Everyone has their rationality — that’s the problem What is Syriza? For the champions of free market economic liberalism at the Economist the answer is simple. It is one of the mad, bad and dangerously “extremist” forces which have failed to grasp the universal benefits which are to be found in capitalist “globalisation”. It is […]
18 Jan
Comments Off on Dispatch from Athens #9: After the election, the deluge?
After the election, the deluge? All the polls today continue to put Syriza ahead. The scope for speculation over the result next Sunday has narrowed. Immediate expectation is defined by two questions. Can Syriza win an absolute majority? And what will be the precise distribution of votes outside the two poles of the Left and […]
17 Jan
Comments Off on Dispatch from Athens #8: Shahzad Luqman zindabad!
Dispatch from Athens #8: Shahzad Luqman zindabad! A joyful gathering in Athens. Warm and funny. Also insightful and serious about the political developments we had met to discuss and organise around. A few hours raced by. Then the awful, heartbreaking news. It was two years ago today that two supporters of the fascist, criminal conspiracy […]
17 Jan
Comments Off on Dispatch from Athens #7: The strategic question is posed
The strategic question is posed, whether the Left asks it or not On the eve of the last campaigning weekend before the historic Greek general election you would be forgiven for thinking that the public mood must be febrile to the point of convulsion. A friend from Beirut PMed me to ask, “It must be […]
14 Jan
Comments Off on Dispatch from Athens #6: Know them by their infomercials
By their infomercials, ye shall know them There is state funding of political parties in Greece, with public funds apportioned according to the share of vote at the previous general election. There are also, as in the US, political adverts on commercial television. That’s in addition to the legal requirement on channels to carry the […]
13 Jan
Comments Off on Dispatch from Athens #5: Bread, education, freedom…and roses
Bread, education, freedom…and roses too The impotence of the old political order in Athens found perfect expression this week in an eccentric intervention by the centre-left mayor of Athens, Giorgos Kaminis. The decline of other social democratic figures more firmly associated with the parties of disrepute has made him a fairly prominent figure. So was […]
12 Jan
The ruins of the centre Left With Syriza still firmly ahead in the opinion polls (there are a lot of them) some attention is falling on the parties of the centre and centre Left (there are a lot of them, too). It’s not because they are important in themselves. They are significant only insofar as Syriza falls […]
11 Jan
Comments Off on Dispatch from Athens #3: Fear meets a movement of hope
When fear meets a movement of hope The Sunday papers still matter in Greece. More so, in fact, than before the crisis. A vicious circle of declining readerships, falling advertising revenue and disinvestment in journalism has left the daily papers as poorly produced and read as they are paginated. The once world-class Eleftherotypia has bitten […]
10 Jan
The Right: cornered, but fighting for its life There are a lot of significant elections in Europe this year — including Britain’s general election in May. Tomorrow’s “Republican march” of national unity in Paris has morphed into a display of “European solidarity” — or, spelling it out more accurately, of solidarity between European political leaders facing angry […]
09 Jan
Athens 2015 – the party is not over Greece has been the European country hardest hit by the global crisis unleashed following the financial crash of 2008. It is also the Eurozone state upon which the most devastating austerity measures have been imposed by the troika of the European Union, the European Central Bank and […]
20 Jan
1 Comment