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The paper presents Greek primary education stakeholders' views regarding their quality of life and EU-related issues before and during the euro crisis. The study took place in 2016, and the population was primary education teachers and parents of Eastern Macedonia and Thrace region. Respondents answered sets of questions for two different years: 2009, before austerity measures were applied, and 2016, during the crisis. Responses denote dissatisfaction with their quality of life and the EU in 2016. The findings show significant shifts of views between 2009 and 2016 regarding the institution of the EU, the euro, the relationship of Greece with the EU and European citizenship. 2016 statements reveal increased euroscepticism in teachers and parents' views and a large proportion of undecided respondents. However, it seems that more respondents adopt a pro-European attitude regarding the common future of Greece and the EU in 2016. All in all, findings show that, in 2016, respondents are divided into pro-European and eurosceptic, which denotes diffuse attitudes towards the European construct and weak identification with European citizenship. Change during crisis can serve as an opportunity for social innovations and education initiatives that will restore trust on the institution of the EU. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the reasoning lines in PM Alexis Tsipras' political discourse in critical moments of SYRIZA's tenure as the ruling party in Greece. Adopting a CDS perspective, we zoom in on the patterns that underlie the (de)legitimization of the crisis-ridden EU in three seminal speeches by PM Tsipras during the Greek/EU financial crisis. To this end, we integrate systemic-functional and cognitive linguistic tools with a view to scrutinizing representational meaning, before turning to employ the notions of endoxon and topos/locus as a means of studying the particular argumentative inferences, triggered by the respective discursive representations. Through this lens, we show how the overall argumentation can be seen as supporting the (de-)legitimation of dominant EU austerity perspectives while transforming SYRIZA into a pro-austerity voice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Maritime transportation constitutes a dynamic Greek economic sector. Greece accounted for 25% of the Maritime Passenger Traffic (MPT) in the European Union in 2007. However, due to the economic recession since 2009, maritime passenger transportation has been facing increasing fuel prices along with declining demand. In this paper, we develop transfer function models, including macroeconomic indicators, for forecasting the coastal and the Adriatic MPT in Greek ports. The majority of the MPT models include the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) as an explanatory variable, reflecting the financial impact on maritime flows. Although the employment and the economic crisis dummy are also used as explanatory variables, the unemployment and the oil price do not affect MPT. The coastal traffic models are generally more consistent when the seasonality trend is eliminated, while the international traffic models perform better when the inherent seasonality is considered. This first effort contributes toward filling the gap of MPT forecasting models for supporting policy-making on maritime transportation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper argues that Syriza has remained faithful to its distinct form of left Europeanism in the post-crisis era. It aims at testing the relative importance of four factors: the party’s Eurocommunist heritage, its ideological pillars, its internal balance and party factionalism, and its transnational affiliations. In order to assess their importance, the present paper draws from on-going research applying a theoretical framework that combines the work of Johansson and Raunio (2001) with Charalambous’ (2013) communist dilemma. While the former framework provides us with the required areas of investigation, the latter focuses on the party’s mechanisms of altering salience levels in respect to its transnational affiliations. It thus pinpoints an additional level of analysis that highlights the importance of the Party of the European Left for Syriza’s unaltered stance towards the European edifice, at least for the party’s Unitary Platform that witnessed the Left Platform’s withdrawal from Syriza following Syriza’s ‘capitulation’ in July 2015. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Greece has suffered the worst from the late 2000s global financial crisis. Despite the completion of the economic adjustment program the rate of recovery in Greece is still weak. The liquidity constraints in the Greek economy imply that the investment shock, which will accelerate its recovery rate, will be an outcome of investment inflows by privatizations and/or other opportunities arising to foreign investors (inward FDI) due to the devaluation of the assets in Greece caused by the crisis. However, the level of attracted by the Greek economy has always been well below the European Union average. This paper investigates the factors favoring inward FDI in Greece after the crisis. A survey is made by the use of a questionnaire for the collection of primary data on the activity of multinationals in Greece and non-parametric methods are used for investigating the attractiveness of the Greek market and the decision to invest. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The world is currently in the throes of a sovereign debt crisis, which in its enormity is comparable to the Latin American crisis, which occurred two decades ago. The situation currently seems to be less toxic than a few months back when it appeared as though a real impasse had been reached. This improvement is mostly on the back of extraordinary coordinated efforts undertaken by the EU as a whole in bailing out whole countries (eg Greece) and also a tacit, though rather late, acknowledgment of the fact that severe consolidation measures were on the cards if any of the peripheral economies were to survive. The paper analyses the fiscal health of the two distinct blocs, which make up the contours of the world now, viz. the developed and the emerging market economies. A sample of both these segments is studied and comment attempted on their relative vulnerability and their future debt trajectory. This issue assumes even greater significance in light of the fact that these countries are currently going through a very fragile economic phase and severe government contraction may have ramifications for recovery in the region. To better address this a fiscal vulnerability index is constructed and also use is made of interest rate-growth differentials to analyse the sustainability question. