Comment: The British left shouldn’t put too much faith in Syriza
By Evel Economakis
A spectre is haunting Europe, the spectre of Syriza. Many socialist voters across Europe are looking to the new government in Athens to provide hope in a continent which has more than its fair share of right-wing governments. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but let me tell those on the British left: they should be cautious before they throw in their lot with Syriza.
Syriza, the party of Alexis Tsipras which came to power last month, is an acronym which means: 'Coalition of the Radical Left'. But does 'radical left' accurately describe this party? To be sure, in the eyes of Angela Merkel and the Troika, the pre-election promises Syriza made to the Greek people are socialist, even extremist. They pledged to renounce the debt, kick out the Troika bailiffs and put an end to austerity that has plagued the country for the last five years. So too are some of the statements the new government has made since it won the elections on January 25th, including finance minister Giannis Varoufakis' plan to halt the privatisation of two ports in Greece, increase the minimum wage and rehire some public sector workers.
None of these things, however, make Syriza socialist. And let us not forget that its junior partner in government, ANEL, or the Party of Independent Greeks, includes extreme right-wingers. Indeed, this mix is reflected in the way the members of the government dress. While many refuse to wear ties, and some don't even tuck in their shirts, others don three-piece suits.
Varoufakis traveled to Berlin, Brussels and other 'heavy' European capitals with hands cupped looking for money, prompting a great deal of speculation about his untucked shirt and lack of a tie. By contrast, the Cuban revolutionaries wore combat fatigues, and that was fine because they told all their creditors to buzz off. That made sense. This does not.
The Syriza government's demands are actually quite modest. All it has put on the European table is the request to spend less on interest and more on things like health care and aid to the destitute. If this is socialism, then Obama's Democrats are socialists, too.
Varoufakis equates Marxism with a "return to humanism and reason". Whose humanism and whose reason? For the past three years he has spoken to diverse audiences ranging from anti-austerity demonstrators in Athens' Syntagma Square, staff at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, Green parliamentarians in the European parliament, Bloomberg analysts in London and New York, the House of Commons in London, and hedge funds in Manhattan and London's City. The one group he has not spoken to are simple workers. This is odd, to say the least, for a self-proclaimed Marxist.
He also adopted Merkelist propaganda in a recent interview addressed to the German people, when he said they "paid so much money to Greece". Quite the contrary, no money came to the Greek people; instead it went to usurers and the bankocracy. The average Greek, whose monthly income is well below that of most Europeans, was – and still is – compelled to pay interest rates needed to service loans that save no-one but German, French, US, Chinese, and – yes – Greek bankers.
Even stranger are Varoufakis declarations that he does not want to replace capitalism with socialism. Rather, by his own admission, he is embarking upon a campaign for stabilising European capitalism in order to avoid the ascendency of right-wing Golden Dawn racist fanatics. He says he is adamantly against the disintegration of the eurozone. Is this a modern-day form of appeasement? Not surprisingly, real Marxists have accused him of being "defeatist" and a "latter-day Menshevik" striving to save the current European socio-economic system.
Greece's minister of finance says he wants alliances "even with right-wingers". He describes as "genuinely radical" his pursuit of a "modest agenda for stabilising a system that I despise". He says he runs the risk of surreptitiously "lessening the sadness from ditching any hope of replacing capitalism in my lifetime by indulging a feeling of having become 'agreeable' to the circles of 'polite society'".
Where are the workers in his equation? He does not explain how the rich have suffered in this crisis. Haven't they become wealthier? He omits any mention of the mega-capitalists backing Syriza, people like George Angelopoulos and Spiros Latsis. Instead, he refers only to second-tier capitalists, hedgefund managers and the like. Are these the proletarians in his dialectical super-scheme?
Is anyone surprised that in the last week more and more voices from major Greek capitalists have expressed sympathy for Tsipras' new government?
Fascism is born of capitalism in crisis. You cannot save capitalism from the fascists because fascists are not anti-capitalists and pose no threat to capitalism. By the same token, you can get rid of the current crisis and it will subside, but the fascists will only return during the next big financial downturn.
Varoufakis wants to save capitalism for "strategic purposes", from itself. Nowhere does he mention what he, Tsipras and Syriza intend to do once they have "saved" capitalism. How sweet this must all sound to big businessmen and bankers in Athens, London, Berlin, Paris, Madrid and New York.
Will the new government in Athens move dynamically against Berlin and Brussels? Strange as it may sound, if Syriza has the guts to do so, it will have the support of the ultra-nationalist bigots. This in turn will blunt the Nazis and sharpen the left. If Tsipras' government does not, the Nazis will return with a vengeance once it falls.
Evel Economakis is a high school history teacher in Greece, where he supports a family on 700 euros a month. He supplements his income as a construction worker and a seaman aboard freighters. He previously taught Russian and European history at the University of Toronto.
The opinions in Politics.co.uk's Comment and Analysis section are those of the author and are no reflection of the views of the website or its owners.
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