https://toarcheio.org To Archeio project site Mon, 04 May 2020 23:24:23 +0000 en-GB hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=5.4.1 https://toarcheio.org/items/anger-management-and-the-politics-of-crime-in-the-greek-crisis/ Mon, 04 May 2020 23:24:23 +0000 https://toarcheio.org/items/anger-management-and-the-politics-of-crime-in-the-greek-crisis/ Continued]]> In 2008, Greece was plunged into recession. A full-blown financial crisis developed in 2009, from which point onwards the Greek economy shrank with persistence unmatched by current comparisons. The onset of financial crisis triggered a major realignment in the configuration of political power in the country, with a collapse in support for the left pillar of a centrist two-party system that had been in place for over 30 years, and the entry to Parliament of an extreme far-right group with a reputation for engaging in physical violence. The political ramifications of the crisis have continued to evolve under the socio-economic pressures of the ongoing recession, the austerity measures adopted to meet the conditions of successive bailouts, and the asymmetrical impact of both upon the country’s citizenry.

]]> https://toarcheio.org/items/doing-economic-relations-otherwise/ Mon, 04 May 2020 23:23:58 +0000 https://toarcheio.org/items/doing-economic-relations-otherwise/ Continued]]> Recent scholarship on Southern Europe focuses on economic crisis and contestations of hegemonic economic and political arrangements. Solidarity features prominently in these accounts as a notion of opposition to austerity and recession. This article uses solidarity as an entry point, and then shifts attention to the everyday politics of its enactment in the TEM complementary currency network. The article presents three sets of challenges faced by network members: moral discourses around debt, disregard of communal labour and hierarchies created through economic inequalities among network members. The discussion of these challenges places resistance and solidarity in larger discussions about capitalist economies and hegemonic thought and practice that go beyond the discussion of solidarity in Greece and Southern Europe.

]]> https://toarcheio.org/items/austerity-discourses-in-der-spiegel-journal-2009-2014/ Tue, 16 Apr 2019 22:25:54 +0000 http://arc.local/items/austerity-discourses-in-der-spiegel-journal-2009-2014/ Continued]]> This article looks at the ways mainstream media discuss austerity and its failure to reach its
proclaimed goals, to reduce public debt and to boost productivity in the heavily indebted countries of
the Eurozone’s periphery. This study analyzed Der Spiegel’s articles presenting the crisis and austerity in Europe, focusing on the Greek case, from 2009 until 2014. A thematic analysis was developed in
the study a broad corpus of articles, focusing on the main ideas they unfold. Deploying critical political
economy literature, critical cultural theory and critical media studies literature, the article criticizes the
neoliberal hegemony of the EU’s crisis politics and foregrounds the role of mainstream media, including progressivist or objectivist ones such as Spiegel, in the reproduction of neoliberal ideas that expand far beyond the crisis, to produce the institutions, social relations, beliefs and subjectivities for a
post-crisis configuration of capitalism. The article concludes that Spiegel, like other mainstream media,
produce a biopolitical policing of the crisis’ exceptionalized subjects (the citizens of indebted countries)
and the implementation of crisis-politics by creating a public “structure of feeling” related to the hegemonic crisis’ rationales. These rationales are further connected to the development of the new neoliberal subjectivity, which is an objective of the crisis-reforms, such as austerity regimes. In effect, mainstream media discourses reproduce the hegemonic frames of the

]]> https://toarcheio.org/items/illuminating-austerity-lighting-poverty-as-an-agent-and-signifier-of-the-greek-crisis/ Tue, 16 Apr 2019 22:25:52 +0000 http://arc.local/items/illuminating-austerity-lighting-poverty-as-an-agent-and-signifier-of-the-greek-crisis/ Continued]]> Light – whether natural or artificial – plays multiple roles in the home: both as a material enabler of everyday life and as a device for exercising a variety of social relations. The post-2008 Greek economic crisis has endangered those roles by limiting people’s ability to access or afford adequate energy services. This paper focuses on the enforced lack of illumination in the home, and the strategies and tactics undertaken by households to overcome this challenge. I connect illumination practices and discourses to the implementation of austerity, by arguing that the threat of darkness has become a tool for compelling vulnerable groups to pay their electricity bills. The evidence presented in the paper is based on two sets of interviews with 25 households (including a total of 55 adult members) living in and around Thessaloniki – Greece’s second largest city, and one that has suffered severe economic consequences as a result of the crisis. I have established that the under-consumption of light is one of the most pronounced expressions of energy poverty, and as such endangers the ability to participate in the customs that define membership of society. But the emergence of activist-led amateur electricians and the symbolic and material mobilization of light for political purposes have also created multiple opportunities for resistance.

