Populism and the Greek crisis: A modern tragedy

ULUSLARARASI İLİŞKİLER, 2018

Extended introduction to a special issue on Deciphering the Greek Crisis: Issues, Failures, Challenges" co-edited by Dimitrios Triantaphyllou and Kostas Ifantis...with a particular focus on populism and its impact on Greece

The recent elections in Greece reflects an enormous change in the political behavior of the electorate. The citizens have not chosen a simple switch on the power, but contributed with their votes to a strategic defeat of populism and in same time they paved the way for the search of a new type of leadership, which is close to realism in handling with social problems that can't be implemented with calculated financial costs. The vote of 7 th Juli is a vote against the over-promising and under-delivery experienced under Syriza’s rule. The voting for conservative ND is not an ideological choice. It's a choice that runs counter to the logic of falsely or hypocritical negotiating austerity measures opposed to Greece buy his Lenders (memorandum) and the consequent tax-tornado as a result of negotiating failure with the partners in the EEC and the IMF. The positive vote for ND also reflects the contradiction with the misguided manipulations of public opinion regarding the Skopje-Qu...

SSRN Electronic Journal

The recent elections in Greece reflects an enormous change in the political behavior of the electorate. The citizens have not chosen a simple switch on the power, but contributed with their votes to a strategic defeat of populism and in same time they paved the way for the search of a new type of leadership, which is close to realism in handling with social problems that can't be implemented with calculated financial costs. The vote of 7 th Juli is a vote against the over-promising and underdelivery experienced under Syriza's rule. The voting for conservative ND is not an ideological choice. It's a choice that runs counter to the logic of falsely or hypocritical negotiating austerity measures opposed to Greece buy his Lenders (memorandum) and the consequent tax-tornado as a result of negotiating failure with the partners in the EEC and the IMF. The positive vote for ND also reflects the contradiction with the misguided manipulations of public opinion regarding the Skopje-Question and finally the strategy of micro concessions and micro-allowances as a means of concluding a "political-social alliance" with an undefined hostile establishment.

Financial crisis has connected Europe with an obvious common pattern which consists the rapidly rise of protest parties that challenge the established political systems. The basic and new feature of these schemes is the intense war rhetoric against the European Union and the vehement rejection of the selected modes of euro rescue. In this sense, populism appears as a new specter haunting European democracies, as active risk, causing serious concerns. Unfortunately, the growing concern does not coincide with policies aiming at finding viable solutions, as the center-right parties and governments believe that the only solution to the crisis is to adopt austerity measures and Social Democrats have not yet found effective alternatives. This essay will attempt to shed light on some aspects of current populism phenomenon with particular focus on its modern manifestations. Firstly, it is useful to attempt a classification of the concept of populism. According to Frank Deckeri populism is a strong stand against the status quo, it appeals to lower social groups and it is a phenomenon of social crises of modernization in the sense that there is a systemic review in nearly every form of economic, cultural and political development, using simplified shapes and models of analysis.

HAPSc Policy Briefs Series

The prevalence of the right-wing party of Nea Dimokratia (ND) in the Greek political landscape reflects an enormous change in the political behavior. Citizens have not chosen a simple switch on the power but contributed with their votes to a strategic defeat of populism and at the same time, they paved the way for the search for a new type of leadership, which is close to realism in handling with the social problems that cannnot be implemented merely with calculated financial costs. The dominance of conservative ND is not an ideological choice. It is a choice that runs counter to the logic of falsely or hypocritical negotiating austerity measures opposed to Greece by his lenders (due to memoranda) and the consequent tax-tornado as a result of negotiating failure with the partners in the EEC and the IMF. The positive choice for ND also reflects the contradiction with the misguided manipulations of public opinion regarding the strategy of micro-concessions and micro-alliances as a means of concluding a "political-social alliance".

Populism as a term reappeared in everyday public discourse in Greece with the first protests against the memorandum with IMF, EU and ECB and its concomitant austerity policies. The polarisation at the base of the populism/anti-populism dichotomy has been exacerbated on both a social and a political/ideological level. Every articulation of popular demands was denounced by the predominant power block as a populist one. All collective practices were stigmatised as populist and stripped of their political meaning. Everyone who distances himself even a minimum from the dominant neoliberal crisis management discourse was and is dismissed as a "populist".

European Populism in the Shadow of the Great Recession, 2015

Within the broader debate on the Greek crisis, the theory of 'populist democracy' postulates that populism is fundamental to the sustenance of the Greek political system and is at the heart of Greece's endemic domestic weaknesses. This article tests this assumption empirically through the use of a sophisticated framing analysis of speeches delivered by the leaders of the five parties in the Greek parliament in the period 2009-11. The findings confirm that populism: (a) is expressed through the narratives of political actors; (b) is observed across the party system; (c) is expressed in the forms of blame-shifting and exclusivity; and (d) differs depending on position in the party system. The article contributes to the debate by testing and building on the theory of democratic populism, providing a novel way of measuring and operationalizing populism and identifying a new typology that distinguishes between mainstream and fringe populism.

Financial crisis has connected Europe with an obvious common pattern which consists the rapidly rise of protest parties that challenge the established political systems. The basic and new feature of these schemes is the intense war rhetoric against the European Union and the vehement rejection of the selected modes of euro rescue. In this sense, populism appears as a new specter haunting European democracies, as active risk, causing serious concerns. Unfortunately, the growing concern does notcoincide with policies aiming at finding viable solutions, as the center-right parties and governments believe that the only solution to the crisis is to adopt austerity measures and Social Democrats have not yet found effective alternatives.

Within the broader debate on the Greek crisis, the theory of 'populist democracy' postulates that populism is fundamental to the sustenance of the Greek political system and is at the heart of Greece's endemic domestic weaknesses. This article tests this assumption empirically through the use of a sophisticated framing analysis of speeches delivered by the leaders of the five parties in the Greek parliament in the period 2009-11. The findings confirm that populism: (a) is expressed through the narratives of political actors; (b) is observed across the party system; (c) is expressed in the forms of blame-shifting and exclusivity; and (d) differs depending on position in the party system. The article contributes to the debate by testing and building on the theory of democratic populism, providing a novel way of measuring and operationalizing populism and identifying a new typology that distinguishes between mainstream and fringe populism.