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The financial crisis of 2007-2009 led to a renewed increase in government deficits and debts in many EU countries, causing a full-fledged fiscal crisis in Greece and severe fiscal pressures in other euro-area countries. This has prompted a series of proposals for improving the fiscal framework of the European Monetary Union, the Excessive Deficit Procedure and the Stability and Growth Pact. The first part of this paper reviews the main properties and developments of that framework until 2007. On that basis, it discusses the recent proposals for reform, which range from marginal improvements of the existing framework to the introduction of an explicit framework for managing fiscal crises in the member states, and the expansion of the scope of policy coordination to address macro economic imbalances and the competitiveness of the member states. We find the proposal of a mechanism for dealing with government default most useful. Attempts to suppress current account imbalances and to target national competitiveness positions would most likely result in serious economic losses and do damage to the internal market of the EU. This would increase the wedge between members and non-members of the euro area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On July 5, 2015, Greek voters were asked whether to approve or reject the terms of an austerity program offered by the European Union (EU) to resolve an ongoing financial crisis. With a turnout rate of 62.5% overall, 61.3% of Greeks voted 'no.' While a majority of voters in every district opposed the bailout's terms, the margin against the proposed austerity measures ranged from 51.2% in Lakonias to 73.8% in Chanion. This paper presents empirical evidence on the determinants of the 'no' vote across Greece's 56 electoral districts. Our analysis is grounded in public choice theories of why large numbers of people turn out to vote in mass elections. In addition to controlling for standard 'instrumental' vote motives, we ask whether political party labels, which serve as summary measures of partisan positioning, and party platforms, which express partisan preferences on ballot questions, are salient in determining electoral outcomes. Holding constant the unemployment rate and average voter age (at the regional level) and the fraction of young people casting ballots for the first time on July 5, 2015 (at the district level), we find that the percentage of 'no' votes was reduced significantly by voter support for Greece's leading pro-austerity party (New Democracy) in the previous nationwide election held in January 2015. In contrast, voter support in January for the anti-austerity party (Syriza), led by sitting Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras, had no measurable impact on July's referendum results. This finding offers support for both instrumental and expressive theories of voting and bolsters the claim that political parties can shape electoral outcomes on questions decided by an institution of direct democracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the evolution of brewing during the financial crisis on the basis of four countries, Cyprus, Greece, Ireland and Portugal. These countries asked for financial assistance and imposed restructuring programs that exacerbated the financial crisis. The examined period is extended from 2008 to 2017 and it is a period during which the adjustment programs were applied to these countries. The purpose of this article is to see if during the crisis an industry can have growth prospects. This search is based on the fact that during the crisis some countries or sectors or products can perform better than the whole. The examination was based on a comparative analysis between the four countries but also with the European Union countries considered as a whole. The paper focused on the comparative evolution regarding production, consumption, number of breweries and microbreweries and direct employment. The results showed that brewery production in the four countries was affected by the country's GDP growth. However it increased particularly in the second half of the period considered. This evolution was positively affected by the growth of tourism, especially in Greece and Portugal. The creation of breweries by small producers, especially in the second half of the period, is characteristic of the brewery's growth. New microbreweries have helped to create new jobs in countries with higher unemployment than the EU as a whole. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose – This study aims to investigate the recent corporate governance (CG) developments in Greece. The recent economic crisis of Greece has caused very high mobility, both at a state level by imposing a new Greek regulation in capital market and at a level of associations in Greece by recommending new voluntary codes on CG. Both the new economic conditions in the world economy after the global financial crisis of 2007-2010 and the 2009 economic crisis in Greece provide a valuable opportunity to study the CG and regulatory aspects of CG in Greece. Design/methodology/approach – This study has three objectives, namely, to present the reasons which lead the business community in Greece to reconsider existing CG practices and outline the main aspects; to locate the current CG developments and trends in Greece in the last decade (2002-2011), especially in the light of the recent debate between various voluntary codes that have lately been proposed; and, finally, to highlight the efforts that have been made so far by companies to comply with