]]> https://toarcheio.org/items/migrant-protest-in-times-of-crisis-politics-ethics-and-the-sacred-from-below/ Tue, 16 Apr 2019 22:25:52 +0000 http://arc.local/items/migrant-protest-in-times-of-crisis-politics-ethics-and-the-sacred-from-below/ Continued]]> This paper focuses on the 300 Migrant Hunger Strikers event in Greece to explore the material conditions of possibility for migrant politics in times of crisis. It identifies three elements that played determinant roles in the articulation of the event: the politics of equality enacted by migrants, the ethics of hospitality and witnessing enacted by the Greek activists and host populations and the sacredness of the event. Critically engaging with the theories of Rancière, Derrida, Agamben and Durkheim, this paper demonstrates how these elements encountered and how their encounter helped migrants to achieve rights, albeit limited and temporary. Moving beyond the particularity of the event, this paper also highlights the event’s importance for migrant politics in times of austerity, and increased surveillance and racism against migrants. Despite its limited and temporary success, the event demonstrates how a politics of equality, ethical openness and respect for human life can form the basis of true cosmopolitan universality. The event also demonstrates how cosmopolitan universality is constructed from below by the migrants, who despite their undocumented status, engaged in an act of citizenship to demand equality.

]]> https://toarcheio.org/items/economic-nationalism-and-the-cultural-politics-of-consumption-under-austerity-the-rise-of-ethnocentric-consumption-in-greece-2/ Tue, 16 Apr 2019 22:25:50 +0000 http://arc.local/items/economic-nationalism-and-the-cultural-politics-of-consumption-under-austerity-the-rise-of-ethnocentric-consumption-in-greece-2/ Continued]]> By nuancing the politics of consumption in the context of austerity, this article highlights the rise of economic nationalism and the reconfiguration of consumer cultures at the aftermath of the global financial crisis. As it argues, in the context of Greece, three types of consumer culture have manifested; these are evoking consumption as resilience, resistance or reinforcement. This work focuses on the latter through the phenomenon of ethnocentric consumption, which is part and parcel of economic nationalism. Economic nationalism can be explored through promotion of ethnocentric consumption and is demonstrable both in the inception and constitution of nation states, but also in times of crisis. This article critically appraises ethnocentric consumption as consumption based on ethnocentric criteria (natural resources, ownership, production, manufacturing, distribution and labour force). In the context of the crisis in Greece, economic nationalism has become manifest as a solution to the national economy. The specific case chosen is a citizens’ movement and its campaign for the promotion of ethnocentric consumption. A close examination of the campaign (We Consume What We Produce) reveals the historical alignment of the state’s and citizens’ economic interests, the reverberation of state narrative from the 1980s and exclusionary nationalism which is also used by fascists. Campaigns for ethnocentric consumption limit the creativity of consumer politics. First, this phenomena appears to be an alternative vehicle for political parties. Second, it is tied around a normative narrative of economic recovery, which is particularly mythological. Third, its overall target is to maximise competitiveness on a global scale, and finally, it demonstrates a densely dangerous relationship with economic nationalism. Yet, it is important to situate this phenomenon within the context of consumer cultures under austerity, especially as more creative modalities of social economy initiatives by grassroots groups have been re-socialising the market.

]]> https://toarcheio.org/items/the-age-of-discontent-greek-publishing-through-six-years-of-austerity/ Tue, 16 Apr 2019 22:25:49 +0000 http://arc.local/items/the-age-of-discontent-greek-publishing-through-six-years-of-austerity/ Continued]]> The effects of the 2010–2015 economic recession on the Greek publishing market have been dramatic, by all means, affecting its structure, operation, quantity and quality features. What is interesting to investigate, thereof, is the response of the publishing environment to the economic downturn in the form of resilience, adaptation, innovation and change within the industry. While the ‘crisis’ has had more severe consequences for the firms at the top, connected often (but not always) to media groups, the experienced, specialized small to medium publishers and booksellers proved to be more resilient, sustaining a vibrant and diversified production within a fewer number of books published. New book titles were reduced by 35% between 2008 and 2012, with signs of further containment following to that. At the same time, a number of small, independent booksellers have sprung up, out of the need to support the distinct quality features of literary production, based on the ‘personal quality’ service model. An approximate 8% of the Greeks can be ranked among the ‘medium to systematic’ readers (i.e. reading over 10 books a year); they are the ones to support the volume and diversity of book title production, including some of the bestsellers, while the outbreak of the crisis concurred with a positive development towards the weaker strand of the readership. The international interest in the economic circumstances met in Greece has helped, to some extent, the export of rights of literary works either dealing with the individuals affected, or analyzing the reasons of the default. At the same time, digital innovation may prove to be a sign of a changing book publishing industry, striving to become international.

