By Stathis Kouvelakis

There is a pervading feeling that, despite its tactical moves, the current government is simply buying time and that it will be difficult to avoid the ballot box when the time comes to elect a president. This prospect (of elections) is tantamount to a Syriza victory. The time of truth then is approaching and everyone fully understands that, not only the country’s future course, but to a decisive degree, the power relationships in Europe are contingent on the outcome of a leftist government project.

Given the circumstances, a realistic assessment of the power relationships in Europe is of vital importance. Citing ‘realism’ in politics is usually identified with calls for moderation and a search for ‘middle solutions’. In this case, realism is a variation of the management of an existing situation, which seems like a ‘safe’ choice that safeguards against adventures and leaps into the void.

However, there are situations where precisely this type of realism is unfeasible and condemned to failure. Instead of stabilising, it accentuates existing contradictions and leads to uncontrollable developments, far worse than the ones it was trying to avoid. This is symptomatic of the circumstances defining a deep crisis: it makes innovation mandatory. The issue at stake is what type of innovation it will be and in which direction it will push.

Greece, along with other countries on the Eurozone’s periphery, has been going through such a situation for the past four years, while even in some of the larger countries of the European centre (France and Italy), the tone is being set by an explosive mix of protracted financial withering, social decay and rampant political instability.

In conditions where the traditional political staff appears increasingly dispensable, the question that comes to mind concerns the type of strategy, condensed at a European level within the EU, which lies behind the formulation and coordination of policies applied on a national level- of course this has been done without even the slightest democratic legitimisation.

The answer was obvious: the solution was to further tighten the neoliberal corset which had been fostered by conditions in Europe and codified shortly before the outbreak of the crisis (1997) in the notorious agreement for stability and growth.

The targets to maintain the public deficit at 3% and the public debt at 60% of GDP, that just three of the EU’s 28 countries adhere to, are no longer deemed adequate. The review of the stability and development agreement in December 2011 – with the Sixpack and the new Fiscal Stability Treaty – which was enforced in January 2013, has fostered a draconian framework of ‘austerity to perpetuity’ for all of the EU. The aim now is balanced budgets (‘the golden rule’) and the commitment to payoff at least one twentieth of the public debt when that suprasses 60% of GDP and until it gets down to that level.

To enforce this framework, a mechanism has been set up to monitor and coerce member states. This involves: the Commission, to which the state budgets are submitted for approval. The European Council which decides upon sanctions against those countries in violation of the rules (in other words, fines can reach to 0.2% of GDP) and the European court, which also has the power to impose similar sanctions.  

The icing on the cake is the Two-Pack rule which came into force in May 2013 and stipulates that all member-states who were in a borrowing programme on 30.5.2013, will move to a post-programme regime of ‘enhanced monitoring’ until 75% of their debt is paid off.

This means the creation of a mechanism similar to that of the well known Memorandums (the obligation to sign a memorandum of macro-economic adaptation, the monitoring of the fiscal situation through evaluations every four months, the commitment to impose new ‘measures’ if they are deemed necessary by the evaluation etc.

Fundamental realism dictates that this constantly deteriorating framework is incompatible with the aim of reaching basic social targets – as the ones outlined by the president of Syriza at the Thessaloniki International Trade Fair. Conflict is therefore unavoidable. This was demonstrated by the way in which the French Prime Minister Manuel Valls was dismissed when he went to Berlin to ‘negotiate’ the impossible task of reducing budget deficits to 3% of GDP. And this happened despite the unprecedented cuts programme which his government had just imposed and the firing of his finance minister, who had dared to dispute austerity and German dominance within the EU.

Realism here, means that Greek society and tomorrow’s leadership must calmly, but also resolutely, prepare in a multifaceted way for a relentless stand-off with the dominant powers in Europe. A contest which undoubtedly will have the backing of the progressive countries in Europe and future imitators.

This article was originally published in Eleftherotypia newspaper (link in Greek) and was translated with the author's permission.