip voor de racistische opmerkingen van Dijsselbloem over Zuid-Europeanen die hun geld hebben uitgegeven aan drank en vrouwen. Het lijkt alsof  in Nederland het verder verarmen van een Europese volk normaal gevonden wordt.

Echter geen mediaberichten betekent nog niet dat de crisis opgelost is. De coalitieregering van SYRIZA met de ultrarechtse partij ‘Onafhankelijke Grieken’ heeft zich onder druk van de Trojka, maar uiteindelijk door eigen keuze, van een antibezuinigingsregering getransformeerd naar een regering die de zwaarste neoliberale bezuinigingsmaatregelen doorvoert. De nieuwe afspraken met de Trojka leveren het bewijs daarvoor. Volgens deze afspraken verliezen gepensioneerden bijna één van de 12 pensioenen die ze per jaar ontvangen bovenop de 40% matiging die al is doorgevoerd in de laatste 6 jaar. Er komt een directe matiging van 9-18% op alle pensioenen boven de 700 euro. Daarnaast worden door de verlaging van de belastingvrijegrens van inkomen van 8.636 naar 5.861 euro per jaar zelfs pensioenen van 475 euro gekort.

De bezuinigingen treffen zelfs de minimuminkomens. Vanaf 2018 worden de werkloosheidsuitkering (nu 360 euro per maand, alleen voor het eerste jaar), de kinderbijslag (nu 13-40 euro per maand) en andere uitkeringen gekort. Mensen die getroffen zijn door natuurrampen zoals aardbevingen (dat gebeurt nogal vaak in Griekenland) krijgen minder financiële hulp van de overheid.

De hervormingen – die volgens Brussel en de Nederlandse media de laatste jaren zijn uitgebleven in Griekenland – zijn bevestigd of verder doorgevoerd. Dit betekent dat de verruiming van de openingstijden van winkels als oplossing is gevonden voor de daling van de economische activiteiten. Ondanks het feit dat de grote meerderheid van de bevolking geen geld te besteden heeft blijven in verschillende plaatsen de winkels ook op zondag open. Daarnaast worden tenminste tot 2018 de daadwerkelijke afschaffing van CAO’s en de versoepeling van het ontslagrecht niet teruggedraaid. Tegelijkertijd wordt ook het publieke energiebedrijf geprivatiseerd.

Het is opmerkelijk wat er ontbreekt aan de eisen van de Trojka en de maatregelen van de SYRIZA-coalitieregering. Net zoals bij de vorige centrum of centrumrechtse regeringen hebben de topinkomens geen last gehad van de bezuinigingsrondes. Het is niet voor niets dat volgens de OESO in de jaren van de bezuinigingen de  ratio van de hoogste versus de laagste inkomens (de zogenoemde P90/P10 ratio) is gestegen van 4.4 naar 5.2. De lijsten van de grote belastingontduikers zijn bewust heel langzaam onderzocht. Tegelijkertijd vloeit een klein, maar zichtbaar deel van de Trojka-leningen (die overigens voor 90% ten goede komen aan de schuldeisers) naar de rekeningen van grote media- en constructiebedrijven, maar wordt er nauwelijks geïnvesteerd.

Van een mogelijk succes van de ingevoerde maatregelen is geen sprake. Sinds 2010 is geen enkele economische voorspelling van de Europese Commissie of het IMF over Griekenland uitgekomen. In plaats van de voorspelde groei is er meer recessie gekomen door de bezuinigingen en de hervormingen. In de hele wereld is er geen enkele serieuze econoom die gelooft dat Griekenland er bovenop kan komen binnen de huidige structuur van de EU en de Eurozone met dit bezuinigingsbeleid en zonder een grote afschrijving van de staatschuld.

Uit het recente enquêteonderzoek ‘Generation What’ blijkt tweederde van de Grieken tussen de 18 en de 34 jaar bereid te zijn om deel te nemen aan een grote opstand tegen de regering. Dat is niets anders dan het resultaat van een bezuinigings- en hervormingsbeleid dat een hele bevolking en vooral de jonge generatie een fatsoenlijke toekomst onthoudt.

Griekenland is hierin geen uitzondering. Hetzelfde onderzoek toont aan dat in Italië, Spanje en Frankrijk het percentage van jonge mensen met dezelfde gevoelens maar iets kleiner is dan in Griekenland. Zelfs in Nederland en Duitsland is éénderde van jongeren bereid om in opstand te komen tegen de overheid. Als hetzelfde bezuinigingsbeleid dominant blijft in Europa raken de mensen binnenkort niet meer verward in dilemma’s van Wilders vs Rutte of Macron vs Le Pen en hebben we straks een heel ander politiek landschap op het continent.

Bron van het artikel:https://joop.vara.nl/opinies/nieuwe-bezuinigingen-brengen-niets-goeds-voor-griekenland-en-europa

Bron van de foto:http://time.com/4785515/greece-debt-austerity-alexis-tsipras/

In this event, we want to go further than just challenging the media propaganda. The roots but also the aims of austerity and reform policies will be discussed. Who are the winners of these policies? What will the economy and the political system look like after their full implementation? What was the role of the participation of Greece to the EU and the euro for the development of the crisis as the crisis in the Eurozone started from Greece?

