{"id":20508,"date":"2015-01-16T08:54:00","date_gmt":"2015-01-16T07:54:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wwwdev-transform-network-net.sociality.gr\/blog\/non-classifiee\/lausterite-detruit-leconomie-et-la-societe\/"},"modified":"2023-09-27T16:00:11","modified_gmt":"2023-09-27T14:00:11","slug":"lausterite-detruit-leconomie-et-la-societe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wwwdev-transform-network-net.sociality.gr\/fr\/blog\/article\/lausterite-detruit-leconomie-et-la-societe\/","title":{"rendered":"L’aust\u00e9rit\u00e9 d\u00e9truit l’\u00e9conomie et la soci\u00e9t\u00e9"},"content":{"rendered":"

(en anglais) On 25 January, early election will be held in Greece. DIE LINKE\u00b4s sister party, the left coalition Syriza, is likely to win a majority. You just spent three days in Athens to talk with leading Syriza representatives. How do they view the situation?<\/span>
\nAxel Troost: <\/span>They are very optimistic and expect Syriza to win the elections by a clear margin. And they are confident they will be able to counter the ideological campaigns currently waged against them in the remaining two weeks.
\nSyriza might need a coalition partner after the elections. Who might that be, and how difficult could the negotiations turn out?<\/b>
\nAxel Troost: No one wants to even rack their heads about that now because the results of the elections are quite impossible to predict. If push comes to shove, there might actually be no social democracy in the next Greek parliament. Pasok still lingers on, and Papandreou founded a new party in its wake. Both of these parties currently poll between three and five per cent. Greek regulations set a three per cent threshold to enter parliament. So none of the two might gain a single seat in the new parliament. If Syriza fails to gain an absolute majority, it will in any case be faced with a challenging task in forming a government.
\nAssuming that Syriza manages to form a government it would lead, should we expect a major show-down in the matter of a haircut for Greece?<\/b>
\nAxel Troost: We should expect a complicated situation. But my estimate is that the primary challenge will not be a haircut but the immediate re-financing of the outstanding debt. Greece needs to re-finance some 22 billion Euros in 2015. It will be not be able to raise that sum on the capital market, except at horrendous interest rates. This makes negotiations necessary. The question of a haircut will certainly be raised in this context, and Syriza will table the idea of a European debt conference that should address a haircut not only for Greece but for other South European countries as well. But what\u00b4s really needed is followup financing so that Syriza can implement its Plan for National Re-Construction which is the thrust of the initiatives they propose.
\nMoney in exchange for reforms \u2013 that\u00b4s the Troika\u00b4s negotiating line. In Athens you met with Syriza\u00b4s economic and finance experts, primarily. No one seems to question that many things in Greece did and do go wrong. What kinds of reforms does the country need, and how does the Troika\u00b4s reform program differ from Syriza\u00b4s proposals?<\/b>
\nAxel Troost: These deficiencies are of crucial importance, and this is important to know in Germany and in Europe: Syriza does not want to go back to the year 2010 or 2008. Pasok and Nea Democratia spent 40 years running the country down and turning it into a system of corruption, favoritism, enormous tax evasion, illicit employment and smuggling. More than 40 per cent of employment is off the books. The smuggling of oil, fuel and tobacco alone causes the evasion of taxes to the tune of 20 billion Euros every year. These problems must be tackled. And in the past four years when Greece was governed under Troika supervision they have simply been ignored. In consultation with the Troika, the current government has indiscriminately slashed the public workforce and cut social benefits but it has done nothing to improve the efficiency of the public sector or the tax administration.
\nSyriza wants to change that, and this would generate additional resources from regular tax income that could be used to finance progressive policies. Syriza aims to put an end to austerity and to policies that place the burden of the crisis on the weakest parts of society. This goes against the grain of the cuts that Merkel, the Troika and others dictate Greece. And this is why there will be conflicts.
\nMore than a few German critics vilify Tsipras and Syriza these days. They claim that Tsipras wants to nullify the contracts with the EU and the IMF, bloat the public sector again, continue the good times on credit and return to the bad old days. Is this how Syriza program can be summarized?<\/b>
\nAxel Troost: No, not at all. I find these claims brash, especially when they come from conservative and social democratic politicians whose counterparts in Greece were instrumental in bringing about the current state of affairs. Syriza\u00b4s policy proposals are a sound program for civil society. If you take a close look at their proposals concerning tax and labor market policies, the re-structuring of social security and public administration, you will see that what they aim at is sound reforms and not a revolution. The left internationally should understand this: unlike Venezuela under Chavez, a Syriza government will not introduce large-scale nationalizations and the like. They will take immediate measures in social policies and labor market regulation, they will help deeply indebted small and medium-sized enterprises and thus re-vitalize the domestic economy, and they will try to put the state back on a solid financial footing. The rich and the big income earners are to contribute their fair share to this, which would be quite a novelty. And Syriza wants to put an end to decades of clientilism.
\nHow does Syriza aim to accomplish this?<\/b>
\nSyriza\u00b4s program rests on four pillars, the first of which is to overcome the humanitarian crisis and the fight against poverty. This includes securing general access to health care and energy, but also subsidies to tenants, food vouchers, preferential rates for public transportation and raising state pensions for seniors who currently receive less than 430 Euros per month. This part of the program has a volume of two billion Euros.
\nThe second pillar is a re-invigoration the economy. Most people don\u00b4t know that many small and medium-sized enterprises in Greece have not been able to pay their taxes and social security deductions and are now deeply indebted to the state. But these enterprises are the core and the backbone of the Greek economy. Syriza intends to set up regional arbitration boards that are to negotiate with these firms with a view to bringing them back to the market so they can process orders and employ people. In addition, the minimum wage which until 2010 was brokered between employers and unions, is to be set at 751 Euros again. And Syriza has four legal motions ready to be passed by parliament that would take back the recent restrictions of employment protection and the right to strike, and reinstate labor market and collective bargaining regulations, all of which were razed under pressure from the Troika.
\nThe third pillar is a labor market program. Syriza aims to create 300,000 jobs for the longterm unemployed. And this may sound odd in other countries: participants are to be selected by computers to avoid that the clientilist tradition is continued and only political cronies benefit.
\nThe fourth pillar \u2013 this may touch the core of your question \u2013 is the institutional and democratic re-structuring of the political system. This means that the tax administration is to be re-structured, tax investigation and new rules are to be introduced to abolish the custom that in the aftermath of every election the heads of tax offices were replaced according to political affiliation. If I were to present Syriza\u00b4s tax proposals to my colleagues from the other parties in the Bundestag\u00b4s Finance Committee, no one would be shocked or claim that Greece was now on the brink of socialism.
\nLet\u00b4s talk about the debt problem a little more. What implications do the elections in Greece have for a possible departure from austerity?<\/b>
\nThe public credits have made it possible for Greece to meet its interest payments. What the debt crisis introduced as a novelty is that debtors in order to re-finance their debt, constantly need lenders willing to loan at reasonable conditions. This makes debtors susceptible to blackmail when this follow-up financing is unavailable. As I said, Greece needs follow-up financing of 22 billion Euros this year. And it has to move the IMF and the ESM to provide this financing. This leads to a conflict over principles. In this conflict I advised Syriza to argue against the devastating austerity dictates and the Troika\u00b4s completely preposterous conditionalities firstly, and not to fight immediately for a debt cut for Greece. It will be easier to mobilize support for this demand among European progressive parties, trade unions and social movements. It is possible to organize a solidarity movement for Greece if it is aimed against austerity.
\nA departure from austerity would require critical majorities at the European level. Do you think it\u00b4s realistic that we will see those soon?<\/b>
\nThat is certainly difficult. First of all, the German government, that is Merkel and company \u2013 and company meaning in this case also the social democrats – are determined to stay their course no matter what. Others like France and Italy but also Monsieur Juncker have realized that the present course of action has led an economic catastrophe because we are now faced with a real risk of deflation and unemployment remains high. They are now trying a course that still prescribes austerity to public budgets and aims to implement further \u201creforms\u201d in the labor market and the pension systems, but also considers growth necessary.
\nHence the so called Juncker Plan which is intended to stimulate private investments. They at least recognize that austerity doesn\u00b4t work and that it wrecks the economy and society. This is a movement that we can tie in with and explain that in Greece we are not going to see major investment programs. These are not at the center of Syriza\u00b4s platform, but rather the four pillars I just sketched. And with sufficient support from the left inside and outside the parliaments of the countries of the Eurozone, we may achieve a situation where the implementation of Syriza\u00b4s policies which the majority of the Greek people want is tolerated.
\n
10 January 2015<\/span>
\nSource: Axel Troost’s website<\/link><\/span>
\nContact<\/span>: axel.troost@bundestag.de<\/link><\/span><\/p>\n

