Below you'll find a list of all posts that have been tagged as “Greece”
There’s at least one reason we should be grateful to the Greek people for exposing the European Union’s democratic dysfunction this summer: Their recent referendum showed that majority rule is impossible in a multinational union. Creating the illusion of democratic decisions within the EU, even when there is no clear will among the member states, has returned like a boomerang …
Late last week, economic journalist Paul Mason, whose Channel 4 blog has been one of the best English-language sources for making sense of the ongoing Greek crisis, published an excerpt from his forthcoming book in The Guardian. It announces that the end of capitalism has begun and that (spoiler) it doesn’t look how we thought it might. The 20th century …
Longtime critic of the Eurozone’s destructive commitment to austerity, Italian comedian-turned-political activist Beppe Grillo has launched what one news outlet called a “full-throated attack” on the single currency, saying his country should throw off that “anti-democratic straitjacket” by nationalizing its banks and taking a stronger stance against the demands of elite financial interests. Grillo, who the Guardian says “transformed Italian …
Like many states in crisis before it, Ukraine serves as a perfect opportunity for neoliberal transformation. While a crisis of faith, of sorts, has resounded in western discourse on the economic effectiveness of austerity, this scepticism, rather ironically, dissipates when you cross over into the remnants of the Iron Curtain. Neoliberalism’s flagellants reside east of the Elbe. There, ideological purity …
China’s stock market suffered its biggest one-day sell-off since 2007 on Monday, with share values plunging by more than 8.5 percent. Panic selling triggered the automatic suspension of trading for over 1,000 companies, leading Chinese financial authorities to announce a new round of share purchases in an attempt to stop the rout. However, Chinese stock indexes continued to fall in …
After being elected in January, Prime Minister Tsipras and his Finance Minister Varoufakis negotiated with the EU commission, the ECB and the IMF for almost five months. While fulfilling almost all of their financial demands, Syriza’s leaders openly criticized the “institutions” for their tough bargaining and resisted some of their harshest measures. At the beginning of July, the Troika tightened …
On Thursday, Amazon, the online retail giant, announced that, contrary to analysts’ predictions and after months of financial losses, it had turned a profit in the second quarter. The stock market responded with euphoria. Amazon’s share price surged by 18 percent in a single day, adding $40 billion to the company’s market capitalization. With 154,000 employees, Amazon overnight became the …
It isn’t just the Greeks, or the Cypriots, or the Irish, or the Icelanders suffering the price of financial terrorism – the extractive demands of global central banks on display in Greece are actively draining the marrow of impoverished communities the world over. Ellen speaks with author and expert Stephen Lendman about the financial powers forcibly overruling Greek democracy, and their intentions to do so everywhere. Co-host Walt McRee speaks with an official of one California county government pushing back against convicted bank felons, and later discusses new human evolutionary awareness about our relationship with money with philosopher Robert Bows. And Matt Stannard discusses our myths about “the Great American Entrepreneur” on the Public Banking Report.
The Italian philosopher Giorgio Agamben said in an interview that “thought is the courage of hopelessness” – an insight which is especially pertinent for our historical moment when even the most pessimist diagnostics as a rule finishes with an uplifting hint at some version of the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel. The true courage is not to imagine an …
In his first international television interview since stepping down from his post as Greek Finance Minister, Yanis Varoufakis told CNN‘s Christiane Amanpour on Monday that European lenders had forced his government to make a choice between “suicide or execution.” After five months of rigorous negotiations, the outspoken Varoufakis stepped down from his post the night of the Greek referendum. And despite voting against the …