Three critical scholars will provide their contribution to the discussion:

Kees van der Pijl, emeritus professor at the University of Sussex, will give the broader context of the issue from an international perspective and will present the Dutch context as well.
Yiorgos Vassalos, political scientist in Brussels, will evaluate the 30-year long participation of Greece to the EU.
Dimitris Pavlopoulos, assistant professor at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, will talk about the winners and losers of the austerity policies in Greece

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/events/275719382636460

The Euro-crisis of euro is already in its third year and it continues unrelentingly. Nevertheless it is overall stated that the crisis is almost over. The North faces no problem. Spain, Portugal and Ireland have solved their own problems by following the recipe of the EU: large cuts in social security and salaries as well as abolishing working rights. Even Greece is on the right track because its state finances have improved through the cuts in the benefits and the increase of taxes.

These arguments are simply a summary of the official story of the spokesmen of the EU and the Greek government. Every citizen with basic understanding of the crisis knows that these kinds of arguments are far from the reality. The crisis affects not only the countries in the South, but the whole Europe.

Let us not forget that the second largest economy of eurozone, France, is placed under the strict supervision of the European Commission due to financial problems. Let us also not forget that the improvement in the state finances of several countries (including the Netherlands) can be attributed to a logistic trick of the EU which excludes specific expenses from the calculation of the budget deficit.

Perverse structure

No, the crisis is not over, because its causes – the liberalization of the financial sector and the perverse structure of eurozone – are not yet tackled.

According to the Troika (European Commission, IMF and European Central Bank) and the Greek government, Greece has a primary surplus of 500 million euros. However according to data of Eurostat, Greece has a primary deficit of 17 billion euros in the first nine months of 2013.

Moreover, and contrary to what the European Commission and the Greek government claim, the course of the Greek economy is anything but positive. The retail sales index is reduced with 8.1 % in 2013. The volume index is reduced with 6.7%. The investments make up only 12% of the GDP (gross domestic product), the seventh lowest percentage in the world! Most probably, the GDP of Greece was reduced with 7 % in 2013 despite the explicit prediction of European Commission and IMF for a small recovery. The sovereign debt has climbed to 170 % of the GDP and is now much higher than before the crisis.

The repeated statements of the European leaders and the Greek government that the austerity policies are effective and the recovery of the economy can occur at any moment goes against all facts. The harsh reality for the common people in Greece is not portrayed at all in this fantasy image.

No access to healthcare

28 percent of the workforce is unemployed. Two-third of the young people is out of work. Approximately one million workers receive their salary with one to twelve months delay. Salaries have been reduced by over 50 percent. The gross minimum wage is 586 euros (510 euros for the youth). The unemployment benefit (WW-uitkering in Dutch) is 360 euros and there is no social assistance benefit. Nearly three million people in Greece do not have access to health care because they can’t afford health insurance. Even pregnant women who come to public hospitals to give birth, may be rejected because they are not insured. Some heavily frequented hospitals are closed and the medical staff has been fired because of the cuts.

According to UNICEF, one out of three children in Greece, is at risk of poverty and social exclusion. Which are the causes? Rising unemployment and cuts in social benefits. 292,000 children live in households without working adults and have for this reason no access to health care.

The new taxes reinforce the regressive tax system in Greece, where the rich pay traditionally very little while the middle class and the poor bear the heaviest burden. There are even poor people whose homes are in danger of being confiscated because they cannot afford paying their taxes. The abolition of the protection of the private homes of poor debtors was a hard requirement imposed by the Troika.

Why do the European Commission and the Greek government try to present another reality? Is it because there are elections next month in the EU? The support for governments that are advocates of austerity and the EU is falling rapidly. The heads of governments and the EU-top still want to present austerity policies as effective even, if necessary, with the use of fictitious data. In Greece, this necessity feels stronger than ever. The coalition parties will most probably face a historic defeat in the upcoming elections and their European austerity partners want to prevent this. For this reason, the Greek government gets again permission to manipulate statistics and magically make a surplus from a large deficit. The way is simple: the 0.5 billion surplus of the Greek government-budget does not include the unpaid liabilities of the government to Greek companies and semi-public institutions.

Presenting the other southern countries as good examples of austerity policies, is also wrong. For example, the 0.1 percent growth of the Spanish economy should be seen in conjunction with the 28 percent unemployment rate and the largest debt ever (almost 100 percent of GDP) .

A sober observation of the facts inevitably leads to only one conclusion: the policies of austerity, privatization and liberalization did not offer any solution, but rather led to a deepening of the crisis.

by Dimitris Pavlopoulos
Dimitris Pavlopoulos works as an assistant professor in Sociology at the VU University in Amsterdam.

