Looting Greece: A New Financial Imperialism Emerges

by Jack Rasmus

Overview

Looting Greece examines how and why the Syriza party, which took power in January 2015 promising to end austerity, and return Greece to economic growth, ended up agreeing to a deal much worse than its political predecessors in 2010 and 2012. Placing the Greek events of 2015 in broader historical perspective, Rasmus argues a radical new neoliberal initiative in Europe has emerged. In the 2015 debt deal the Troika will now directly manage Greece’s economy?running its banks, writing Greece’s budget, vetting and replacing government ministers, exercising veto rights over Greece’s parliament and Executive agencies, dictating its taxes, and implanting ‘Troika Commissars’ to watch over and approve day to day decisions of Greek government at all levels. Looting Greece explains how a new kind of financial imperialism is emerging in Greece, Europe’s periphery, and soon elsewhere.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780986085352
Publisher:	Clarity Press, Incorporated
Publication date:	11/04/2016
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	426 KB

About the Author

is the author inter alia of Systemic Fragility in the Global Economy, 2015; Obama’s Economy, 2012, He hosts the weekly New York radio show, Alternative Visions, on the Progressive Radio network; is shadow Federal Reserve Bank chair of the ‘Green Shadow Cabinet’ and economic advisor to the USA Green Party’s presidential candidate, Jill Stein. He writes bi-weekly for teleSUR TV, for Z magazine, Counterpunch and elsewheres. Dr. Rasmus studied economics. Dr. Rasmus studied economics at Berkeley, took his doctorate in the University of Toronto. He teaches at St. Mary's College in Calif

Table of Contents

Chapter 1 The Meaning of the Greek Debt Crisis 11

Syriza's Poorly Bet Hand 13

The Troika's Stacked Deck 17

Greek Debt Crises and 'Weak Form' Euro-Neoliberalism 21

Generic Neoliberalism 23

Eurozone Neoliberalism 28

The Greek Debt Crisis and Euro Social Democracy 34

The Emerging New Debt-based Imperialism 36

Chapter 2 The German Origins of Greek Debt 45

The Lisbon Strategy and 'Internal Devaluation' 47

Germany's Lisbon Strategy Implementation 49

Germany's Bundesbank Dominates the ECB 51

Greek Debt as Private Bank-Investor Debt 55

The Myth of Greek Wages as Cause of Debt 56

From Private to Government Debt 57

The German Origins of the Greek Debt 61

Chapter 3 Pasok and the Debt Crisis of 2010 66

2009: PASOK's Strategic Error 66

PASOK's Voluntary Austerity Program 68

Bond Vigilantes Escalate the Debt 72

The 2010 Debt Agreement 74

Who Was Really Bailed Out? 75

Chapter 4 The Second Greek Debt Crisis of 2012 79

A Brief Recapitulation 79

Some Defining Characteristics of the 2012 Debt Crisis 82

2011: Interim Preceding the Second Debt Crisis 84

The 2012 Debt Crisis and the Three-Way Negotiating Farce 87

The 'German Hypothesis' 90

The Second Debt Restructuring Deal of 2012 92

Chapter 5 Collapse of New Democracy & Rise of Syriza 103

New Democracy Pleads to Renegotiate 104

The Bond Buy back Boondoggle of December 2012 107

Who Benefits? 109

Muddling Through: 2013-2014 112

Syriza Comes of Age 113

The Euro zone Stagnates Once Again 114

Chapter 6 Syriza Takes the Offensive 120

The Troika's $2.8 Trillion Grexit Firewall 121

Troika Strategy to Defeat Syriza at the Polls 123

Syriza's Electoral Offensive 126

Chapter 7 The Troika Counter-Attack 136

The Debt-Swap Proposal and Euro Tour 139

The February 20 Interim Agreement 146

The Lessons of Bargaining: February-March 2015 154

Chapter 8 From Confrontation to Capitulation 158

Troika Economics: 1932 Déjà vu 161

Varoufakis Marginalized 163

Brexit Before Grexit? 165

The Troika's 'Final and Best' Offer-June 2015 167

Greece's Interim 'Final' Offer 172

The Road to Referendum 176

Referendum and Fallout 182

Chapter 9 Syriza Tamed 188

Greece as an Emerging 'Economic Protectorate' 190

Party Restructuring as a Precondition for Economic Restructuring 191

The Third Debt Deal of August 2015 193

The Parliamentary Election of September 20, 2015 197

General Strikes and Grexit 198

Feints, Rear-Guard Actions, & Longer-Term Agreement 200

The IMF's Secret Concerns in Negotiations 202

The IMF-EC/Germany Split 204

Debt Restructuring by Another Name? 207

Observations on the Third Debt Agreement of 2015-18 209

Chapter 10 Why the Troika Prevailed: Interpretations and Analyses 216

An Overview of Greek Economy 2015-2016 216

The Greek Debt Crisis as a Banking Crisis 217

The Big Picture 220

Eurozone Structure and the Greek Crisis 223

Syriza's Fundamental Error 228

Syriza's Objectives 231

Could a Grexit Have Succeeded 233

Syriza Strategies 235

Troika Strategies 241

Tactics-Troika vs. Syriza 247

The Individual Factor in Syriza's Defeat 251

Organization and Public Consciousness Factors 253

Is a Fourth Greek Debt Crisis Inevitable? 257

Conclusion

A New Financial Imperialism Emerges 264

The Many Meanings of Imperialism 264

Colonies, Protectorates, and Dependencies 266

Gerece as an Economic Protectorate 269

Wealth Extraction as an Imperialist Objective 271

'Reflective' Theories of Imperialism 273

Alternatives to Hilferding-Lenin 278

Greece as a Case Example of Financial Imperialism 284

Private Sector Interest Transfer 287

State to State Debt and Interest Aggregation and Transfer 289

Financial Imperialism from Privatization of Public Assets 297

Foreign Investor Speculation on Greek Financial Asset Price Volatility 299

Index 310

Editorial Reviews

"In this brilliant book, Rasmus shows that the EU is a finely honed device for looting its poorest members of their wealth and their democracy." — PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS

From the Publisher