Introduction
A decade almost after
Lehman Brothers’ bankruptcy and World’s economic, political and social Great
Depression, Greece seems the only nation still unable to recover. Although too
small in this anarchic World it has managed to be in the swirl of this “man
dust’ continuously the last decade making distinguished organizations like International
Monetary Fund (IMF) and European Central Bank (ECB) and powerful
countries with their leaders as well to seem incapable to contribute effectively. Or have they done just the opposite serving ideally their interest by behaving in a purely “Thucydides” realism attitude? Is this Greek social immunity in all taken measures and given advice really a nation’s failure or just an imposed consequence of the international system? Do domestic politics and mainly populism count more than anything else for ten lost years spent in a reckless Greek foreign and internal policy with still an unknown future to come? Is there in Greece as has been rumored a hidden “oil curse” dragging Greece to an authoritarian electoral democracy and powerful elite’s domination intentionally? What is that they all missing or just pretending not see it? Greeks, its internal political structure of their state or international anarchy are finally more responsible for this misery? Conclusively, is there for Greece any leeway for a break with its past or another lost century has just started?
countries with their leaders as well to seem incapable to contribute effectively. Or have they done just the opposite serving ideally their interest by behaving in a purely “Thucydides” realism attitude? Is this Greek social immunity in all taken measures and given advice really a nation’s failure or just an imposed consequence of the international system? Do domestic politics and mainly populism count more than anything else for ten lost years spent in a reckless Greek foreign and internal policy with still an unknown future to come? Is there in Greece as has been rumored a hidden “oil curse” dragging Greece to an authoritarian electoral democracy and powerful elite’s domination intentionally? What is that they all missing or just pretending not see it? Greeks, its internal political structure of their state or international anarchy are finally more responsible for this misery? Conclusively, is there for Greece any leeway for a break with its past or another lost century has just started?
In the following
analysis, it will be pursued to show the real reason why Greece has become a
Gordian knot in after-Lehman Brothers era. A good example where the balance of great
powers may means nothing in 21th century for people’s prosperity. A paradigm
where international hypocrisy may lead humanity in another century with another
World War finally. What if real democracy revives again and brings prosperity
to a new World with maybe more dimensions in international relations than the distinguished
Kenneth N. Waltz’s three “images” of last millennium’s World?
Background
Greece in its modern
shape was founded in 1830 heavily already indebted to England through two large
mishandled Revolution’s loans taken in 1823-4. In 1826 4 years before its
official declaration was bankrupted for its first time. In the end of 19th
century another bankruptcy in 1893 and a well disputed for its purposes War
against Ottoman Empire in 1897 cost Greece another round of huge loans for Turkey’s
compensation given promptly by International Finance Committee (IFC) that were
paid till the end of ‘70s securing like many other countries in Europe Greece
role as a “late developer” in the industrialization era. Immediately after a
military junta in late ‘60s just before the end of repaying the loans a socialist
governance started in 1981 characterized steadily by a deep corruption. After
the end of Cold War Greece governing mainly was based on bribes from Germany and
Russia for armaments and state procurements while dismantling any national
cohesion.
Greece ended up after
all in the first decade of this millennium heavily debt burdened with around
320 bn euro or 178% GDP, unsuccessfully governed by short-term lived coalitions,
globally disregarded and selling off its wealth without even having realized yet
what went wrong and insisting on going on the right way ironically. Its financial
data has proven its failure as a state unanimously while its stubbornness to
resist change cannot be understood and interpreted enough even now through
social, economic and international theories. No matter its own fault,
international economy and international state system seem to exploit Greek
government inefficiently willingly pushing Greece towards nationalism and an old-fashioned
elite-style governance while diminishing Greeks’ prosperity. In the same time
in its exclusive economic zone as well as in respective ones of neighborhood countries
like Cyprus, Egypt and Israel vast quantities of oil and gas attract giant West
companies interest like EXXONMOBIL, TOTAL and EDISON. As situated in the
periphery of Europe and West civilization, Greece seems convicted in a role of
a distinguished “Latin Europe” membership serving an imperialism of Europe’s
hegemonies.
Argument
Greece seems to be the “zero-sum”
game between West (US versus Germany balanced Europe), Russia and China. A
primitive realist contest that reminds us Thucydides’ state relations principles
where no one of the key World players seems to care for Greece but only who
will conquer the heartland of ancient spirit and not only.
Even the Greeks appear
to resort exclusively to their first image of existence where man is striving
only for his exclusive survival full of envy and pride and indifferent for his
state and political system. Full in passion and nationalism cares to satisfy
his basic instincts with little thought for next generations’ looming life.
