https://toarcheio.org To Archeio project site Thu, 30 Apr 2020 11:27:41 +0000 en-GB hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=5.4.1 https://toarcheio.org/items/national-anti-austerity-protests-in-a-european-crisis-comparing-the-europeanizing-impact-of-protest-in-greece-and-germany-during-the-eurozone-crisis/ Tue, 16 Apr 2019 22:25:51 +0000 http://arc.local/items/national-anti-austerity-protests-in-a-european-crisis-comparing-the-europeanizing-impact-of-protest-in-greece-and-germany-during-the-eurozone-crisis/ Continued]]> Protest and social movements are drivers for the Europeanization of national public spheres. This is suggested by the literature on the emergence of Europeanized public spheres and the Europeanization of social movements as well as the discussion about the politicization of the European polity. The article tests this assumption in a standardized content analysis for newspaper reporting on the Eurozone crisis in Greece and Germany. Focusing on the public attribution of responsibility, the analysis looks for horizontal Europeanization (senders/addressees from other EU countries), vertical Europeanization (senders/addressees from the EU level), and discursive Europeanization (similar topics discussed at the same time). The findings do not identify protest as a strong driving force towards vertical or horizontal Europeanization of the public spheres in Greece and Germany. There is a weak tendency towards discussing similar topics at the same time in German and Greek media reports on protest. Consequences for European democracy and crisis politics are discussed.

]]> https://toarcheio.org/items/living-parallel-lives-italy-and-greece-in-an-age-of-austerity-2/ Tue, 16 Apr 2019 22:25:45 +0000 http://arc.local/items/living-parallel-lives-italy-and-greece-in-an-age-of-austerity-2/ Continued]]> The economic crisis has triggered a process of political convergence between Italy and Greece. The simultaneous downfall of the Italian and Greek governments, following the public withdrawal of European confidence in their ability to handle the crisis, was followed by the establishment of technocrat-led governments based on parliamentary ‘super-majorities’ and then by ‘protest elections’, marked by unprecedented levels of electoral volatility. By apparently ending bipolarism, the crisis has completely changed patterns of national government formation and resulted in experiments with unusual government types. Both political systems have entered a transitional phase whose outcome is anything but certain, especially in the continuing context of economic crisis.

]]> https://toarcheio.org/items/multimodal-argumentation-in-news-magazine-covers-a-case-study-of-front-covers-putting-greece-on-the-spot-of-the-european-economic-crisis/ Tue, 16 Apr 2019 22:25:37 +0000 http://arc.local/items/multimodal-argumentation-in-news-magazine-covers-a-case-study-of-front-covers-putting-greece-on-the-spot-of-the-european-economic-crisis/ Continued]]> In this paper, front covers of news magazines are studied as a distinct multimodal genre that invites readers to buy the magazine not only by attracting their attention but also by assuming a position with respect to the particular cover story. In order to account for the argument that a front cover may convey in support of that position, an argumentative reconstruction is required that also needs to take seriously into account the way in which the verbal and the visual modes interact to create meaning. The study proposes a multimodal argumentation perspective on the systematic reconstruction of the arguments that front covers of news magazines put forward. As a case in point, six covers by two German weekly news magazines are analysed, featuring the role of Greece in the eurozone crisis in the period 2010–2012.

]]> https://toarcheio.org/items/has-germany-fallen-out-of-love-with-europe-the-eurozone-crisis-and-the-normalization-of-germanys-european-identity/ Tue, 16 Apr 2019 22:25:33 +0000 http://arc.local/items/has-germany-fallen-out-of-love-with-europe-the-eurozone-crisis-and-the-normalization-of-germanys-european-identity/ Continued]]> The European Union has been in its biggest ever crisis since the onset of the Greek sovereign debt crisis in 2010. Beyond the political and economic dimensions, the crisis has also sparked discussions about Germany’s European identity. Some scholars have argued that Germany’s behavior in the crisis signals a continuation of the process of “normalization” of its European identity towards a stronger articulation of national identity and interests, that it has “fallen out of love” with Europe. This article will seek to reassess these claims, drawing on detailed analysis of political and media discourse in Germany—from political speeches through to both broadsheet and tabloid newspapers. It will argue that the crisis is understood broadly as a European crisis in Germany, where the original values of European integration are at stake. Furthermore, the crisis is debated through the lens of European solidarity, albeit with a particular German flavor of solidarity that draws on the economic tradition of ordoliberalism. Rather than strengthening expressions of national identity, this has resulted in the emergence of a new northern European identity in contrast to Greece or “southern Europe.”

]]> https://toarcheio.org/items/how-party-linkages-shape-austerity-politics-clientelism-and-fiscal-adjustment-in-greece-and-portugal-during-the-eurozone-crisis/ Tue, 16 Apr 2019 22:25:31 +0000 http://arc.local/items/how-party-linkages-shape-austerity-politics-clientelism-and-fiscal-adjustment-in-greece-and-portugal-during-the-eurozone-crisis/ Continued]]> Drawing on an analysis of austerity reforms in Greece and Portugal during the sovereign debt crisis from 2009 onwards, we show how the nature of the linkages between parties and citizens shapes party strategies of fiscal retrenchment. We argue that parties which rely to a greater extent on the selective distribution of state resources to mobilize electoral support (clientelistic linkages) are more reluctant to agree to fiscal retrenchment because their own electoral survival depends on their ability to control state budgets to reward clients. In Greece, where parties relied extensively on these clientelistic linkages, austerity reforms have been characterized by recurring conflicts and disagreements between the main parties, as well as a fundamental transformation of the party system. By contrast, in Portugal, where parties relied less on clientelistic strategies, austerity reforms have been more consensual because fiscal retrenchment challenged to a lesser extent the electoral base of the mainstream parties.