Source: http://www.volkskrant.nl/vk/nl/3184/opinie/article/detail/3630449/2014/04/08/Het-gaat-helemaal-niet-beter-met-Griekenland.dhtml

In this climate, the Hellenic Society of Imperial College has chosen to invite Mr. Adonis Georgiadis, the Greek Minister of Health, to speak about the Greek “national effort” to exit the crisis and the “pan- European dimension” of this effort. Mr. Georgiadis is a staunch and flamboyant supporter of the austerity cuts and a very controversial figure in Greece. His term of office in the Ministry of Health has already been marked by the most violent reforms, budget cuts and layoffs in the health sector since the beginning of the crisis. As Greek students, staff and alumni of IC, we believe this invitation is offensive and uses the name of IC to serve political interests. We thus oppose it.

Mr. Georgiadis’ policies are dictated by the troika and have been imposed on every country receiving financial support from the IMF in the past. The disastrous consequences of these austerity measures, notably the preventable loss of human lives, have been demonstrated by several reports, the most recent of which was published in The Lancet journal. With health spending capped at 6% of GDP and no recruitments in the public health sector in 3 years, public hospitals are severely understaffed and face shortages in basic consumables. Despite that, primary health care centres have been forced to close, further burdening the already overcrowded hospitals, while public-health workers face layoffs. Meanwhile, as the number of state-subsidised pharmaceuticals has drastically decreased, many patients with chronic conditions (e.g. cancer, AIDS) are unable to cope with the increased expenses. Furthermore, it is estimated that 2.3 million people are uninsured, practically lacking access to health services if they are unable to pay. Finally, deteriorating living conditions and limited access to health care have led to a resurgence of malaria and tuberculosis. The levels of HIV infection are soaring among drug users, infant mortality has risen by 43% and suicide, alcoholism and drug use rates are spiking. Mr. Georgiadis responded to protests against the imposed policies in a provocative way. The Minister has repeatedly bullied doctors and medical staff on national television, blaming them for the existing problems, while advocating the need for budget cuts. However, depriving a whole society of basic health care in the name of debt repayment is, in our opinion, unacceptable.
Of course, other public services like higher education have not been spared from austerity policies. Since 2009, the funding of public research centres and universities, as well as the salaries of research staff and faculty members, have been cut by more than 30%. Over 1000 new lecturers, appointed years ago, have been placed on a “waiting list”. More than 1700 administrative employees were put into a “suspension” scheme, subscriptions to academic journals have been halted for months and many departments are lead to merger or closure. All these measures are coupled with frequent defamatory comments against public universities by government members, including Mr. Georgiadis who has openly promoted private institutions.

The rise of Mr. Georgiadis in Greek politics is a symptom of the authoritarian, far-right turn of the Greek government. Many members of the government have promoted xenophobia and racism, with the Prime Minister himself stating: “We have to re-conquer our cities from immigrants”. A 2010 law opening the door to citizenship for second-generation immigrants has been repealed. Democratic institutions are also under attack. The government passes controversial laws by decree, one of which ordered the sudden closure of the state TV and radio broadcaster last year. Several strikes have been outlawed in advance using a “forced mobilisation order”, a concept originally designed to be used in national emergencies. Mr. Georgiadis has been in the vanguard of these developments. He has suggested that “left-wing ideology has surrendered Greece to the hands of Muslims, transforming Athens into a Taliban-land”. He has also said: “One of the goals [of the government] is that they [immigrants] understand they are not welcome in Greece. One of the ways to convince them is to frequently prosecute them *…+ to make their life as difficult as possible so that they understand it is time to go”. Mr. Georgiadis also has a history of anti-semitic remarks (“all major banks belong to the Jews”, “the Jewish lobby will determine the fate of Greece’s foreign debt”).

Therefore, the “effort” of Mr. Georgiadis and his government is all but “national”. It is rather an effort towards increasing inequalities, selling-off public property and turning against the weakest members of society. The “pan-European dimension” of this effort can only be interpreted as a call for the adoption of these authoritarian and neoliberal policies across the continent.
As Greek students, staff and alumni of Imperial College we strongly oppose the invitation to Mr. Georgiadis. We want to make clear that the few committee members of the Hellenic Society do not represent the Greeks of IC; they act as political partisans and exploit an IC society to serve their own political interests. Mr. Georgiadis attempts to use the status of IC to promote himself inside Greece and legitimize his controversial policies. Many, if not most, of the thousands of Greeks in the UK and other European countries, have been forced to leave Greece because of the policies of Mr. Georgiadis’ government (and the governments preceding it, which came from the exact same parties that are in power today). Inviting someone with such a background to lecture on exiting the crisis is misleading and quite ironic. On top of that, we believe that a person who has so vehemently lashed out at Greek universities, which are the almae matres of many current students and staff of IC, cannot be welcome here.

*The sources of the quotes and figures used in the text are available on request.

Olli Rehn, the EU commissioner for economic and monetary affairs, demanding stepped-up austerity, declared, “It will be essential for Croatia to take decisive action in order to achieve this in order to restore confidence in the economy…. This means that by April, Croatia is asked to undertake adequate and specifically specified [sic] measures to ensure progress towards the correction of its excessive deficit and debt.”

The EU will be the sole arbiter of whether the measures implemented by the Croatian government are adequate, and if deemed insufficient, the country could face possible sanctions, Rehn added.