They are even ready to resort to War proving their long glorious history but little
idealism rests anymore in the place where two and a half millenniums ago
democracy, sciences and technology signaled an unachievable since then level
for humanity.
It is obvious that Greeks
have not perceived their true interest and where perceived they have not found
its expression in governmental policy. What is strange is while sometimes Greece is
praised for its reforms and progress from West and many distinguished political
personalities in the same time Greeks get more in oppression and in poverty. Indeed,
it is a question how Greece can improve while the international relations of
the World remain going on the old footing.
In this anarchy defined
World, Rousseau becomes contemporaneous when he argues for loss of solidarity
spirit under Europeans identity and substitution of patriotism with other
sub-or transnational interests. Greek
elite-based government seems to be devoted solely to two things since the burst
of the crisis: how to extend its time of ruling over its citizens and how to
increase its power over them. Lenders are frequently presented as warriors that
want to conquer Greece putting people in a perpetual need of war and
resistance.
International economy
with its transnational characteristics has affected Greece ability to recover.
Germany economical domination in EU through Euro and its foreign policy especially
in Balkan Peninsula determined political and economic limited reaction in
Greece through crisis. No doubt, Greece resembles more to a “Latin America”
country fitted at the periphery of Germany’s Europe with Greeks as prisoners of
a structure which they cannot afford.
“Complex
interdependence” accounts for Greek poor governance that brought certain common
political characteristics no matter the ruling party in lead. Greece with a
weak state has resulted in a policy outcome based on conflict among complex
public-private linkages leading to deadlocks.
International state
system certainly shaped modern Greece. Power, domination, empire, glory and
“total” security induced Greece to organize itself and meet external
challenges. The classic argument between England and Prussia applies also to
Greece. A country with a very vulnerable and critical geopolitical location was
always the bone of contention. From Katherine the Great to Stalin and now to
Putin, Greece and Poland where always looked greedily by Russia. Even China form
Far East disembarked in Greece arguing for its global interests. Threatened by
sea and land, the desire of Slavs to descent to warm waters and the Ottoman’s
expansion to the West militarization became vital for Greece affecting its governance
through Kings, dictators and deep corrupted democrats under an authoritarian Putin-like
modern democracy nowadays.
A regime like heavy oil
producing Arab countries where citizens are satisfied by tax evasion and
generous state benefits, has been arise undermining Greece present and future
perspective. Illegal global trafficking of all kinds transformed Greece to a
NATO member and a transit country for transnational barons in the same time. A
full-scale propaganda concealed for decades the country’s finances deficits and
lending with the synergy of EU up to 2009 and its aftermath national deadlock.
As long as, there is no
occupation however compelling external pressures maybe they are unlikely to be
fully determining. Some leeway of response to pressure is always possible, at
least conceptually.
Evidence
In Greece all considered Great powers of
21th century met in this economic crisis. US President Barak Obama chose to end
his Presidency with a tour in Europe visiting Greece where he praised democracy
as the only known viable type of rule for West civilization future and not only
and Germany where Chancellor and her Minister of Finance Herr Schauble strongly
resisted all these years imposing a different fiscal policy more US based and
confronting World economic crisis that burst out after Lehman Brothers
collapse. In the same time from 2015 a radical leftist Greek government
strongly opposed West and struggled desperately to reach an agreement with
Putin, pushing for a loan of 5bn euro as an exchange to a possible oil pipeline
that will turned Greece orientation towards entering Russian “sphere of
interest” and obviously its political system. Meanwhile Greece throughout vast
Russia armaments in the past had been already transformed in the only NATO
member with Russia military equipment even stating officially through its
Defense Minister an aspiration to produce Kalashnikov rifles in Greece. Meanwhile,
China exploited Greek despair as well, securing through COSCO a 67% of Piraeus
port share that allowed it to disembark its goods for European market in South
willing to acquire the national train company for goods transportation as well.
In a ‘zero sum” challenges Germany, Russia and China seems to be satisfied for
nothing less than full domination with US reacting always too late mostly
misinformed and actually in the last moment before Greece collapse.
According to EUROSTAT Greek basic salary
in 2016 fall in the 11th place of EU with 684 euro, unemployment
reached 22% while referring to young people under the age 25 to 45% a
percentage similar to Bulgaria and Romania.
