As this is written the EUs finance ministers are preparing a second bout of talks before the EU heads meet this afternoon. The British Telegraph (12 July) reports that Germany will not accede to the Greek proposals - even should they be 'strengthened' by more austerity measures - as demanded by other countries. The Germans have apparently prepared a five year Greek exit plan from the Euro.
This blog has long argued the Syriza's original anti-austerity stand would never be agreed within the framework of the Euro. This, for example, is from February 22;
If the saga of Greece's negotiations with the EU resolve anything, it is the mastery that Germany have over the common currency. The defence of the Euro has ceased to be (if it ever was) a vaguely internationalist token of progressive, modern brotherhood across nations, it is the core of Germany's immense economic and political power. This concrete reality is an unreformable obstacle to any individual national political leadership in Europe striking an independent economic and therefore political course away from the status quo. Sooner or later, if the Greek people want to create a new sort of society, they will have to break with the Euro and its current institutions. (Reforming the EU as a whole would have to start with a revolution in Germany.) And such a realisation played no part in Syriza's struggle and therefore weakened it.
Syriza gained a big majority in Greek parliament on July 10 for its leaders' new proposals to cut 13bn Euros from government spending. But not an overall majority of Syriza MPs. The vote was not 'whipped' by the party leadership. It was a conscience vote. And a handful of Syriza MPs abstained or voted 'no' to Syriza's austerity plans. They included two ministers. Syriza - as a party - is no longer the government. If Syriza's plans (or a sterner version of them) are accepted by the EU then Syriza will not rule in Greece. Some of Syriza, in a coalition with parties that accepted the last austerity package from the troika, will govern. The next trench of laws will be dictated by the troika and will need to be passed in the coming weeks by the Greek parliament's new majority as a token of Greece's commitment to the latest austerity.
What do Syriza's main leaders think they will get from their concessions (if accepted.)? They believe that all necessary measures have to be taken to stop the collapse of the Greek banks and the loss of capital for state wages, pensions, welfare, health, investment and trade. Despite the demonstrations, the patience of the people with the euro-ration and the resounding 'no', Syriza leaders do not believe that they have any other choice when it comes to defending the Greek people from immediate financial collapse. In their book the 'no' vote failed to do what it was supposed to do. It failed to impress the leaders of Europe. The fight against austerity has its limits. The limits are that it has to win, if it is to win at all - from inside the Eurozone.
Various commentators that want to hang on to Syriza's coat tails claim that in return for these essential concessions Syriza will 'win' the argument on long term debt relief. That is just artful. The debt question was blown open by the 'no' vote (and the US State Department influence on the IMF to publish its pre-vote report which defined the Greek debt as 'unsustainable.') In other words Greece had already won the debt argument before presenting the new austerity programme. How will the people of Greece, who have fought so long and hard, who have sacrificed so much to stay with the Syriza government think? We shall see; but whatever else they think Syriza's actions must seem like snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.
What is (was and remains) the alternative? Greece should repudiate all debts and print its own currency. To prevent hyper inflation the government needs to appropriate major assets, companies and personal wealth above certain limits, and base the new currency on these assets. (As Germany did successfully in the late 1920s.) Major loans should be launched from Russia and China. They will be high interest because of the repudiation, but again can be offset against possible interests in portage and transport held by both countries. This will produce convulsions in Greece and across Europe and the Eurozone in particular. Fear and greed by the world's rulers will create a major drive to stabilise the system which Greece might also exploit. In Greece itself the mass movement of the people will need to act to organise and defend and stabilise daily life and security. The Greek people, when in action, are the most politically and economically and socially conscious people in Europe and possibly in the world. They can point the way to a different future. In the course of such endeavour they would win the support of the ordinary people everywhere.
If the Syriza leaders make their austerity deal with the EU, what should the international solidarity movement do? That movement is based in supporting all those who fight for all the people against austerity, not any particular governments. The Solidarity (not charity) movement in Greece and the battle with austerity continues and must be supported more than ever, including against the new austerity measures if agreed by the EU.
The political regroupment in the Greek parliament, if the austerity deal is accepted by the EU, will, in due course, also pull together those that would combat the new austerity laws in the European and the Greek parliament. Their future, and the future of Greece, would now depend on the movement of the Greek people and their allies across the world.
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