The World Bank joined in, with its office in Zagreb stating, “The excessive deficit procedure is a good disciplinary tool for restoring macro-stability and reducing macro-imbalances. If it does not solve its economic weakness through sustainable fiscal adjustment and institutional reforms, Croatia will not fully benefit from EU membership, and the search for future prosperity may prove unsuccessful.”

The Social Democratic Party (SDP)-led coalition government is more than willing to oblige. Prime Minister Zoran Milanovic fell in line, defending the procedure in parliament as something “nearly all EU members went through last year” and adding, “the programme would help Croatia put its budget in order and implement reforms without delay.”

Since coming to power in late 2011, the SDP, in coalition with the Croatian Peoples Party (HNS) and the regional Istrian Democratic Assembly (IDS), has continuously pursued anti-working class policies, cutting public spending, raising Value Added Tax (VAT) to 25 percent—among the highest rates in Europe—and further privatising state assets and companies. Defending the privatisation drive, Finance Minister Slavko Linic, also of the SDP, said, “[O]ne should send a message that privatisation is in the function of reducing our foreign debt and covering this year’s deficit, because that is what rating agencies and creditors will appreciate.”

All three major rating agencies rate Croatia’s debt below investment level, with Standard & Poor’s further downgrading it on January 24.

After drafting the 2014 budget last November, the government set about implementing a whole raft of austerity measures, including cutting farm subsidies and health spending, raising VAT on tourism and levies on gas and tobacco—claiming they would cut the deficit to 5.5 percent in 2014. The EU found the measures insufficient, triggering the “excessive deficit procedure.”

“Our aim was to avoid burdening the economy,” Linic said, trying to justify the November budget draft. He submitted right away to the new EU demands, which included a cut of a further billion euros in the deficit this year and adjusting Croatia’s deficit targets to 4.6, 3.5 and 2.7 percent of GDP for the years 2014-2016. The new measures will force an unspecified number of public employees to retire early without filling the vacancies, while others will see their allowances cut. Further cuts in subsidies, health spending and pensions, as well as new taxes on gambling, have been announced.

The austerity measures the EU is forcing throughout the continent have had a major impact on Croatia. The country has been in continuous recession since 2009, with GDP contracting by almost 20 percent by 2012. A further drop is expected in 2013. The government was forced to slash its 2014 growth estimate from the previous 1.3 percent to only 0.2 percent, as the result of the latest cuts demanded by the EU.

Official unemployment reached 21.6 percent in December 2013. Youth unemployment is well over 50 percent and “one of the highest in Europe,” according to the World Bank. The bank noted a sharp rise in poverty to over 14 percent by the end of 2012, underlining that “the profile of the poor has changed, with the educated and younger living in richer urban areas now more affected.”

The latest statistics show the average full-time monthly wage for January to November 2013 was 5,511 kunas (around €720, or US$1,030), or 1.7 percent less in real terms compared to the same period a year ago. Some 55 percent of employees receive less than 5,000 kunas (€650). Even these figures understate the real conditions, because part-time wages are not included. Widespread disillusionment with the main political parties and the EU is evident, as noted by an article in the Economist, titled “Euphoria over joining [the EU] has given way to a morose mood.”

There is a growing concern in ruling circles that the overwhelming opposition to never-ending austerity measures might erupt in violent protests, as has happened in neighbouring Bosnia-Herzegovina. The ruling class know they can count on the unions to suppress workers’ resistance, but the fear is that popular discontent might develop independent of and in opposition to the unions.

The business portal SEEbiz.eu carried an article last month dedicated to discussing the possibility of and strategies for controlling public protests, after the Economist put Croatia high on the list of countries at risk of social unrest in 2014. SEEbiz spoke with two union leaders, one of whom—perhaps saying more than he intended—graphically exposed the role of the unions as advisers to the ruling class and as an industrial police force. Kresimir Sever, president of the Independent Croatian Unions, stated as clearly as possible, “What those in power should be afraid of are spontaneous unrest and going out in the streets. While it is organised by the unions, they are under surveillance.”

By Ognjen Markovic

Source: http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2014/02/15/croa-f15.html

Since the 1st of January 2014 the presidency of EU is held by the Greek prime-minister Antonis Samaras. In Greece, this was “celebrated” from the one side with a feast where the European leaders were invited and from the other side with arrests and teargas against the protesters who took to the streets of Athens.

It is well-known that the government that holds the presidency of the EU can have minimal effect on the policy at a European level. However, the presidency of Samaras is a black page in the history of EU. This presidency marks the course of the EU with much more austerity and much less democracy.

In Greece, both the government of Samaras and his predecessors followed the hardest ever neo-liberal program in the history of EU under the supervision of the European Commission, the European Central Bank (ECB) and the IMF (known as the Troika). According to this program growth should come through drastic cuts on labour costs and the dismantling of the social welfare state. In this way, the situation for the workers in Greece could compete with the destitution of the labourers in Asiatic countries. This is why pensions and salaries are reduced to poverty’s level. The minimum monthly salary is now € 460. Layoffs of public servants and abolition of Collective Employment Agreements are also part of this catastrophic recipe.