According to the Doctors Association of Athens thousands fled mainly to
UK, Germany and Sweden since 2010, 5 more times than usual. Certain forms of
industrial activity seem to be sloughed off by the most advanced countries, or
more precisely, by corporations seeking lower labor costs welcoming Greeks that
abandon their country and Greece confined to certain types of manufacturing and
services that favor the mix of labor supply and organizational skills. According
to Greek Tourism Confederation (SETE) around 25 million tourists visit Greece
yearly, a country with 11 million inhabitants but the income is lower than the
expectations.
In the same time, the demographic
projections along with refugees’ flood through Middle East, Asia and Africa of
almost 1 million persons only for 2015 shivered the state foundations.
International organizations and NGOs initially contributed in the reception and
control of the ceaseless insertion in Greece and Europe hundreds of thousands
of people while NATO finally came in Aegean Sea with its fleet to augment
security. Greek government found itself in moments when it could not provide
the minimum of security of its people and their property. Increase in
violence cannot be regarded anything else than an expression of Man’s
aggression towards a State that do not represent its purpose for security and
prosperity. Nationalism appears daily in Greek media to calm domestic instincts
were Turkey, a NATO Greece ally, is having a role of intruder satisfying a
peculiar interest by Greeks for their nation. All seem eager to defend their
country but none to change it.
Socialist Greece in an analogy with
Russia’s oligarchic post-communism governance seems in a vicious cycle trying
to serve both EU and its currency euro values and domestic and global elites
interests. Citizens find themselves trapped in ignorance fed from an
authoritarian oppression that West approves. State and media are characterized
by a strange synchronization in their messages towards deepening society’s
poverty and tolerating oligarchs’ illegal attitude. Not surprisingly, recent
media acquisitions happen from oligarchs accused for forming gangs and a
Russian oligarch close to Putin. Justice seems incapable to impose different
values than the existing ones in the society that led to this mess. All main
leaders that were convicted for robbing the State have been already released
enjoying freedom. When voices of freedom are heard sporadically soon disappear afterwards
chased by an unseen the security apparatus and a half-blinded jurisdiction. It
is not by coincidence that he most preferable political leader in relation with
the existing ones for ruling the nation in all polls for decades now is the
“No-one”. Many political parties that had expressed a will for change soon fell
in a cooption with the old political system that were supposed to alter ending
in ripping and enjoy state benefits. Some of them like “Laos” and “DIMAR” even
managed to participate in Government before disappearing. A World system seems
to control everything inside Greece in the old way and secure the inability of
Greeks to change their country, life and future. Germany that dominates in
Greece the last decades and especially after euro adoption seems to have chosen
a system of bribes to locals to exploit Greece wealth in a traditional 19th
century old fashion colonization.
A seek for participation in the EU core
had replaced any other ideology pushing patriotism away and replaced only by
nationalism. While not clearly defined and exercised EU ideology seems to lead
to it’s dismantle unable to satisfy Greeks ambitions. An EU that has started
its “amputation” with BREXIT seems mostly to resemble with Germany’s Foreign
Policy been totally unattractive for nations especially in South Europe where
citizens find their life to deteriorate under a fiscal policy that it is not
clear what it seeks for. A European identity looks gradually to become a
Germany identity that has no chance to substitute EU nation’s sovereignty making
them finally to resist or abandon EU. A cataclysm of EU money through its
programs for decades proved to turn against itself turning many nations
especially in South Europe into passive receivers with no adding value than the
subversion mainly to Germany and European Committee.
Greek government in a “complex
interdependence” has become a component of the puzzle along with EU and IMF,
Greek powerful families and new ambitioned oligarchs, unions that struggle to
lose as less as possible, companies that try to survive and Greek who seek
their wellness. From 2009 none elected government has managed to finish its
constitutional term resorting to new elections when demands from all other
components become unaffordable. In 2015, respectful German newspaper “Die Welt”
wrote that Greeks have 800 billion euro in Swiss banks revealing the Greek
tragedy. EU still brings new packets of austerity deals and IMF issuing
continuously reports that prove taken measures as not enough. New oligarchs
most of them accused from Justice but never convicted for smuggling continue to
acquire power so as to impose their will on the people. Unions are organizing
protests all these years with little effect in improving the situation and Greeks
steadily appears dissatisfied and pessimist in all opinion polls.
Not few times a possible military coup
come again in the press during this crisis as Greece is one of the few NATO
countries that even today spends above 2% of GDP for its defense having
developed a strong military state. Addressing external threats from its
foundation either towards East and Ottomans or North and Communists, Greece
organized internally to meet external challenges. Its glorious stance in WWII
where was the first nation that resist German expansion and defeat its ally
fascist Italy and a fierce and devastating civil War against Stalin communists
in 1946-49 shaped a society where government was granted full power with less
supervision by representative bodies deciding enormous armaments easily in the
late of century that led to corruption and budget collapse.
