*** ANTONIO VARSORI, MONICA POETTINGER (Eds.): Economic Crisis and New Nationalisms. German Political Economy as Perceived by European Partners. Presses Interuniversitaires Européennes / Peter Lang (1 av. Maurice, B-1050 Brussels. Tel: (41-32) 3761717 - Fax: 3761727 - Email: pie@peterlang.com - Internet: http://www.peterlang.com ). Euroclio series, No. 84. 2014, 181 pp, €41.70. ISBN 978-2-87574-193-6.
The crisis that the European Union - and even more so the eurozone - has been enduring since the various consequences of the collapse of the subprime market has had the collateral consequence of showing that Europe still needs to be constructed in people's minds. In some people's minds, at least. The problems demonstrated that underneath the European varnish there still exist national or even regional views and that under the pressure of nationalist fervour that is still present as a lifebuoy in the member states, these views can release potentially fratricidal energies. As if sixty years of peaceful and voluntary European integration meant nothing in a world - and in a European community… - where humanity and its nation states would remain condemned to be brothers turning on each other…
Following on from a conference organised in Florence a little over three years ago under the auspices of the Cesifin Alberto Predieri Foundation, this book has the huge merit of going beyond the various national anaethemas that the crisis constantly throws up to look at what gives rise to them and their pertinence (or lack of pertinence). In order to assess this, it is the way that broadsheets - the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung for Germany, the Corriere della Sera and La Repubblica for Italy - talked about the crisis over the course of 2008 to 2013 which is examined under the microscope of economists, historians of economic thought and political scientists from both countries. Their six essays have the aim, explains Monika Poettinger (of Bocconi University and Florence University) in the introduction, of showing “how the historical past and the permanent influence of long dead economists still determine present interpretation of economic facts,” since the populists of the time make capital out of distorted readings of the facts. She happens to point out that Marx is still the most-quoted economist in the newspapers in question, and is quoted to such an extent in fact as to lead one to believe we lived in a '“Marxian” world'; that ordo-liberalism is only entitled to quote an author from Angela Merkel's country although his philosophy of recommending state intervention in the economy is music to the ears of left-wing newspapers like La Repubblica; and that economic theories have often been distorted for political and ideological ends by contemporary economists, which explains many judgements of the single currency and its viability…
In the end, over and beyond the veneer of mutual grudges and accusations trotted out in the media, the authors gathered together in this book point out more similarities than divergences in the German and Italian interpretations of the crisis of recent years. This is reassuring and very good news. Nevertheless, it remains a fact that intergovernmental governance of the crisis is the key ferment for the renaissance of populism. Michel Theys
*** GEORGE KASSIMATIS: Le régime inhumain des prêts à la Grèce. L'expérience grecque d'un problème européen aux dimensions mondiales. Editions Livanis (98 Solonos, GR-10680 Athens. Tel: (30-210) 3661200 - Fax: 3617791 - Email: webmaster@livanis.gr - Internet: http://www.livanis.gr ). Politique - Economie series. 2015, 328 pp, €18.88. ISBN 978-960-14-2919-9.
Respected constitutionalist George Kassimatis cross-examines in this book the manipulation that he says the Greeks are subject to. A manipulation that takes the form of continual psychological violence that causes fear and gives Greeks an implacable feeling of guilt, both personally and collectively. And also a mammoth manipulation in the media, argues this Athens University professor, all of which hide the real social consequences of the inhumane regime forced on Greece, a regime that even goes as far as shaking the foundations of democracy itself, for example the justice system and trad unionism. The author contends that Greece is not the only country to be manipulated: it is the very idea of the progress of Europe that is currently being damaged, through manipulation in Greece that spares neither political power nor the domain of foreign policy, nor economic policy and the economy in general. In a way, this is the apotheosis of the corruption policy designed to manipulate political leaders, important businessmen, scientists and celebrities in general. Does this mean that for Greeks, all is lost? No, the author says they have enough resources to be able to recover. (AKa)
*** NADIA VALAVANI: L'enlèvement de la Grèce. La detteet les privatisations - Une chroniqueparlementaire. Editions Livanis (see above). Politique series. 2015, 296 pp, €15.55. ISBN 978-960-14-2916-8.
