Abstract
The institutional transformations in the Greek state should be seen in the light of wider—indeed global—changes in the nature of the state. It is a process that was initiated many years ago: Poulantzas called it authoritarian statism. It has to do with limiting the remit of representative institutions. The beginning of the new century was marked by the advent of a special kind of authoritarian statism, the regime of exceptional regulation. The assumption is that the “normal” operation of the state creates pathogens (e.g. economic crises and terrorism) justifying its suspension through even greater restrictions on relations of representation and reinforcement of institutions inaccessible to popular control. In Europe the most significant element in this process has been the latest European Union (EU) and Economic Monetary Union (EMU) agreements. Greece is the most representative example, given that a number of internal government functions have passed into the jurisdiction of lenders. It is this that has led to Greece being described as a quasi-protectorate.
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- 1.
On the subject of these “loopholes” Poulantzas says: “The State often transgresses law-rules of its own making by acting without reference to the law, but also by acting directly against it. It is very discursiveness, each juridical system allows the Power-State to disregard its own, laws and even enters an appropriate variable in the rules of the game that it organizes. This is called the higher interests of the State (raison d’Etat)—which, strictly speaking, entails both that legality is always compensated by illegalities ‘on the side’, and that state illegality is always inscribed in the legality which it institutes … Every juridical system includes illegality in the additional sense that gaps, blanks or ‘loopholes’ form an integral part of its discourse. It is a question here not merely of oversights or blind-spots arising out of the ideological operation of concealment underlying the legal order, but of express devices that allow the law to be breached … The state-institutional structure is always organized in such a way that both the State and the dominant classes operate at once in accordance with the law and against the law … illegality and legality are themselves part of one and the same institutional structure” (Poulantzas 1980: 84–85).
- 2.
For Greece, it is indicative that the number of people in the security forces rose from 30,000 in 1974 (1.03% of Labour Force) to 150,000 in 2013 (3.1% of Labour Force).
- 3.
And as Burgi aptly observes, the question is shifting from what policies are effective in addressing unemployment and poverty to what the threshold is for a minimal social protection network (Burgi 2014: 23).
- 4.
In the conclusions of the European Council of March 24 and 25, 2011, inter alia, it says: “These new commitments will thereafter be included in the National Reform and Stability Programmes and be subject to the regular surveillance framework, with a strong central role for the Commission in the monitoring of the implementation of the commitments, and the involvement of all the relevant formations of the Council and the Eurogroup … Each year, concrete national commitments will be undertaken by each Head of State or Government … Member States commit to consult their partners on each major economic reform having potential spillover effects before its adoption … Progress will be assessed on the basis of wage and productivity developments and competitiveness adjustment needs … Each country will be responsible for the specific policy actions it chooses to foster competitiveness, but the following reforms will be given particular attention: … review the wage setting arrangements, and, where necessary, the degree of centralisation in the bargaining process, and the indexation mechanisms … ensure that wages settlements in the public sector support the competitiveness efforts in the private sector … labour market reforms to promote “lexicurity … aligning the pension system to the national demographic situation, for example by aligning the effective retirement age with life expectancy … limiting early retirement schemes”.
- 5.
Correspondingly “Participating Member States commit to translating EU fiscal rules as set out in the Stability and Growth Pact into national legislation. Member States will retain the choice of the specific national legal vehicle to be used, but will make sure that it has a sufficiently strong binding and durable nature (e.g. constitution or framework law”.
- 6.
“Developing a common corporate tax base could be a revenue neutral way forward to ensure consistency among national tax systems”.
- 7.
In the preamble to the specific Treaty it states “that compliance with the Contracting Parties’ obligation to transpose the ‘balanced budget rule’ into their national legal systems, through binding, permanent and preferably constitutional provisions, should be subject to the jurisdiction of the Court of Justice of the European Union, in accordance with Article 273 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union; … that Article 260 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union empowers the Court of Justice of the European Union to impose a lump sum or penalty payment on a Member State of the European Union which has failed to comply with one of its judgments … that the European Commission has established criteria for determining the lump sum or penalty payment to be imposed in the framework of that Article”.
- 8.
As indicated in Article 3 of the Treaty “the budgetary position of the general government of a Contracting Party shall be balanced or in surplus”.
- 9.
0.5% of GNP is the prescribed ceiling for the deficit.
- 10.
It is stated clearly in the introductory report that in the event of a State having a deficit of over 3%, it must “if necessary, compel a Member State to reduce a deficit which might be identified”. How could that be done? According to Article 3 of the Treaty “in the event of significant observed deviations from the medium-term objective or the adjustment path towards it, a correction mechanism shall be triggered automatically. The mechanism shall include the obligation of the Contracting Party concerned to implement measures to correct the deviations over a defined period of time”. Automatically means the adoption of the reversed qualified majority, that is Commission’s proposals for sanctions can only be rejected with two thirds of the votes of member states in the Council against them (Vassalos 2018: 76).
- 11.