Greeks are asking continuously for lower
taxes and satisfied with small changes while they don’t realize how much of
their counties’ wealth is being lost to theft, corruption and government
incompetence. In 2014, Prime Minister Antonis Samaras and his Energy Minister
Giannis Maniatis after a visit of their staff to Huston and Geonergy Corporation
announced that Greek government expects from the exploitation of energy oil and
gas resources only in Ionian Sea 150bn euro in the next 25-30 years. The
respective amounts from other areas south of Crete and in the exclusive zone of
Greece in Mediterranean Sea are immense. Estimates only for the Greek mineral
resources are 40bn euro as well. Solar power in Greece is in abundance although
the initial efforts to be exploited somehow managed to be stopped and even
putting Greeks to pay taxes to retain some solar energy production.
Conclusion
Greece in the post-Cold
and post-Lehman Brothers era found itself in the middle of a fierce
geopolitical struggle both within West where there was a disagreement between
Germany and US in the right way that economic crisis should be addressed and
confronting efforts of Russia and China to exploit its weak state capacity.
Greeks and their
successive governments failed to react dynamically and resort to introversion.
Soon the crisis turned into panic leading its workforce to flee away mainly in
Europe and other strong World economies. Populism and nationalism were logical
to prevail making the situation worse while uncontrolled incidents like the
influx of refugees had finally to be dealt with support from outside through
NGOs and NATO that reinforced Greek malfunctioning state.
West, international
organizations like IMF and EU institutions hesitate to designate the true
sources of Greek crisis. An electoral authoritarian has been established where
elections have little to do with liberty and prosperity. A full sale patronage
system of oligarchs has taken the power from the official state where its
institutions fail to respond and recover. Elected governors from a political
elite care more to rip the fruits of the power and extend their political life
than change the country. Any resistance is easily eradicated justifying
completely people’s strong disapproval of all existing politicians. There is no
external support from outside as the colony system still seems relevant defining
the relations between strong and weak nations in 21th century.
EU has failed as
Rousseau foresaw to bring a unify ideology into practice. As a result people
and nations are dissatisfied turning back to nationalism and EU dismantling.
Greece seems to invest more than it should in an EU integration forgetting to
care for itself on its own. A well imposed attitude of resorting to other
strong nations of EU as a panacea proved to be disaster both in economic terms
and more serious in destroying national spirit.
Greece being in the
periphery of Europe seems to continue in 21th century to be a servant of the
Europe core. Under an economy of services mainly through tourism and a mental
“hemorrhage” of its youth and qualified workforce there is nothing left than
serve summer leavers from the North in exchange of low salaries and a stagnant
economy.
Under present
projections growth of 1% till 2060 under huge debt leaves no space for hope and
verifies a loom future far away from liberalism towards an elite repressive and
corrupted regime. A World alliance seems to have been shaped in coordination to
rule Greece for another century under a neocolonialism status of Gunder Frank
where the latter will have sovereignty but in fact be prisoner of a structure
which it cannot afford.
Orthodox Church,
ancient history and invisible military threats are expected to continue their
role in keeping Greece under the same populist spirit with only goal its remain
in a peculiar West hostage. 800 billion euro in Swiss banks belonging to Greek
elite system seems to be the mortgage of Greeks slavery.
No doubt, it is “oil
course” in its modern appeal that imprisons Greece. Oil, natural gas, mineral
resources, sun, wind and water become nightmare instead of blessing of Gods for
Greeks waiting simply the day that a Prometheus return to them the light of
their life. A dusting bowl that will dump this social dirt or a Hercules that
will clean the modern Augeas stables.
In another dimension of
the ones that were described by Kenneth Waltz in last century there is that
with the soil of the states where sincerity between states should prevail in
order to move this World in another era. The intangible virtues of the man and
state should link this transnational World in a consistent manner with modern
life that technology does and avoid incidents like Greece in the start of this
century where hypocrisy and evil create an unsolved problem in IR deliberately,
making theorists anachronistic, state leaders puppets, man “animal” and people
“herds”.
We cannot go on in this
interconnected World of men, spirits, soils and cables in the same way we did
in the past-Westphalia era without making it inhabitable finally by a WWIII. We
have to get rid of “Westphalian straitjacket” letting free the state and the
man. A new theory IR is needed for God’s sake.