]]> https://toarcheio.org/items/firm-relocation-in-times-of-economic-crisis-evidence-from-greek-small-and-medium-enterprises-movement-to-bulgaria-2007-2014/ Tue, 16 Apr 2019 22:25:49 +0000 http://arc.local/items/firm-relocation-in-times-of-economic-crisis-evidence-from-greek-small-and-medium-enterprises-movement-to-bulgaria-2007-2014/ Continued]]> This paper examines firm relocation in the aftermath of the 2007 global economic crisis. In particular, the paper analyses the unprecedented recent increase in the movement of small and medium enterprises (SMEs) from Greece to Bulgaria using original insights by a survey of 103 Greek companies in Bulgaria. The findings suggest a reconsideration of the existing literature on firm mobility in order to explain the post-crisis movement of Greek SMEs. Entrepreneurs perceived firm relocation as a necessity, while, contrary to the existing literature, labour cost does not appear to have significantly influenced firm exit from Greece, the level of demand was highlighted as more important compared with the literature findings and access to external finance emerged as a major factor. Important among elements that attracted businesspeople to Bulgaria were low taxation and geographical proximity to Greece. The present analysis thus challenges the significance of firm relocation determinants in the literature.

]]> https://toarcheio.org/items/the-indignant-citizen-anti-austerity-movements-in-southern-europe-and-the-anti-oligarchic-reclaiming-of-citizenship/ Tue, 16 Apr 2019 22:25:48 +0000 http://arc.local/items/the-indignant-citizen-anti-austerity-movements-in-southern-europe-and-the-anti-oligarchic-reclaiming-of-citizenship/ Continued]]> This article discusses the change in political vision of anti-austerity movements in southern Europe in comparison with previous protest movements. It focuses on the emergence of a discourse of citizenship at the core of the new protest wave, as seen in frequent references to ‘citizens’, ‘citizenry’ and ‘citizenship’ in movement manifestos, and the resolutions and declarations of popular assemblies. I investigate the meaning and motivations of this ‘citizenism’ and how it reflects the change in economic conditions and popular perceptions in the aftermath of the 2008 economic crisis. The analysis draws from movement documents, and in-depth interviews with 40 protest organisers and participants from the Indignados movement in Spain and the Aganaktismenoimovement in Greece. I argue that within these movements, the idea of citizenship has acted both as a source of popular identity interpellating a diverse set of demographics, and as a central demand, organising calls for greater popular participation in decision-making, freedom of expression and against corruption. Anti-austerity movements put forward an anti-oligarchic view of citizenship, which is different from the liberal, civic-republican and social democratic approaches, in its understanding of citizenship as the power of the dispersed ‘citizenry’ against the concentrated power of economic and political elites. This grassroots re-appropriation of citizenship highlights how anti-austerity movements in southern Europe have departed from the anti-statism of autonomous movements and have developed a more positive view of the state as a basis of social cohesion and a possible means of ‘people power’.

]]> https://toarcheio.org/items/sovereign-debt-crises-referendums-and-the-changing-face-of-colonial-power/ Tue, 16 Apr 2019 22:25:48 +0000 http://arc.local/items/sovereign-debt-crises-referendums-and-the-changing-face-of-colonial-power/ Continued]]> While it is poorly performing economies like Greece that have become synonymous with sovereign debt crises in recent times, other more deeply indebted economies remain exempt from such representations. This paper builds on an argument made elsewhere that sovereign debt crises are implicated in the expansion of colonial power through austerity, in both their overt and covert manifestations. While the 2015 Greek referendum in a climate of austerity attempted to cover over the imperializing will of the European Union through the referendum device, in Australia the referendum campaign seeking ‘recognition’ of Aboriginal people in the Constitution effaces the foundational debts of dispossession that structure both economy and sovereignty. While the referendums in both crises are invoked to resolve different legal, economic and cultural issues, they are indissociably connected in that they operate to legitimize the expansion of global colonial power. Referendums more generally are becoming increasingly visible as governance devices and yet their cultural-legal and racial meanings are yet to be tracked. I begin this task by bringing together a range of heterogeneous texts and literatures. By analysing and interconnecting these seemingly disparate texts, I argue that the Greek and Australian referendums are both techniques of colonial power.

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