Against all the formally-stated expectations of the EU and the IMF, the recovery of the Greek economy never came. The figures are very illustrative: in the last years, the GDP has dropped with approximately 25%. Greece is one of the seven countries in the world with the lowest amount of investments. Unemployment has risen to 28% and for young people even to 60%. Two millions Greeks have no access to health care. During the last 3-4 years, the number of suicides is doubled. Almost 1.2 millions employees have not been paid for several months. The emigration of Greeks has increased enormously.

Despite the fake debt write-off in 2012, the sovereign debt has increased to its pre-crisis level and therefore it has become undoubtedly unbearable. In this way Greece keeps being in need for new loans and new austerity measures in order to pay off these loans. There is no light at the end of the tunnel but only the downward spiral of austerity. The supposed recovery of the Greek economy after three years of austerity is not yet materialized. The government has undertaken a package of ‘necessary’ measures with catastrophic consequences for the citizens. In spite of all promises, this package had no effect whatsoever on the recovery of the economy. Critic raised by several economists – even within IMF official reports- was utterly ignored.

The new EU-president has practically abolished democracy in his own land. The police in Greece intimidates, beats and arrests citizens on fictitious charges. Not only have protesters and trade-union members experienced this kind of practices but also immigrants. The drowning of twelve refugees in the Aegean Sea last January, which according to several international organizations was caused by the Greek Cost Guard, is the most recent event that bears evidence to these practices. Moreover a big number of police officers support the neonazi party “Golden Dawn”.

Labour rights are violated and there is no environmental protection. Private companies hire staff with salaries below the already reduced minimum wages while forcing them also to work unpaid overtime. Companies operating in Greece, both Greek and foreign ones, violate European environmental legislation while establishing letterbox companies in the Netherlands and elsewhere to avoid taxation in Greece (e.g. the Canadian mining company Eldorado Gold which is engaged in large-scale gold mining activities, leading to huge environmental damage in northern Greece, has established its letterbox company in Amsterdam) .

Are Samaras and his predecessors the only responsible ones for this situation? Behind all this we find the dirty hands of Europe. First, the EU leaders do not seem to be interested in the violation of human and labour rights in Greece. Second, it’s the EU as a member of the Troika that forced the imposition of these inhumane reforms in Greece.
According to a recent report to the European Parliament about the role of the Troika on the economy of Greece and other countries, ” … the European institutions ( ECB , the Commission and the Euro group ) [are] fully co-responsible for the conditions imposed by the economic adjustment programs and hence also responsible for the social consequences.”
The authors of the report ” … regret that these programs , at least for Greece , Ireland and Portugal , set out a number of detailed requirements for reforming the health care system and budget cuts, despite the fact that Article 168 , paragraph 7 of the TFEU prohibits such interventions. “

And this is just the tip of the iceberg. Almost every month there is a meeting between the officials of the Troika and the Greek government. The Greek press reports regularly the new demands of the Troika that no one refutes. At this very moment, the Troika’s “recommendations” to Samaras include pensions as low as € 360 per month, massive layoffs and lifting the restriction on home-evictions for debts. The latter will soon result in thousands of homeless people.
The EU leaders continue to support this failed program and turn a blind eye on its inhumane consequences. This economic adjustment program is in line with their neoliberal programs throughout Europe.

The EU leaders, including the Dutch PM Mark Rutte, follow (perhaps at a slower pace) the “paradigm” of Samaras: they dismantle the social welfare state, proceed with layoffs of civil servants, liberalize flexible labour, and abolish labour rights. These are policy measures that cause social discontent in the rest of Europe and eventually lead to the rise of populism and fascism.

History will ironically laugh about 2014, the year of an ongoing European crisis. This year, started with an EU-presidency that acts against the interests of its own people instead of protecting them. The rest of the European leaders encourage the policies of the current EU- presidency and they give Samaras a pad on the back. The Greek presidency is the very symbol of austerity, poverty and abolition of the democracy. And, not to forget, “under the supervision” of Troika!

By Dimitris Pavlopoulos

Translated by ReINFORM

Source: http://www.joop.nl/opinies/detail/artikel/25444_griekenland_als_eu_voorzitter_ontkracht_democratie/

A few days ago, a group of them showed up in front of prime minister’s, Antonis Samaras residence in Athens, to sing the Christmas carols for him. Watch the video someone managed to film before the police stopped them.

This is their carols’ text in English:

“Antonis Samaras
listen carefully
the teachers are singing
the Christmas carols for you!
We used to be in the classrooms,
inside the schools
and you now throw us all out at once
you shut the schools down
leaving the poor students out
and you take away society’s happiness
Antonis Samaras, listen carefully!
These lay offs will remain on paper
We will return to our schools
We will win in broad daylight”

The common backdrop is the 2008-09 financial crisis and its aftermath. Economic distress is almost a necessary condition for serious social or political instability, but it is not a sufficient one. Declines in income and high unemployment are not always followed by unrest. Only when economic trouble is accompanied by other elements of vulnerability is there a high risk of instability. Such factors include wide income-inequality, poor government, low levels of social provision, ethnic tensions and a history of unrest. Of particular importance in sparking unrest in recent times appears to have been an erosion of trust in governments and institutions: a crisis of democracy.