Ancient Greek mythology explains that love-smitten Zeus turned himself into a peaceful but powerful bull to seduce and carry off the Phoenician princess Europe. Greece has been experiencing a strange mutation of this primordial myth for the past five years because it is itself the victim of being carried off by contemporary Europe and its 'allies.' Only this carrying off has none of the myth's eroticism or charm. Economist Nadia Valavani, deputy economy minister in the Greek government headed by Alexis Tsipras, says this ravishment is in fact an organised pillaging and asset-stripping of the country, its sovereignty and its public wealth, all under the pretext of unending debt. It amounts to a social holocaust for the vast majority of the country's inhabitants. This book aims to be a parliamentary chronicle of this pillage carried out in the name of neoliberal doctrine. As the author sees it, only taking control of public wealth and using it efficiently to serve the interests of the people will ensure the long-term survival of Greek society and the country itself. (AKa)
*** VASSILIS VAMVAKAS: La raison de la crise. La polarisation, la violence, la réflexion sur la politique et la culture populaire. Éditions Epikentro (9 rue Kamvounion, GR-54621 Thessalonica. Tel: (30-231) 0256146 - Fax: 0256148 - Email: http://www.epikentro.gr ). 2014, 304 pp, €18. ISBN 978-960-458533-5.
The current crisis was associated with the Memorandum even before the Memorandum was put into action, and even before the forced reforms and painful pay and pension cuts became a reality. Discussion about the “drug” and its toxic or therapeutic dose very soon diverted attention away from the actual “illness.” According to Vassilis Vamvakas, lecturer in sociology and communications at Aristotle University in Thessalonica's School of Journalism and Media, very few analyses or interpretations of the problem have found any resonance in public discourse, which has focused on the principal results of the Memorandum and its success or failure rather than the crisis itself. This collection of essays does not attempt to measure the gap between systematic analysis of the reasons behind the crisis and the recent state of public discourse. The articles (which were previously published in various newspapers) are only a first attempt to provide ways of understanding the new forms of public discourse. The author says it is a first attempt to begin a cartography of domains in which intense polarisation has flourished, along with unexpected violence and words of hate. It also reflects on the causes and consequences of the crisis, mainly during the period 2012-2013. (AKa)
*** TOBIAS LOSCHER: Präventive Aufsicht der Europäischen Union über den Bundeshaushalt. Peter Lang (1 Moosstrasse, P. O. Box 350, CH-2542 Pieterlen. Tel: (41-32) 3761717 - Fax: 3761727 - Email: info@peterlang.com - Internet: http://www.peterlang.com ). "Finanz- und Steuerrecht in Deutschland und Europa" series. 2014, 291 pp, €66.95. ISBN 978-3-631-65450-7.
One of the aims of discussions about reform of economic and monetary union is to strengthen the common rules and provide the European level with the means to monitor and, where necessary, penalise in order to prevent a budget deficit developing in the member states. Thomas Loscher's thesis, however, reveals the limits of such a reform in both European and German constitutional law. He points out that the latter does not allow the transfer of key budget powers to the European level. The author says that only a greater restriction of Parliament's decision-making powers for measures that would generate debt would comply with the rules under German constitutional law.
(GLe)
*** L'Europe en formation. Revue d'Etudes sur la Construction Européenne et le Fédéralisme - Journal of Studies on European Integration and Federalism. Centre International de Formation Européenne (10 av. des Fleurs, F-06000 Nice. Tel: (33-4) 93979397 - Fax: 93979398 - Email: europe.formation@cife.eu - Internet: http://www.europeenformation.eu ). 2014, No. 373, 128 pp, €20. Subscription: €50.