the expanding body of CG best practices and Greek legislation. Findings – The main finding is that the development of regulatory reforms and practices on CG is a process based on the European Union directives. Practical implications – The improvement of legal, institutional and regulatory framework of CG in Greece can attract new investors. Originality/value – This paper re-examines the value of CG in Greece under the new economic conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Following a radical political economy, this paper offers a distinctive account of the crisis of the Greek economy. The public debt crisis of Greece is better understood when positioned within the neoliberal turn of global capitalism, which has shaped the prevailing European Monetary Union (EMU), and under the severe negative impacts of the current international crisis on weaker economies. However, the Greek debt crisis is deeply rooted in the unsettled capitalist development of the Greek economy and in its troubled integration in the European Union and global markets, manifest in the country's declining competitiveness. The austerity program currently implemented will lock the country into a deadly spiral of debt deflation. Greece needs a radical break from uneven and combined capitalist development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of International Relations / Uluslararasi Iliskiler is the property of International Relations Council and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

Copyright of International Relations / Uluslararasi Iliskiler is the property of International Relations Council and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

EMU structural asymmetries contributed directly to both procyclical debt-fuelled growth pre-crisis and sharply recessionary adjustment post-crisis. Greece's fiscal and debt crisis represented an 'orthodox' national failure inside EMU, yet the underlying reason for the Euro-Area financial crisis was external imbalances generated by EMU asymmetries. Exclusive reliance on internal devaluation, lack of a Euro-Area countercyclical response, and financial fragmentation, all accentuated the cost of asymmetric adjustment to crisis. The asymmetric EMU institutional framework also necessitated a greater reliance on intergovernmental activism to engineer ad hoc interventions, at the expense of both the Community method and democratic procedure. Financial markets mispriced sovereign risk, failing to counterbalance EMU asymmetries. The Greek crisis prompted the Euro Area to develop stronger policies and institutions and to eschew an extreme existential challenge. EMU is stronger at 20, yet with persisting asymmetries, old and new, and insufficiently equipped to face the next major crisis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract Almost for a decade now, Greece has experienced a deep economic crisis. According to the theory of economic growth, as well as the experience of other countries, the prioritization of knowledge-intensive activities might be a useful tool for growing the economy. Mass media discourse exerts influence on the public sphere and popular opinion, but in most of cases, articles dealing with research, technology, and innovation (RTI) seem to have been focused—before and after the crisis's onset—mainly on failures of the national RTI system, without considering RTI as a potential growth factor. However, the RTI sector has gained some ground in the national policy agenda, especially in terms of policy planning for 2020. It seems, though, that this should be attributed to the limited space for political maneuver that Greek governments have at their disposal to exit the crisis, which is directly related to the new policy framework advanced by the EU's cohesion policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The euro crisis and a new debate about immigration in Europe have undermined support for the EU while the unsolved Greek debt problems as well as the ECB's quantitative easing policy have raised new crucial policy issues. It is necessary to identify the key issues of Eurozone stabilization and to clarify the economic benefits from monetary integration. As regards the economic welfare analysis of the euro, the new model presented shows the benefits of the euro's reserve currency position, namely in the framework of a neoclassical growth model with seigniorage based on international reserve holdings. Discounted benefits are about 10,000 € per capita in a stable Euro area. Thus the benefits are bigger than often considered, at the same time one may raise the question of whether the existing institutional setting of the Eurozone is sufficient for achieving long-term stability and prosperity. As regards the envisaged third rescue package for Greece it is emphasized that a haircut of public creditors along with adoption of a Greek capital levy plus privatization efforts are required to achieve debt sustainability and growth. The traditional interpretation of subsidiarity in the EU is found to be misleading and the vertical division of politics is destabilizing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article gives an outline of the failed strategy followed by the Greek government under Alexis Tsipras during the six-month negotiations with Greece's creditors (January-July 2015). It is argued that Mr. Tsipras' government had no concrete plan during these negotiations and that its moves were largely based on a combination of ignorance, misconceptions, and wishful thinking. The prolongation of negotiations was made at the expense of creating huge problems for the Greek economy and making the Greek position worsen with each passing day. The final blow was the proclamation of the Greek referendum which was held on 5 July 2015. Because of this failed strategy, Greece was found at the edge of default and exit from the Eurozone, a development which was avoided literally at the last moment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The capitulation of Syriza could have been anticipated. They had given assurances to the ruling class in the years before assuming power in Greece. Capitulation was inscribed in the main strategic line officially declared and followed