Reading Varoufakis: Frustrated Strategist of Greek Financial Deterrence (click here for the original site)
by Adam Tooze
Adam Tooze holds the Shelby Cullom Davis chair of History at Columbia University and serves as Director of the European Institute. He is currently at work on a history of the global financial crisis 2008-2018, which will appear in time for the anniversary in September 2018.
Γιατί οι Βρετανοί θα έπρεπε να συμβουλευτούν τον πρώην Υπουργό Οικονομικών της Ελλάδας, για να χαράξουν στρατηγική στο παζάρι με την ΕΕ. Η ανάγκη για Plan B του Γιάνη Βαρουφάκη. Γράφει ο Βόλφγκανγκ Μουνχάου.
του Wolfgang Münchau
This is a superbly written account of the struggle to alleviate the austerity imposed upon the Greek people by the eurozone. Greece, argues Varoufakis, has been put in a debtors’ prison and robbed of autonomy and dignity for the indefinite future. Critics would argue that he failed as finance minister in 2015 because he was insufficiently politic. More plausibly, he could never have succeeded, such were the vested interests arrayed against him. This outcome was — and is — a tragedy, because he was — and is — right. The bulk of Greek debt should indeed be cancelled outright.
Yesterday, the Eurogroup came up with another fudge, another extend-and-pretend loan tranche, for Greece. It is, as this annotated version of the Eurogroup statement explains, a further boost to Greece’s never-ending crisis. Greece’s creditors, the EU and the IMF, are refusing even to discuss Greece’s recovery, Greece’s escape from debtor’s prison.
What happens when you take on the establishment? In this blistering, personal account, Yanis Varoufakis blows the lid on Europe’s hidden agenda and exposes what actually goes on in its corridors of power.
ATHENS – On March 25, Europe’s leaders convened in the birthplace of the “European project” to celebrate the 60th anniversary of the Treaty of Rome. But what exactly was there to celebrate?
Were they reveling in Europe’s disintegration, which they now call “multi-speed” or “variable geometry” Europe? Or were they there to applaud their business-as-usual approach to every crisis – an approach that has fanned the flames of xenophobic nationalism throughout the European Union?
Anyone who doubted that the IMF is in deep trouble over its inane involvement in the toxic Greek bailout, and Berlin’s policy of extending Greece’s insolvency ad infinitum while the country’s social economy shrinks, should now have no more doubts. Congressman Bill Huizenga (R-MI), a senior member of the House Financial Services Committee, yesterday introduced the IMF Reform and Integrity Act, which would require the U.S. to oppose the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) co-financing of a third Greek bailout with the European Stability Mechanism.