According to Article 8 “The European Commission is invited to present in due time to the Contracting Parties a report on the provisions adopted by each of them in compliance with Article 3(2). If the European Commission, after having given the Contracting Party concerned the opportunity to submit its observations, concludes in its report that such Contracting Party has failed to comply with Article 3(2), the matter will be brought to the Court of Justice of the European Union by one or more Contracting Parties … the judgment of the Court of Justice shall be binding on the parties to the proceedings, which shall take the necessary measures to comply with the judgment within a period to be decided by the Court of Justice”.
- 12.
It is characteristic that in accordance with the first Memorandum, the Finance Minister not only signs the approved drafts of the agreements but also negotiates and signs the quarterly revisions and agreements of the Memorandum, about which he simply informs the House. In the second Memorandum, there was a provision for the recapitalization of the banks before the relevant agreement was concluded. After being signed it was to go to the Parliament as information (Kotzias 2013: 313–314; Kaltsonis 2014: 175, 176).
- 13.
One characteristic example is the provision in Article 7 of Law 3839/2010, which states that “acting in the context of the Constitution and its laws, the Prime Minister, through a decision published in the Government Gazette, on matters of urgency and major national concern may, by way of exception from any general or specific provision and in compliance with the general principles of Community law: (…) entrust directly to natural or legal persons the conduct of studies or the provision of services and determine the subject and time of delivery of the study or service”. The second paragraph of the article in question is interesting: all public sector services are made available to these persons, given that they “are obliged to provide the abovementioned studies, committees and working groups with all information and data required” (Kaltsonis 2014: 178).
- 14.
Under Article 14 Paragraph 5 “The Borrower hereby irrevocably and unconditionally waives all immunity to which it is or may become entitled, in respect of itself or its assets, from legal proceedings in relation to this Agreement, including, without limitation, immunity from suit, judgement or other order, from attachment, arrest or injunction prior to judgement, and from execution and enforcement against its assets to the extent not prohibited by mandatory law”.
- 15.
As indeed is mentioned at point 11 of the Form of Legal Opinion written by the Greek side “Neither the Borrower nor any of its property are immune on the grounds of sovereignty or otherwise from jurisdiction, attachment—whether before or after judgement—or execution in respect of any action or proceeding relating to the Agreement”.
- 16.
It is worth noting the dimensions of the loss suffered by bondholders which at the most conservative estimates amounted to 53.5% of the original face value of the bonds but in reality was much greater because the new securities were of longer duration and at lower interest rates (Chrysogonos 2013: 73).
- 17.
In Keratea there were many months of protests by residents against the installation of a sanitary landfill site. In Skouries, there were also strong reactions against the operation of a gold mining plant.
- 18.
“The choice of English law as governing law for the Agreement is a valid choice of law binding the Borrower in accordance with Hellenic law” as mentioned in point 9 of the Form of Legal Opinion, accepted by Greece.
- 19.
In accordance with point 10 of the Form of Legal Opinion “The Borrower has legally, effectively and irrevocably submitted to the exclusive jurisdiction of the Court of Justice of the European Union in connection with the Agreement and any judgement of this court would be conclusive and enforceable in the Hellenic Republic”.
- 20.
In accordance with Article 15, Paragraph 2 of the Master Financial Assistance Facility Agreement that is included in the second Memorandum “The Parties undertake to submit any dispute which may arise relating to the legality, validity, interpretation or performance of this Agreement and each of its Facility Specific Terms (including the Annexes and Schedules thereto) to the exclusive jurisdiction of the courts of the Grand Duchy of Luxemburg”.
- 21.
As quite rightly observed by Panagiotis Sotiris: “What else is slavery in the modern era than the attempt in the absence of a ‘free’ labour force that will work for capitalist agriculture, to get one, if necessary by violence. Similarly, what more were the great colonial empires than attempts to extend capitalist production relations and forms of accumulation by violence, within the context of expanded reproduction of European capital” (Sotiris 2003).
- 22.
Here too our view differs substantially from that of N. Kotzias, who thinks that “Greece is being treated in one-dimensional fashion as country whose entire being is circumscribed by the fact of owing money, for whom the primary criterion for decision-making and action is the interests and demands of its creditors” (Kotzias 2013: 312). In fact the situation is not a triangular schema of entrepreneurs, states and “imperial” administration (i.e. the bureaucratic machinery of the European Union) as Kotzias with post-modernist logic assumes. It is an attempt to overthrow the previous model of accumulation for the benefit of the most powerful sectors of monopoly capital, a strategy mediated by the corresponding political personnel in each national formation. The real problem is the crisis and the reason for it varies: in some places it can be the debt, in others the banking system, and in any case the outside economic interventions have taken place for different reasons in each country. But the question is not just one of conflict between a post-modern imperial coalition and “debt colonies” of a new type. It is class struggle (both between bourgeoisie and working class and intra-bourgeois) but it is also antagonism between capitalist formations within the imperialist chain.
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Sakellaropoulos, S. (2019). Transformations in the State. In: Greece’s (un) Competitive Capitalism and the Economic Crisis. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-14319-0_7
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