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*Update – The election results are in.
There might be hope for the people of Greece in their upcoming elections. Excerpts of an interview of Tariq Ali hosted by Kostas Vlahopoulos and Thomas Giourgas.
“3. What is your view of the current sociopolitical situation in Greece?
Tariq Ali: The situation is polarised. The fascists of Golden Dawn and the Conservative descendants of the wrong side in the Greek Civil war have the support of a sizeable section of the Greek population. This cannot be ignored and we do so at our peril. The emergence and growing support for SYRIZA (and PODEMOS in Spain) is the post positive development in Europe, but in order for it to move another step forward without moving backwards it will have to challenge the Greek oligarchs, confront the ship-owners mafia that owns the media, that pays few taxes, if any, and also to remove the tax free status of the Orthodox Church. Its not that the Church is poor. Its ownership of property makes the institution an oligarch in its own right. In the case of the ship-owners they must be compelled to pay taxes in retrospect so that the country can move forward economically again and start functioning properly. Such a move will annoy the more backward sections of the EU elite but will be popular in Europe as a whole and will lay the basis for a political battle with the Troika by splitting their supporters.
1. For the first time in Greek political history, a radical left party, SYRIZA, is the strong favorite to win the general elections taking place in January the 25th. What kind of reaction do you expect from the neo-liberal Europe and in particular from Germany?
Tariq Ali: If SYRIZA wins it will mark the beginnings of a fightback against austerity and neo-liberalism in Europe. Two concurrent processes will be in motion from the beginning of the victory. There will be a strong attempt by the EU elite led by Germany to try and tame SYRIZA via a combination of threats and concessions. The aim of this operation is simple. To try and split SYRIZA at a very early stage.
Secondly there will be a high level of expectation from SYRIZA’s electorate and beyond. Mass mobilizations will be extremely important to sustain the new government and push it to carry through the first necessary measures. The debt and the readjustment measures must be repudiated immediately before moving on to implement a plan that restores the social gains that have been achieved and are being dismantled by the Troika-led governments. The first three months will be decisive in terms of revealing the contours of the political and economic landscape envisaged by SYRIZA. Neo-liberalism can not be dismantled overnight but the will to do so must be paramount. Bandwagon careerists must not be allowed to sabotage what can and should be done
6. Financial markets are considered to be the omnipotent regulators of politics and democracy itself in some cases. Could it be possible for a left government to clash with market system within the capitalist framework?
Tariq Ali: Yes, that is what is on the agenda today and what the Bolivarian governments in South America have been doing for the last fifteen years with relative success. Market-fundamentalism has led to a sharp decline in democracy (Wolfgang Streek, the German sociologist has explained the process of decline very well in his books and essays) and the Wall Street crash of 2008. What is needed is a combination of regulation, state intervention to take back the public utilities and create and own industries that can help fund the former andsenhanced democracy on every level to ensure popular participation.
This can be our only minimum programme at the present moment.”
One can only hope that the push back against the neo-liberal tide will take root in Greece, blazing the trail for the rest of the EU to follow.
Did you ever want to see a society remade into the corporatist mode? Greece is going down that path right now. The IMF is gleefully setting out conditions and ‘austerity measures’ necessary for Greece to qualify for the bailout package. How much would you wager that the Public Sector is going to take a beating? Today’s news is part of a cycle of the forced privatization of the Greek economy.
“Hundreds of youths rioted in Athens on Saturday, throwing Molotov cocktails and stones at police who responded with tear gas at a large May Day rally against austerity measures needed to secure loans for near-bankrupt Greece.”
The youthful vanguard responds, but until the middle class in Greece responds their efforts will be in vain.
“Greece’s additional austerity measures are likely to include raising consumer taxes while docking pensions and public service pay. Unions are furious.
“These measures are death,” said Nikos Diamantopoulos, participating in a rally organized by unions. “How people are going to live tomorrow, how they’re going to survive, I do not understand.”
The people will live for tomorrow but will they accept the dismantling of the state in order to ‘save’ their country? Some resist:
“The Greek people do not owe anything to anybody,” Left coalition leader Alexis Tsipras told reporters at one of the Athens rallies, assailing “those who have brazenly robbed public money and pension funds.”
Virginia Kalapotharakou, an accountant who joined striking seamen and dockworkers rallying in the port of Piraeus, called the potential measures “very reactionary.”
“They’re trying to do away with all the rights we gained through struggles in previous years,” she said.
Because breaking unions and cutting the public sector is obviously the first choice in fixing a country. How about raising corporate taxes and income taxes for the rich? Austerity plans seldom mention these strategies.
Stay tuned, hopefully the workers in Greece can resists the undoing of their country.
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