Portside

The European debt crisis has little to do with poor budgeting and everything to do with crony capitalism.

Europeans, in order to lessen their dependence on Russian oil and gas, are plotting to develop European controlled solar energy in the Algerian (or Tunisian Sahara). These projects would be done in such a manner as to maintain the core-peripheral relations between France and Algeria - using neo-liberal economic models that the Europeans should own and control the energy sources while the North Africans would get nothing out of the deal. Before it was oil, now solar.

Europeans, in order to lessen their dependence on Russian oil and gas, are plotting to develop European controlled solar energy in the Algerian (or Tunisian Sahara). These projects would be done in such a manner as to maintain the core-peripheral relations between France and Algeria - using neo-liberal economic models that the Europeans should own and control the energy sources while the North Africans would get nothing out of the deal. Before it was oil, now solar.

Greece's new government is committed to `ecological transformation'. Syriza's existing programmatic commitments to work towards "the development of a new paradigm of social, environmental and economic development," and the need to build a public sector of a "new type" could transform energy and climate politics in the EU and beyond.

"Alexis Tsipras stated it correctly. Greece won a battle - perhaps a skirmish - and the war continues. But the political sea-change that SYRIZA's victory has sparked goes on. Greece has already changed; there is a spirit and dignity in Athens that was not there six months ago. Soon enough, new fronts will open in Spain, then perhaps Ireland, and later Portugal, all of which have elections coming. It is not likely that the government in Greece will collapse." *

Right-wing governments in Europe's periphery are terrified of a Greek success at the negotiating table. U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders writes, 'If Syriza succeeds in rolling back the EU-mandated measures...It could encourage dissident political movements in other parts of Europe...'

The Greek election was a warning that, while wealth and political power may be related, they are not the same thing: Governments can be overturned. Europe needs answers. The Greek crisis is a crisis of the entire EU. To one extent or other, every country - even Germany, the EU's engine - is characterized by falling or anemic wage growth, increasing economic inequality, spreading deflation, and an overall decline in living standards.

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Syriza will not easily sweep the policies of austerity aside, but there is a palpable feeling on the continent that a tide is turning. The victory of Greece's left-wing Syriza Party was, on one hand, a beacon for indebted countries like Spain, Portugal, Italy, and Ireland. It is also a gauntlet for Germany, the Netherlands, Finland, and the "troika" - the European Central Bank, the European Commission, and the International Monetary Fund.

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