Trust has been in secular decline throughout the rich world since the 1970s. This trend accelerated and spread after the collapse of communism in 1989. And as opinion polls have documented, it has sped up again since the 2008–09 financial crisis.

The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU), a sister company of The Economist, measures the risk of social unrest in 150 countries around the world. It places a heavy emphasis on institutional and political weaknesses. And recent developments have indeed revealed a deep sense of popular dissatisfaction with political elites and institutions in many emerging markets.

The protesters in Turkey in 2013, for example, were dissatisfied with some abrupt decisions by Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s government. In Bulgaria, what started off as protests against higher electricity bills turned into generalised anti-government demonstrations complaining of corruption—and led to the fall of the government. Protests have continued.

What to expect in 2014? The recession is now over or has eased in much of the world. Yet political reactions to economic distress have historically come with a lag. Austerity is still on the agenda in 2014 in many countries and this will fuel social unrest.

Restlessness on the rise

According to the EIU’s ratings, 65 countries (43% of the 150) will be at a high or very high risk of social unrest in 2014. For 54 countries the risk of instability is medium and for the remaining 31 countries it is low or very low. Compared with five years ago, 19 more countries are now in the high-risk categories.

The Middle East and North Africa (MENA), southern Europe, the Balkans and the former Soviet countries of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) are well represented in the high-risk categories: 12 out of 18 MENA states, six of the seven Balkan countries, eight out of the 12 CIS states, five out of six southern European ones. More than 40% of the countries in eastern Europe are in the high-risk categories. This region was hit hard by the financial crisis and also has many of the underlying characteristics associated with unrest. Unsurprisingly, many high-risk countries are in sub-Saharan Africa. But there are also some in Latin America and Asia—including the world’s largest and most successful emerging market, China, where the authorities are perennially nervous about the risk of mass protests.

Laza Kekic: director, country forecasting services, Economist Intelligence Unit

Source: http://www.economist.com/news/21589143-where-protest-likeliest-break-out-ripe-rebellion

From the first minute the real causes of the crisis were high-jacked by the populist notion that the Greeks are to blame for their fate, that the Greeks have been corrupted, that the Greeks have been cheating and lying, and that the Greeks now want the North Europeans to pay for their missteps. Such a public view on the matter was needed so that the fierce austerity that was to be imposed on Greece would be justified and the people of Europe would have to show their tough love to their EU partner.

In the last few weeks I had the chance to ask Prime Minister Rutte and the euro group president Jeroen Dijsselbloem a few questions about Greece. My goal was to see how much they knew about the situation. What I found was not only ignorance, but also misguided understanding, gimmicks instead of real knowledge and a perverse use of terms that describe the approach the Europeans have over the Greek issue.

Rutte and his Greek family

I asked Rutte about the link between austerity and the rise of the extreme right, nationalist, anti-Europe parties, with Greece’s Golden Dawn and France’s Marine Le Pen in mind. He by-passed the core of the question, and eagerly proceeded to explain how he sees the Greek issue. He was equally eager to defend the austerity measures, in line with chancellor Merkel’s views about the necessity of such measures for countries like Greece, Portugal and Ireland. This was no news. But there was one thing he said that came as a big surprise to everyone present at the press conference.

Some of my family is from Greece and one even had to travel from Greece to the Netherlands to find a job here because of the economic uncertainty. So I do realize and I know first-hand the huge impact this had on the Greek society.

The minute Rutte uttered the phrase “some of my family is from Greece”, I realized that these two countries have no real knowledge about each other. If the prime minister’s main source of news and understanding of the situation is based on a member of his family, if such “props” or gimmicks need to be deployed by Rutte to convince about his “first hand” knowledge, then you know there is something missing here. And that is REAL information.

You can listen to all the questions I asked the prime minister and the answers he gave in the special program of Hellas Pindakaas, aired on 8.11.2013. To listen, click here. here

What made the Dutch prime minister throw this firework in the air and then refuse to comment further on it? It is much easier to impress by saying that you have relatives from Greece; therefore you have first-hand knowledge. These “fireworks” fill the void that real reporting and real information have left in their absence. The truth is no fairytale. It takes time to sink in. And if you have been feeding the public with stereotypes about Greece via De Telegraph, or via the rhetoric of one-time government partner Geert Wilders, then the truth sounds suspicious, even when it is said. Fact: There are no correspondents of major Dutch newspapers in Athens. There was a time that only Ingeborg Beugel spoke out in the Dutch media about the other side of the Greek issue, the reality of the program and its impact on the real economy and the society. Many Dutch used to mock her for expressing her sympathy for the Greek people and their problem and some still do it even today. In an interview on Hellas Pindakaas Ingeborg said that in the first years of the crisis she received threats by anonymous Dutch men because she dared to support the Greeks against the troika and its policies.

When the leaders of Europe know nothing about each other’s’ society, then stereotypes and prejudices flourish. The South is poor and lazy, the North is hard working therefore prosperous. That simple. As if we learned nothing from the WW2 and the stigmatization and scapegoating of whole nations. The peoples of Europe, like their leaders, became so alienated that hated each other’s’ guts. The crisis brought out our worst self and at the same time, made it easier for certain words and terms to lose their meaning. For example the word solidarity became just another word we use but do not fully understand or comprehend or mean.

