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Syriza victory: The great democratic examination of the EU has arrived!
The victory of Syriza is the return of politics to Europe.
Syriza victory: The great democratic examination of the EU[1] has arrived!
For the first time in many years, a non-institutional party wins an electoral victory[2]. And the institutional parties[3] are to politics what military music is to music ... So this is a great victory that the project of European democratization has just seen, a victory that creates the conditions for the emergence of a trans-European political consciousness, from which finally will emerge trans-national parties which Europe needs, if it wants to continue.
Unfortunately, few commentators understand it that way. No songs of praise on the fact that Greece is again the source of such a democratic renewal ... Is it a lack of imagination? of basic knowledge? or the result of the rage felt by the supporters of system that is losing hand?
Fact is that 4.7% of PASOC should resonate pretty lugubriously for all institutional parties still in power in Europe, but who knows that if any truly innovative political movement would pass the humiliation of their media, this is what kind of score would also wait for them[4].
So far the Euro crisis was managed by bankers, technocrats and Treaties[5]. This whole system, which is completely disconnected from the collective interest of Europeans in a crisis-ridden Europe, has only made errors, but which actually is not the main problem. The real problem is that this system has acted without any democratic legitimacy.
The arrival of an opponent to the closed game of the Troika, derived from the demand of the people and representative of the interests of citizens of one of the European nations, provides a great democratic test to the EU. Since the time, in which we were told about European values, which the EU is supposed to defend, we will finally know if the bureaucrats in Brussels (Commission), Frankfurt (ECB), Washington (IMF) and the European capitals are ready to share power with the European people.
Syriza comes in fact with solutions designed to be in service of the citizens[6] before being in service of the financial markets and outdated treaties. The European system will therefore have to show that it is able to capitalize positively on the fresh oxygen provided by Syriza to the limited debates of the Troika.
... or will he rather tense up and try to defeat SYRIZA by its innumerable resources (financial, political and media) that may take such diverse forms as: smear campaign against the soundness of Tspiras' decisions, thwarting his political choices, sudden ouster along the lines of that of Letta by Renzi in 2013, brutal rise of the neo-Nazism of the Golden Dawn, attempt for a coup d'état to restore order...
If the EU fails in this democratic test that awaits her now, then we will only have the more extremist forces pretending to defend the European people, anti-European and anti-democratic forces this time, those that justify the use of terror to restore order.
The EU was highly disappointing in its previous democratic tests (French and Dutch referenda in 2005 or Irish in 2008), preferring to ignore the message of the people and passing the rejected texts under the hand. But by this time, the EU could believe that people did not understand; today, nobody has any lessons to give to anyone.
[1]As EU we define the European decision-making system as it is currently operating, a mixture of bureaucracy at the European level and institutionalized policy at the national level.
[2]Regarding the alliance of Syriza with another non-institutional party, ANEL, which is judged far right and provoked the European press to loud protests, one can also look at it positively: if ANEL is as far right as SYRIZA is far left, the danger can be relativized; and moreover the fanatical right of neo-Nazi type is Golden Dawn and not ANEL; immigration and values are matters of concern to citizens, and measures are constantly taken on these subjects by Europe and the member states without any publicity and any mandate, if a SYRIZA-ANEL alliance creates the conditions for a public debate, it also means "more democracy"; the participation in power of ANEL is the best way to prevent radicalization; ...
[3]We tend to forget that a political party is a machine to access power at the service of a man, a woman or a team of men and women with a specific political orientation, which in the context of a vibrant democracy would dissolve as soon as its mission is fulfilled.
[4]France is a frightening example of this complete locking of politics by media , who feature only political bogeys: Marine Le Pen on the right and Jean-Claude Mélanchon on the left, both reactionary, outmoded and anti-European, which nobody really wants, but towards whom everyone will end up going for lack of serious alternative to the institutionalized french politics. Yet it is France from where during the last 25 years came the first and unique experiences to date of trans-European parties, real solutions for the revitalization of European policy, led by Franck Biancheri.
[5]The essence of the effort made by the ECB since 2009 is to respect the treaties, which were formulated in 2003, and that is well before the crisis, regarding the 2% of inflation for example ... not to mention that such a 2% inflation in 2003 was certainly the result of proposals made years ago after lengthy and laboropis negotiations. In reality, the Treaty that crush Europe are there to disguise the lack of trans-European political and democratic power.
[6]De facto, Syriza provides solutions, not for the Greek crisis, but for the European crisis. But if their argumentation is received well in Greece and possibly also in all countries affected by the austerity programs of the recent years, it is much less well received in countries, who don't feel concerned by austerity , particularly in northern Europe. For the argumentation of SYRIZA to become in fact irresistible, it needs to be carried by a trans-European party or a trans-European alliance of non-institutional parties of the same type as Syriza. Tsipras is aware of this, since he just embarked on a European tour (Source: Europe1, 01.02.2015). We Newropeans have always felt that it was impossible to reach the trans-European dimension starting from the national level; we really hope that SYRIZA will proove us wrong.
Should we wait for institutional reforms to bring out transeuropean lists for the European election 2019? - 19/02/2018
Pierre Moscovici: "The future of the euro" - 07/09/2017
Open Letter to the European Leaders: Countering the British nationalist takeover with a European democratic blow - Towards a first real trans-European election - 25/07/2016
Open call: Euroland Agora in Athens - October 7-10, 2016 - 20/07/2016
Inventing 21century democracy - 31/03/2016
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