consistently by Syriza: ‘Neither break nor surrender [to the EU, ECB and the IMF] but an honest compromise'. They expected to implement a mild Keynesian policy, a policy that is an illusion in the contemporary crisis of capitalism.They asked for a class peace in conditions of open class war.Austerity is a means of control under conditions when the neoliberal strategy has failed and the globalization promoted by finance capital has imploded. The sinister story of the three Memoranda imposed in Greece in the last five years abolish, in form and in essence, all economic and legislative sovereignty from the Greek State. It takes into its extremes a long history of debts, defaults, foreign political interference and economic dependence of the country. The resistance of the population is a political time-bomb that Capital's institutions cannot defuse. In the current world crisis of global capitalismit is not only the Greek link that has been broken in 2009–2010 but the European chain itself, without meaning by this its automatic collapse.Nothing can be the same in the euro-zone, in the EU, and globally after the Greek bankruptcy. Greece as ‘Europe's failed state in waiting' (Larry Summersdixit) is situated in the crossroads of all international contradiction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Copyright of Politics & Policy is the property of Wiley-Blackwell and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This abstract may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full abstract. (Copyright applies to all Abstracts.)

The European Union has been in its biggest ever crisis since the onset of the Greek sovereign debt crisis in 2010. Beyond the political and economic dimensions, the crisis has also sparked discussions about Germany's European identity. Some scholars have argued that Germany's behavior in the crisis signals a continuation of the process of 'normalization' of its European identity toward a stronger articulation of national identity and interests, that it has 'fallen out of love' with Europe. This article will seek to reassess these claims, drawing on detailed analysis of political and media discourse in Germany-from political speeches through to both broadsheet and tabloid newspapers. It will argue that the crisis is understood broadly as a European crisis in Germany, where the original values of European integration are at stake. Furthermore, the crisis is debated through the lens of European solidarity, albeit with a particular German flavor of solidarity that draws on the economic tradition of ordoliberalism. Rather than strengthening expressions of national identity, this has resulted in the emergence of a new northern European identity in contrast to Greece or 'southern Europe.' [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article investigates the discursive framework of the Greek debt crisis in an attempt to rethink the characterization of the European Union as a post-modern, post-national polity. By scrutinizing speculative speeches delivered by the EU’s prominent politicians, this study argues that Greece is hybridized and constructed as a peripheral member of the EU in-group, part of the in-group, yet further away from the core. Politics of representation surrounding the current crisis show us that the EU is hardly constructed in a post-national/post-modern way. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

During the 2000s, the European Union (EU) and the euro zone provided anchors for regional integration in South-East Europe including the Western Balkans. Today’s crisis has called into question the credibility but not the desirability of that framework, and regional actors can still mobilize building blocks forged in the past decade for much needed bottom-up reforms. The process could be galvanized by a regional insider with economic and political capital. With Greece absorbed in its own crisis, Turkey is a candidate for such a role. Assessing Ankara’s capacity to drive change in the region vis-à-vis the debate over its once touted, apparently moribund ‘zero-problems-with-neighbours’ policy, we argue that Turkey’s most sustained foreign policy success has been in the Western Balkans. This is because its approach complement the soft instrument legacies of the earlier EU framework for regional integration. As such, if Ankara abandons its own commitment to economic and political liberalization, it may forfeit its potential to serve as a leader in the region. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The sovereign debt crisis and economic collapse of Greece is not a national exception. The eurozone and the entire EU are now the epicenter of the world capitalist crisis that exploded in 2007. Greece is the weakest link of the European chain that is threatened to break apart with enormous consequences for the world economy. All the interventions by the EU led by Germany, by the European Central Bank and the IMF were socially disastrous and economically totally inefficient. The second bailout of Greece in February 2012 has been met with a powerful resistance by the Greek popular masses and has no more chances to succeed than the previous one. No EU financial mechanism or ‘firewall’ is capable of preventing the contagion, which involves now not only small peripheral countries like Portugal or Ireland but the third and fourth biggest European economies, Italy and Spain, and starts to hit the ‘hard core’ of the EU. The crisis manifests the historical decline of capitalism in its birthplace, the European Continent, as well as the decline of bourgeois democracy. A new era of historical social confrontations has opened where the question of political power and of the future of Europe has been explicitly posed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article offers information on several causes of the financial debt crisis faced by Greece in 2010, which includes economic mismanagement, careless spending, and corruption. It overviews the history of Greek membership in the European Union (EU) and analyzes the significance and role of Euro in the EU community. It informs that by prescribing a procedure, the Exit Clause in the Lisbon Treaty can save Greece from withdrawing from the EU.