Dijsselbloem is taller than an ostrich – but his head is still in the sand…

Next in my quest to find how much Dutch politicians know and understand about Greece, was Jeroen Dijsselbloem. I attended the Europe House Lecture 2013 in The Hague and asked Mr. Dijsselbloem the following question. You can see the question and his answer on video via this link here (on 28:08 second).

Question: Hans-Werner Sinn the German economist and President of the Ifo Institute for Economic Research, a close advisor to Angela Merkel and one of the most influential economists in Europe, said in an interview he gave to the Greek newspaper Real News.

What troika is demanding is impossible. The Greek society is in no position to survive the austerity that is needed for a sufficient devaluation and for competitiveness. The strategic approach of the euro zones officials will push these countries into the abyss. I see a lot of similarities with Germany in the years 1929-1933. It is inhumane and very risky to expose a society to such grave dangers. The strategic approach of the euro zones officials could destroy not only the Euro and the societies of the South of Europe, but also the very basis of the European idea.

He is only one of the prominent economists who speak against the austerity and the approach of the euro zone towards the debt crisis. How can you be so sure that your approach is the right one, that it will work, and what gives you such certainty?

And do you consider the human cost of the policies you implement? Do you consider the people who suffer from the crisis, the unemployed 60% of the young people, the homeless, the home owners who get evicted, the shop owners that have no customers, the people who eat from the garbage; – do you consider them as collateral damage of an economic plan that has to go through no matter what? At any cost?

Answer: You described the Eurozone approach as austerity, which is wrong. The euro group approach deals with budgetary imbalances and risks. Why? Because a number of countries were so heavily indebted and were making so little money, that they could no longer go to financial markets and finance thems elves. That’s rather a fundamental problem. And Greece was one of those problems, one of those countries.

The euro zone stands ready to support Greece and will further support Greece, even beyond the program as well. But the main point is not austerity. There is no, for the long run, for Greece, no other approach, than Greece has to become more competitive, has to be making money again, and has to deal with its structural deficit. That’s the only way to become sustainable again, and in the long run to become independent of a program. And there is no easy way I am afraid. But we do take into consideration the effects and we do take into consideration the toll that it’s taking of the people of Greece.

Dijsselbloem and the non-austerity

What a paradox! Although austerity has become the dominant dogma of the (German) Dutch politics in the last few years, Mr Dijsselbloem decided to put his head in the sand and call austerity by a less aggressive, more benevolent term. He was looking for ways to convince the European citizens that austerity works in Greece, and one of such ways is to call it by a different name.

Words have definitely and intentionally lost their meaning. EU officials now call austerity “dealing with budgetary imbalances and risks”. Prime Minister Rutte called the cuts in salaries and pensions “structural reforms”. Right now in Greece, the law that protects home owners from being evicted (from their first house) is demanded by the troika to be abolished, so that the banks can take your house if you have no money to pay your mortgage. And the negotiations are also stuck because the Greeks do not want to completely deregulate the labor market and allow for massive dismissals. These two measures are also called necessary “structural reforms”. Measures upon measures that seem to fit only the big interests and leave the people unprotected. Solidarity – another word that has lost its meaning. Solidarity amongst equals, amongst partners, means right now that countries like Germany make profit out of lending money to Greece. And for those countries it is more profitable to have a crisis, to have a strong euro, to have the Greek issue not solved but on going until 2025 and even further.

Austerity Figures – The (sad) story in numbers

Here are some figures that the media or the politicians conveniently omit from their reports and speeches. Figures that show how little our European leaders know about the dire straits other countries are facing. Figures that show that no matter how you call austerity, the results are still detrimental for the vast majority of the Greeks.

350.000 businesses and homes have had their electric energy supply cut because they couldn’t pay the bill. A bill which for the last 2 years comes with an additional emergency tax, imposed by the government to cover the void in state revenues.

56 business owners end up in jail every day because of the recession and because they cannot pay their debts.

Greece has lost 25% of its pre-crisis GDP in the last 3 years.

Unemployment in the youth has reached a record 60%. In the general population is 27%.

Reports from health authorities in Greece raise concerns that some troubled drug users may think to self-inject HIV to claim benefits, amid the country’s deeply troubled economy.

The prices of goods are still very high! In a super market in the suburbs of Athens, buying the cheapest low cost products: 2 lit of milk, half a kilo of yogurt, 6 eggs, half a kilo of toast bread and 200 gr of feta. In Greece you pay: 8,55 Euros, in France: 6,50 Euros, and in Germany: 4,73 Euros.

It would be impossible to report on all the austerity and liberalization measures wish were implemented over the last 4 years. Even the Greek government has difficulties monitoring its own policies. Nobody really understands what’s going on. The only obvious thing is progressive chaos and less money in people’s pockets, a direct consequence of badly conceived and badly implemented austerity measures.

What do economists say on the matter?

Famous economists and Nobel Prize winners Joseph Stieglitz and Paul Krugman criticized those methods:

Such policies can only be adopted at a time of strong economic growth and it would be inefficient and even dangerous within a context of a crisis.

