Greece is in a dramatic condition and the situation would only deteriorate further if the country ends up defaulting on its debt, or even leaving the euro area altogether — a so-called Grexit. If Greece is to be spared this fate and escape the current crisis there must first and foremost be a complete change of outlook within the country itself. There must be a clear commitment to break with the habits of the past 40 years, and resist the temptation to blame other for Greece’s woes. The government in Athens must also accept that its democratic legitimacy cannot, by its very nature, take precedence over the democratic legitimacy enjoyed by its European partners.
Those are the two conditions which will allow the Greek authorities to make credible commitments that can then be followed by their practical implementation on the basis of a programme agreed with their partners. We understand the impatience and concern of those partners, who are sick and tired of feeling that they are forever pouring their aid into a bottomless pit, reminiscent of the perforated Danaids water but of classical mythology.
But this Greek tragedy is not merely a national issue. It is having, and will continue to have, an impact on the whole of Europe, of which Greece is an integral part in both historical and geographical terms. Thus we should not simply confine ourselves to gauging the more or less extensive economic and financial consequences of Grexit. We need to also understand Greece’s situation from a geopolitical standpoint. We must not look at Greece only through the detail-focused microscopes of the International Momentary Fund’s but also through the binoculars of the UN. In other words, we must see Greece as a country set in the Balkans, an area whose instability hardly needs further fuelling at a time of open warfare in Ukraine and in Syria and of a growing terrorist threat — not to mention the migrant crisis.
Even when one does confine oneself to a strictly financial viewpoint, we crucially need to stress that Greece’s current liquidity crisis is the result of a solvency crisis which is itself merely a symptom of far deeper woes. These relate to the weaknesses of an economy and a state that need to be comprehensively reconstructed on the basis of in-depth administrative, judicial, educational, fiscal and other reforms.
The EU must play its part to the full in that reconstruction process by offering Greece a comprehensive three-pronged plan. This should consist of offering Athens reasonable financial aid in order to allow it to rebuild its solvency in the short term; second, mobilising all those EU instruments — structural and cohesion funds, loans and so on — that can help to revive the Greek economy and in turn lighten the country’s debt burden in relation to gross domestic product; and third, immediately undertake an reassessment of the weight of Greek debt and that of the other EU countries “under programmes” on condition that promised reforms are enacted.
Only a comprehensive plan of this nature appears capable of providing the Greek people and their authorities with prospects for hope and mobilisation, and thus of getting them to put their heart and mind into the effort for reconstruction which the country so badly needs and from which the EU as a whole will benefit.
Odysseus found the courage and the energy to endure a further 10 years of gruelling ordeals after those already suffered during the Trojan War because he never lost hope of returning to Ithaca and to his Penelope. If the Greeks and the Europeans find it in themselves to look towards a future, which is of necessity a shared one and which they know will be a better one for all, then they will find a way to forge a compromise honouring the principles of co-operation and of solidarity that are the very foundation stones underpinning the European project.
The writer is a French economist and former president of the European Commission
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