The 2010 Greek financial crisis marks an important chapter in an era where the underlying maneuvers of private financial entities figure centrally in the wherewithal of Western nation states. Utilizing framing research, this study examines representation of the Greek crisis by US news media from December 2009 to July 2010. In contrast to the incident's coverage in the European and business press initially attributing the crisis to speculation and the manipulation of Greek debt, major US news media presented the event through specific event-driven frames that obscured knowledge of deeper causes. By drawing attention to dramatic events in Athens and the American stock markets, US outlets presented the financial crisis in narrow terms that blamed the event on alleged character flaws and ineptitudes of a nation and its people. This reportage legitimized proposals of economic austerity as reparation. In the midst of excessive business and financial-related information, the ability of US journalism to explain how and for whom transnational economic processes proceed remains provisional. Journalism prompting public discourse on such dynamics is crucial at present as the formulas hastening the Greek crisis now threaten industrialized countries throughout the West. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, we investigate the convergence process within the European Union. More particularly, we study the convergence process of the new entrants from Central and Eastern Europe and of the 15 Western countries between 1990 and 2007. Applying a panel approach to the convergence equation derived from the Solow model, we show that new entrants and former members of the European Union can be seen as belonging to different groups of convergence. The existence of heterogeneity in the European Union or the Eurozone might affect their stability as the recent Greece's sovereign debt crisis illustrates it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Twenty years after the beginning of the implementation of EU Cohesion Policy in Greece in the current programming period, 2007–13, for the first time Greek regions have been excluded from Objective 1 ‘Convergence’, a situation that it seems will continue in the next period. As it appears, Cohesion Policy has helped the country and its regions to converge to the European average. However, at an intra-national level, it seems that this is not the case, since internal inter-regional disparities appear to have increased in recent years. To these developments should be added the impact of the economic crisis, which according to early indications has negative repercussions for almost all Greek regions, with varying levels of intensity. These findings, combined with the constantly deteriorating economic situation at national and regional level, sustain the argument that Cohesion Policy will continue to be one of the most important policies of the EU and should constitute a powerful tool against the crisis and its regional dimensions. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The Greek sovereign debt crisis of 2010 exposed the weaknesses of governance of both the 'euro area' and of Greece. Successive governments in Athens had failed to overcome endemic problems of low competitiveness, trade and investment imbalances, and fiscal mismanagement placing the economy in a vulnerable international position. Once the market crisis erupted, the European Union's Council of Ministers and the European Central Bank failed to provide a timely and effective response. The implications are threefold: the constraints on domestic reform proved immutable to EU stimuli; the 'euro' is more vulnerable to crisis than previously acknowledged; and the early discussion on 'euro' governance reform suggests that its underlying philosophy has not shifted significantly towards more effective 'economic governance'. This article explores the antecedents and management of the crisis and assesses the outcome. At the EU level, a paradox was evident in the denial of agency and resources that might limit the obligation of states to rescue an errant peer. Domestically, within Greece, the unprecedented external monitoring and policing of its economy - though matched by some initial successes - raises in the longer term sensitive issues of legitimacy and governability, with uncertain prospects for avoiding further crises. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Current developments in Greece make clear that the rules of the European Stability and Growth Pact (SGP) were neither strict enough nor enforced strictly enough. To deal with the ongoing exit from the fiscal crisis and its related phenomena, we propose a new framework for fiscal policy consolidation in Europe. The centrepiece is a European Consolidation Pact to supplement the SGP which would supply loan guarantees in exchange for a fee and stricter budget consolidation measures. The new framework also spells out the details of an orderly government default. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]