The troika demands an even more radical austerity and an implementation of a liberalization program. The resulting recession could be a catastrophe and could increase the debt, instead of reducing it. Paul Krugman wrote on July 21 2010,

I and others have watched with amazement and horror, the emergence of a consensus in policy circles in favor of immediate fiscal austerity.

On May 22 2010 Stieglitz explains that

If Europe goes down the route it is taking, there will be a disaster. We have learned since the great depression that austerity is not the answer.

Stieglitz compares these austerity measures to medieval medicine. He says:

it is like bloodletting, where you took blood out of a patient because the theory was that they were bad humans. And very often, when you took the blood out, the patient got sicker. The response then was more bloodletting until the patient very nearly died. What is happening in Europe is a mutual suicide pact.

The troika sees an internal devaluation as the solution to the Greek issue. Here is a description of internal devaluation from the Bloomberg economic information website: “The country has to restore competitiveness more brutally, by cutting wages, which in turn requires persistently high unemployment to suppress workers bargaining’s power”. How can such a project be officially implemented by European institutions to one of their own member states?

What do the Greeks say on the matter?

In spite of the dire consequences of the austerity and the way it has been criticized by prominent economists, in spite of the way that the situation has evolved, we still hear the same litany. Dijsselbloem even said in his lecture that the ministers of Euro group are losing their patience as new reforms have to be applied as soon as possible and only a strict enforcement of austerity measures will improve the present situation.

Austerity is the only way. This is what the leaders of Europe want for poor debt-ridden countries like Greece. Any other plan, less strict, more growth-oriented would not pass through their parliaments in Berlin and The Hague, since their public opinion has been poisoned with bias from the start and the real information about the real effects of austerity is missing from the public discourse.

But how do the Greeks describe austerity? And what do the real people have to say on the matter? This quote is taken from the documentary “Chronicles of a European Winter- Athens”:

People are deeply depressed because suddenly you understand that the sign that you saw written on the streets, you are stealing our future, it is actually true. Because you don’t know what to hope for any more. You don’t know what to plan for any more. And even if you hope for something or you want to plan it, you don’t know what is going to happen tomorrow. I mean, it’s a joke, you go away for 2 days and you come back and it’s a different government. You don’t turn on news for a little while, you come back 2 days later and there is a new austerity measure. We are being slapped around the face. This fatigue, it’s not just fatigue, it’s like imagine this huge hand that is slapping you on one side of the face and by the time you come back and recover , before you recover it slaps you around the other side. And it goes like this all the time. The austerity is relentless.

For the last 4 years ordinary Greeks have been called on to pay for a crisis which was caused by a shaky financial system. For the last 5 years the contributions required of the financial system have been practically nonexistent. And very little has been done to improve the stability of the system. Especially since more money is to be gained from a volatile environment, eg. by speculators and funds and the markets in general. The reason is simple. The financial system is more or less immune to any political decision which might erode its prerogatives.

And the leaders of Europe, ignorant of the real impact of such austerity and arrogant enough to deny that there is any austerity at all, will continue to say that they have great respect for the sacrifices of the Greeks. Respect, which is just lip-service, since at the same time the same respectful leaders shamelessly ask for even more of these sacrifices from the Greek people.

Source: http://www.iamgreek.nl/in-the-netherlands/2013/12/19/mark-rutte-and-jeroen-dijsselbloem-nl/

Austerity-driven budget cuts across Europe have caused governments to ignore the protection of human rights, according to the human rights commissioner.

“Many governments in Europe imposing austerity measures have forgotten about their human rights obligations, especially the social and economic rights of the most vulnerable, the need to ensure access to justice, and the right to equal treatment,” Nils Muižnieks states in a new research paper about the impact of the economic crisis on the protection of human rights.

“Regrettably, international lenders have also neglected to incorporate human rights considerations into many of their assistance programmes.”

In the document, the Commissioner for Human Rights lists the important ways in which austerity measures have undermined human rights.

“National decisions on austerity measures and international rescue packages have lacked transparency, public participation and democratic accountability.

“In some cases, onerous conditionalities have prevented governments from investing in essential social protection, health and education programmes. When the EU as a central actor in the crisis makes decisions about economic governance in member states and when the Troika sets conditions for rescue packages and loan agreements, the impact on human rights should be better taken into account.

“The economic crisis has had dire consequences on vulnerable groups, in particular on children and young persons. Youth unemployment in Europe has reached record levels, with millions of young people unemployed with scarred futures. Cuts in child and family benefits, health care and education have also added a strain on millions of families. An increasing number of children are dropping out of school to find employment and support their families, risking life-long setbacks in educational achievement, and providing the conditions for job insecurity coupled with the re-emergence of child labour and exploitation.”

The commissioner wants governments to now focus on “the urgent need to reinvigorate the European social model based on the foundations of human dignity, intergenerational solidarity and access to justice for all.”

He adds: “Governments should focus on reducing youth and long-term unemployment as a priority and on upholding social protection floors for basic income and health care during the crisis. Effective access to justice for all must be guaranteed during economic downturns by maintaining the judiciary and the legal aid system.”

More information

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