The bankrupting of democracy is too high a price to pay for the Euro-elites’ scheme to save their system through more austerity and integration.by Mick Hume
Amid all the
endless speculation and wrangling over how the Euro-crisis will end, one question
remains unanswered: who has bothered to ask the people of Europe what they
think of the anti-crisis measures being imposed across the continent, or of
their rulers’ plans for the future of the Eurozone and the European Union?
When even the Europe editor of the
Europhile BBC suggests that ‘it is quite possible that an early casualty in the
Eurozone crisis will be democracy’, it is surely time to ask some serious
questions about the way that the handling of Europe’s financial and economic
problems is intensifying the crisis of democratic politics.
If there is one thing that worries the
Euro-elites even more than their out-of-control finances these days, it is
their uncontrollable electorates. Governments, EU bureaucrats and Euro-bankers
do not trust the ignorant European masses, many of whom have stubbornly refused
to accept (on the rare occasions they have been asked) that the authorities
know what’s best for them. We have followed on spiked in recent years the elites’ sustained
efforts to impose a new centralised constitution on the EU and then, when those
nations offered a vote rejected their imperious plans, to sneak it in through
the backdoor anyway. They will not take ‘no’ for an answer, no matter how often
and how loudly we tell them.
The contempt for democracy in high places
has come out more forcefully in response to the Euro-crisis. First the faceless
officials and financiers of the EU, the European Central Bank (ECB) and the
International Monetary Fund effectively deposed the elected government of Ireland
and took over managing its debt-ridden economy. Now Greece, the current cockpit
of the Euro-crisis, is suffering the same fate, sentenced to a debtors’ prison
and subjected to dictatorship-by-bureaucrat.
And the supposedly more powerful members
of the Euro club are not immune either. We now know that in August the ECB
wrote to Italian premier Silvio Berlusconi, demanding that ‘bold and immediate
action’ to cut public spending and reform the labour market was ‘essential’
before the ECB could help to lower Italy’s debt burden. It reads like a
bailiffs’ demand to indebted tenants, only aimed at a sovereign government. And
all done in private, of course, until somebody leaked the letter last week.
Some elder European statesmen have raised
concerns about this behind-closed-doors undermining of democratic governments.
The German president Christian Wulff has warned that the ECB’s manipulation of
Euro states’ national finances through the purchase of government bonds strikes
at the ‘very core’ of democracy, leaving some governments in ignorance of what
is happening to their own treasuries. A former Austrian chancellor has also
reportedly warned of the danger of an advancing ‘dictatorship of experts’ in
Europe.
Yet within today’s political circles there
remains a largely unspoken consensus that this is how things have to be.
Everybody can now see that it was misconceived to imagine they could smoothly
integrate economies as different as mighty Germany and creaky Greece into the
same single European currency. But what is the only solution the elites can see
for the failure of economic integration? Why, more and closer Euro-integration,
of course! They want to centralise control over public finances and borrowings
as well as exchange and interest rates. And this concentration of more power in
the hands of bureaucrats, bankers and accountants is now effectively endorsed
as the only solution not only by the Euro-bureaucrats themselves, but also by
‘outsiders’ such as US president Obama and Tory chancellor of the UK exchequer
George Osborne.
Every discussion of the possible outcome
of the crisis only seems to suggest two options: either a ‘disastrous’ break-up
of the Eurozone or its ‘restructuring’ – that is, a mega-bailout coupled with
further moves towards fiscal as well as economic union. The first of these is
not really considered an option at all by the Euro-elites. It would be an act
of political suicide on their part. So the second option is their only one. But
they also fear what the reaction of their peoples will be to that, especially
in Germany and France.
