Tsipras and Varoufakis claimed that they could use the Greek people’s support in elections and the referendum to increase their bargaining power in an intergovernmental forum. They discovered that there was no truth in this claim. They fatally misunderstood the nature of the Eurozone and the EU. These are not institutions in which different sovereign nations reach a compromise on their interests, as they erroneously believed going into the negotiations. They are institutions in which national governments agree to subordinate their national will and interest to a set of technical rules dictated by market imperatives. As Syriza discovered, this institutionalized self-limitation of national sovereignty by European governmental elites is implacably hostile to the idea that policy should be accountable to electoral majorities. The essence of the Eurozone and the EU is anti-democratic.Like I've been saying, capitalism (economic liberalism) and democracy (social and political liberalism) are antithetical. There is a contradiction at the heart of liberalism making it impossible to reconcile international economic liberalism, national sovereignty, and democratic governance without limitation.
thecurrentmoment
The Grand Old Duke of Athens
Peter Ramsay
4 comments:
Spot on.
I usually counter anti-socialism rants with "you must have some degree of socialism to have a democracy". Unfortunately, the ranter is usually too stupid to understand my point.
The negotiations didn’t break down because of an unbridgeable gap between ... the German ‘Ordoliberalism’ of Schäuble and Djisselbloem and Greek-style Marxism of Varoufakis and Tsipras. This gap has never existed. They broke down because Varoufakis repeatedly breached the Eurogroup’s etiquette. In doing so, he challenged the very foundations of the eurozone’s mode of governance.
The Eurogroup is not a democratic institution. Though it is made up of finance ministers from democratically elected governments, these ministers meet as individuals who are there on the assumption that they will build consensus, make compromises, and reach agreements amongst themselves.
The etiquette of the Eurogroup is that one leaves one’s national interests at the door. Relations are more personal than political. Ideologies and grand statements of political doctrine have no place in the body’s deliberations....
The hostility towards Varoufakis stems from his breaking of all of these rules. He refused to play the Eurogroup game....
At the heart of the matter is how Varoufakis presented his demands. Thinking of himself as a representative of the Greek people, he made his wishes public, and when in the Eurogroup, he maintained the same stance – changes in views could not be informally agreed around a table but had to be taken back to Athens and argued for, in cabinet and with the Syriza party.
It was this breach of etiquette that made agreement impossible. Creative solutions can usually be found in the EU. It is, after all, a machine built on compromise. But when someone violates the very rules of the game, nothing can be done. Varoufakis exposed the Eurogroup as a private club where relations between individuals matter more than relations between the populations that are formerly being represented around the table. For that, he – and Greece – must now be punished.
The Real Sins of Varoufakis -- by Christopher Bickerton
https://thecurrentmoment.wordpress.com/2015/07/09/the-real-sins-of-varoufakis/
And on the German economic mindset:
Of rules and order
German ordoliberalism has had a big influence on policy during the euro crisis
“NO MATTER what the topic, it’s four to one against me,” laments Peter Bofinger, one of the five members of Germany’s Council of Economic Experts, which advises the government. The other four, he says, consider deficits and debt bad, oppose the European Central Bank’s quantitative easing as “monetary meddling” and believe austerity is the answer to the euro crisis. In Germany, says Mr Bofinger, “I’m the last Keynesian—and I feel like the last Mohican.”
The relationship between Mr Bofinger and his colleagues mirrors the gap that exists between German and Anglo-Saxon (or Latin) views of economics. German thinking on economics has long differed from the mainstream in other countries, including other euro-zone members. In the past six years of euro crisis, the gap has become larger, more visible and more controversial. Sebastian Dullien of the European Council on Foreign Relations, a think-tank, says that this amounts to a “decoupling” of Germany from the rest of the world....
http://www.economist.com/news/europe/21650565-german-ordoliberalism-has-had-big-influence-policy-during-euro-crisis-rules-and-order
Post a Comment