Translation from the German original by David Meienreis<\/span><\/p>\n

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\u2028Axel Troost, le porte-parole pour l’\u00e9conomie du groupe parlemenatire de Die Linke dans le Bundestag allemand a rencontr\u00e9 des dirigeants politiques de premier plan de Syriza. Dans cet entretien, il explique pourquoi une diminution de la dette n’est pas un probl\u00e8me pour l’imm\u00e9diat et comment Syriza essaie de reconstruite l’\u00c9tat grec jusqu’ici mal g\u00e9r\u00e9. Le premier d\u00e9fi, selon lui, est la fin d’une politique d’aust\u00e9rit\u00e9 d\u00e9vastatrice.\u2028<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10566,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[61],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20508","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-article"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wwwdev-transform-network-net.sociality.gr\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20508","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wwwdev-transform-network-net.sociality.gr\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wwwdev-transform-network-net.sociality.gr\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wwwdev-transform-network-net.sociality.gr\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wwwdev-transform-network-net.sociality.gr\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20508"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wwwdev-transform-network-net.sociality.gr\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20508\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":26823,"href":"https:\/\/wwwdev-transform-network-net.sociality.gr\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20508\/revisions\/26823"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wwwdev-transform-network-net.sociality.gr\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10566"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wwwdev-transform-network-net.sociality.gr\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20508"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wwwdev-transform-network-net.sociality.gr\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20508"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wwwdev-transform-network-net.sociality.gr\/fr\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20508"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}