]]> https://toarcheio.org/items/portugal-is-not-greece-policy-responses-to-the-sovereign-debt-crisis-and-the-consequences-for-the-portuguese-political-economy/ Tue, 16 Apr 2019 22:25:27 +0000 http://arc.local/items/portugal-is-not-greece-policy-responses-to-the-sovereign-debt-crisis-and-the-consequences-for-the-portuguese-political-economy/ Continued]]> This paper delineates the changing environment from a benevolent to a conditionality-oriented. It uses the case study of Portugal and the implementation of the austerity programme to show how a semi-peripheral country of the European Union (EU) reacted to this changed environment. The first section shows how the EU has become more divided due to the growing cleavage between rich and poor member states. This is followed by the section on the making of the growing tensions between the European partners and the International Monetary Fund. Subsequently, the semi-peripheral economy of Portugal is analysed, before the policy responses of the Portuguese government are presented.

]]> https://toarcheio.org/items/living-parallel-lives-italy-and-greece-in-an-age-of-austerity/ Tue, 16 Apr 2019 22:25:22 +0000 http://arc.local/items/living-parallel-lives-italy-and-greece-in-an-age-of-austerity/ Continued]]> The economic crisis has triggered a process of political convergence between Italy and Greece. The simultaneous downfall of the Italian and Greek governments, following the public withdrawal of European confidence in their ability to handle the crisis, was followed by the establishment of technocrat-led governments based on parliamentary ‘super-majorities’ and then by ‘protest elections’, marked by unprecedented levels of electoral volatility. By apparently ending bipolarism, the crisis has completely changed patterns of national government formation and resulted in experiments with unusual government types. Both political systems have entered a transitional phase whose outcome is anything but certain, especially in the continuing context of economic crisis.

]]> https://toarcheio.org/items/turn-the-other-greek-how-the-eurozone-crisis-changes-the-image-of-greeks-and-what-visual-representations-of-greeks-tell-us-about-european-identity/ Tue, 16 Apr 2019 22:25:16 +0000 http://arc.local/items/turn-the-other-greek-how-the-eurozone-crisis-changes-the-image-of-greeks-and-what-visual-representations-of-greeks-tell-us-about-european-identity/ Continued]]> This article analyses the discursive practices of political cartoons and their contribution tothe construction of Greek and European identities in light of the European sovereign debtcrisis. The goal of this article is to assess the emergence of Greeks as a significant Otherto Europe and its implications for European identity. To this end, the article develops atheoretico-methodological framework that brings together theories of identity as a pro-cess and a project, and a discourse analysis/iconology methodology tailored to politicalcartoon research. The article first tests for the existence of a Europe-wide discourse of thecrisis and the Greeks, using qualitative methodology. Once the existence of such a dis-course is established, the article goes on to examine the contents of this discourse, con-cluding that a Greek Other has indeed emerged through a process of differentiation, andcontinues to search for common interpretive frames and shared meanings that wouldpoint towards a common European identity. The political cartoon data sample comesfrom these countries: Austria, France, Slovakia and the United Kingdom.

]]> https://toarcheio.org/items/deconstructing-the-profligacy-myth-using-critical-theory-and-social-constructivism-the-case-of-greece-and-its-wider-socio-economic-and-political-consequences/ Tue, 16 Apr 2019 22:25:13 +0000 http://arc.local/items/deconstructing-the-profligacy-myth-using-critical-theory-and-social-constructivism-the-case-of-greece-and-its-wider-socio-economic-and-political-consequences/ Continued]]> This article is aimed at deconstructing the widely spread view according to
many media outlets, policy analysts and commentators that the Greek crisis
and the subsequent eurocrisis is the result of generous social welfare benefits
and fiscal spending irresponsibility on the part of Greek politicians and citizens.
The lesson to be drawn from this analysis is multifold. In attempting to
do so, I will use critical theory of international relations in order to dissect the
very structure of the EMU which inevitably led to the build-up of trade and fiscal
imbalances in the EU’s periphery as a first theoretical line of argumentation
in contesting this view. The second theoretical line of argumentation focuses
on social constructivism and its credentials in dealing with the underlying issue
of “Greek profligacy”. The diffusion of conservative attitudes regarding
social welfare is put into the broader context of “new constitutionalism” and
neoliberal politics. The application of both theories is aimed at identifying basic
culprits which brought about the deadly mix of European banking crisis and
sovereign debt crisis, and thereby points to a necessary change in policy stance
toward “PIIGS” countries and the very foundation of the EMU.

]]> https://toarcheio.org/items/electoral-epidemic-the-political-cost-of-economic-crisis-in-southern-europe-2010-11/ Tue, 16 Apr 2019 22:25:12 +0000 http://arc.local/items/electoral-epidemic-the-political-cost-of-economic-crisis-in-southern-europe-2010-11/ Continued]]> This article introduces a collection of essays on the elections of 2010–11 in Italy, Greece, Portugal, Spain, Turkey, Cyprus and the Turkish Cypriot community. It examines the impact of the European sovereign debt crisis on electoral trends in the era of the Greek and Portuguese bailouts. After briefly examining the crisis economies, it investigates patterns of abstention, incumbent punishment and opposition success, including the rise of regional, anti-party, far-right and racist parties. The article concludes, following Krastev (Journal of Democracy, vol. 13, no. 3, 2002, pp. 39–53), that the crisis is creating ‘democracy without choices’ in Southern Europe with potentially destabilising consequences throughout the region.

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