Their answer has been effectively to
suspend democratic debate of these matters and keep the public out of the loop,
conducting the real deals in smoke-free rooms and secret correspondence behind
a curtain of media obfuscation. So for example, we have been repeatedly assured
that the idea of the Greek government defaulting on its debts is out of the
question. Meanwhile behind the scenes, plans have been put in place for a sort
of slow-motion, secret default on at least half of Greece’s national debt. We
have also been assured that each bailout of banks and governments is the last –
until the next one. Meanwhile, the numbers apparently required for a grand
bailout of governments and re-capitalisation of banks have crept up from ‘only’
billions of Euros to trillions. No doubt when the leaders finally agree the
latest deal it will be declared a triumph for European democracy, the absence
of any public consent for it quietly shoved under the carpet along with those
unpaid Greek debts.
Through all of this semi-secret financial
jiggery-pokery there has been a remarkable absence of any real public
discussion of the fundamentals of Europe’s economic crisis. Great play was made
in the British media last week of the German parliamentary debate before the
Bundestag voted to pass the Greek support package by a large majority. Rather
less was said about the fact that this stage-managed occasion was merely
ratifying the deal done back in July, not the Euro-leaders’ latest proposed
mega-bailout, and that it was passed only after senior figures assured
parliament that there would be no bigger demands made on the German taxpayer.
Even then, the uncertain parliamentarians were hardly reflecting the views of
their voters, half of whom tell opinion pollsters they would rather scrap the
Euro and bring back the Deutschmark. Little wonder the Eurocrats are so nervous
about telling us the truth.
Yet despite the widespread discontent and
anger across much of Europe at the counter-crisis measures being imposed, there
is little sign of any political alternative on offer. Instead, formal political
debate has been reduced to the sort of petty issues we have seen kicked around
during the UK party conference season. Meanwhile, the leaders of all Europe’s
major parties basically agree that on the substantive issue of the crisis there
is no alternative; the austerity-and-integration show must go on, whether the
citizens of Europe they purport to represent like it or not, and whether or not
it will work.
It has become almost a cliché to talk
about the need for more leadership in European politics. Like many clichés, it
is true. But what the political-media class largely means by leadership today
is having the nerve to press ahead more forcefully with the bureaucracy’s big
plan for Euro-survival, and worry less about what the little people think. For
them, ‘leadership’ equals unqualified elitism. For some of us, on the other
hand, genuine political leadership in a supposedly democratic society would
mean leading a public debate on the crisis and winning the argument for your
vision. The pathetic excuses we have for leaders today, however, have no
argument to offer, beyond the spectre of Euro-apocalypse and the desperate need
to cling together for their own survival.
Yet what opposition does exist today seems
to have if anything even less a grasp of reality. The sort of protest groups
that have grabbed headlines in Europe and America of late look more like
childish adolescents throwing a tantrum at their mean parents than serious
movements for social change. In this context, the protesters’ demand for
countries such as Greece and Ireland to default on their debts looks less like
a radical alternative than another stop-the-world-I-want-to-get-off cop-out.
There is no more engagement with the issues of economic crisis and the future
of our societies here than in the empty debates in our parliaments and at party
conferences.
Is there an alternative to the current
elitism scheme for imposing further austerity-plus-integration? The consequence
of allowing debtor nations to default and the fallout that would follow would
undoubtedly be very serious. But that is no excuse for closing down the debate
and refusing to think outside the accountants’ box-file.
Democracy is a meaningless charade without
choices and competing visions for the future of society. And the bankrupting of
democracy is surely too high a price to pay for any financial package. There is
no ready-made alternative economic solution to hand. But the very least we
should demand is that the true depth of the crisis be made public, and that
every aspect of the counter-crisis measures must be openly debated. The first
step in that direction should be to challenge the way that European democracy
is being bankrupted and asset-stripped in the name of saving the continent.
Fighting for the future of Europe is not the same thing as the survival of the
Euro-elites.
As things stand, we in Europe look set to
end up with the worst of both worlds. We are supposed to swallow the abrogation
of democracy and imposition of the dictatorship of experts and bureaucrats in
the name of economic necessity. And then their elitist schemes won’t work
anyway either to bring about an integrated Europe or to revitalise the Euro
economy.
The future of all the peoples of Europe is
far too important to be left to the discretion of Eurocrats, accountants,
bankers and political cowards.
Mick Hume is editor-at-large of spiked.
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