The most recent issue of this review that was begun fifty-five years ago by the high-priest of fundamental federalism, Alexandre Marc, contains a special report on the rising power of Eurosceptic and Europhobic parties in last year's European elections. Economist Laurent Baechler, the review's new Editor-in-Chief, says that among European citizens, this mostly seems to reflect a mixture of rejection of national political elites and criticism of the European project as currently led. The way he sees it, it is therefore less a rejection of the European project by the people than a pressing demand for an alternative Europe, because very urgent action is needed to move beyond the institutional shortcomings that gave rise to the malfunctioning of the eurozone and to boost the democratic legitimacy of European institutions as a whole. With this in mind, what about the Spitzenkandidat process that was introduced for selecting the president of the European Commission? Two German researchers provide cautious answers to the question, pointing out that the sphere of European political parties is still lacking in coherence, which is reflected in the varying levels of support for each of the heads of list in the member states. This question is also considered in Andrew Duff's reflections in an editorial on the “Juncker mandate.” In order to make this procedure truly credible in the European elections of 2019, the former liberal democrat MEP and former president of the European Union of Federalists, one should “resurrect the proposal to create a pan-European constituency from which a certain number of MEPs would be elected from transnational party lists.” In the same spirit, the elected president should have the right to choose his or her commissioners from a list of three people - at least one of whom should be a woman - submitted by each of the member state, and the College of Commissioners should be reduced in size so that it no longer resembles … COREPER. (MT)
*** Futuribles. L'anticipation au service de l'action. Futuribles Sarl (47 rue de Babylone, F-75007 Paris. Tel: (33-1) 53633770 - Fax: 42226554 - Email: revue@futuribles.com - Internet: http://www.futuribles.com ). January-February 2015, No. 404, 116 pp, €22. Annual subscription: €115. ISBN 978-2-84387-417-8.
Most of this issue of a recognised French future prospects review is devoted to the potentialities and sometimes the dangers of social and technological innovations offered to humanity to escape the deep crisis that the world is bogged down in, especially France and the European Union. Surely we are witnessing a retreat of public institutions, asks Hugues de Jouvenel in the editorial, accusing elected politicians and the elite who behave, he says, like travelling entertainers rather than strategists by turning their back on construction of the common good. In the same spirit, Jean-François Drevet slams France's lack of influence within the European Union, attributing it to the reprehensible error by the authorities in Paris of trying to preserve influence, favouring the intergovernmental approach and ignoring importance in any rule of law of sticking to one's commitments, including budget commitments. The analyst provocatively goes on to point out in passing that the European Union is not based on the balance of power, the way empires used to be, but rather on a common exercising of sovereignty, which implies respect for treaties and procedures. Hence France is responsible for breaking up the Franco-German engine and only her involvement on the international stage can provide hope of managing to get it working again in the future. (MT)
*** LIONEL ZETTER: Lobbying. The art of political persuasion. Harriman House (18 College Street, Peterfield, Hampshire GU31 4AD, Royaume-Uni. Tel: (44-1730) 233870 - Email: contact@harriman-house.com - Internet: http://www.harriman-house.com ). 2014, 600 pp, £38.24. ISBN 978-0-85719-410-7.
In this world of ours, lobbying as a persuasive art has become a global industry that prospers everywhere where democracy is established. We would be wrong, however, to believe that it is a modern invention, as shown in this book that some would consider a reference in this domain and that is now in its third edition. Lionel Zetter demystifies the world of international lobbying by going back to the origins of lobbying and describing the legal and ethical frameworks in which it has evolved. At the same time, the author provides a guide to the mechanisms used by the various types of lobbying, presenting the keys to planning a public opinion campaign and use of the media. He covers the globe in detail, particularly where pressure groups influence public affairs. In eleven chapters, ranging from the United Kingdom to Japan via Brussels and Washington, the Middle East and various Gulf States, he tries to show that lobbying adapts to the different political cultures. (CDe)