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Jacques Le Cacheux - In July 2015 the European Union imposed on Greece a third assistance plan. This plan is extremely controversial. Why ?
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Rencontrer les enseignants
Sylvain KAHNProfessor
History and Geography
Thomas RAINEAUProfessor
History
Philippe PERCHOCProfessor
History and Political Science
"In July 2016, the European Union imposed a third aid plan on Greece."
"This plan is very controversial. Why so?"
-Hello, Jacques Le Cacheux.
-Hello, Sylvain Kahn.
-You are an economist, a professor at the University of Pau
and Sciences Po, a researcher at the OFCE, the Office français
des conjonctures économiques,
and you specialize in European economic issues.
We are in June 2016 and everyone remembers that, about a year ago,
in July 2015, the European Union imposed a third aid plan on Greece.
This plan was very controversial and still is. Why so?
-You remember that the Greek crisis started in 2010
with speculative attacks on the Greek debt.
That there had already been two aid plans granted by the European Union
in order to end the Greek public debt crisis.
That it already represented over 200 billion euros.
-It was a loan, not a donation.
-Absolutely. But there has also been a partial cancellation
of the public debt held by private institutions.
So a certain number of measures have been taken since 2010
to try and make this Greek public debt more manageable.
But, in 2015, you remember that general elections were held in Greece
at the end of 2014, that a new government arrived
at the beginning of 2015 with a clear anti-austerity stance.
-The government led by Alexis Tsipras.
-Indeed.
-Leader of the Syriza party.
-And his famous minister for Finance back then, Varoufakis, who was,
in a very militant way, hostile to the approach
chosen by the European Union since the beginning of the crisis.
-This approach consisted in granting loans in exchange for...
-In exchange for policies that we call austerity policies,
that is to say policies to massively reduce public expenditures
and massively increase compulsory levies, taxes, etc.,
in order to try and reduce the budget deficit and better control
the path of the public debt. In this context, during spring 2015,
it clearly appeared that what had been done until then was not enough
to bring this debt back on a sensible path.
At that time, the Greek public debt already represented 170% of the GDP
while it was around 150% at the start of the crisis.
It had not decreased and even kept on increasing.
So, of course, we wondered what could be done to face this issue.
Basically, there were two stances. On the one hand, to make it simple,
those who campaigned for a massive reduction of the Greek debt
one way or the other in order to lighten the burden.
On the other hand, those who supported a policy to continue austerity,
mainly Germany, but also other European countries to some extent.
We often talk about Germany, but do not forget
the Finnish government, the Netherlands, etc.,
a certain number of countries... -Austria.
-Austria, too, are clearly in this camp.
The camp of those we could call tough,
those who think that if one made a mistake, one had to pay
and make an effort to repair the damage one did to oneself
without counting on someone else to do it.
In this situation, at the beginning of summer,
there was a new episode of tension between the Greek government
and the Euro Area authorities, but also, as you know,
a referendum, etc., a series of troubling political events
when seen from the outside.
For example, Tsipras submitted to a referendum
a rather hostile stance regarding the negotiation
of a new austerity plan with Europe and, a few days later, he accepted,
after winning his referendum, to nevertheless negotiate
what eventually proved to also be an austerity plan.
In these conditions, it is quite difficult to exercise
any judgment on this because, once again,
we stopped right in the middle of the ford.
New austerity measures have been imposed and, at the same time,
we still have not decided what we will do about the public debt.
Today, I think that the IMF very clearly campaigns
for a massive reduction, or restructuring, for something
that significantly loosens financial constraints on the Greek government.
Whereas the German government is still rather reluctant.
But it seems that, for a few days now, we have been heading
towards a reasonable compromise regarding that issue.
-But a compromise nevertheless, since you mention
the Council of Ministers for Finance of the Euro Area that was held in May.
This compromise would lead to the fact that we accept to mention
a possible debt forgiveness but not before 2017.
-Yes, it requires a lot of time.
But I think that it is already a sign that stances are converging.
Meaning that, eventually, the German government faces its contradictions.
On the one hand, the German government demands that the IMF should be
in the creditor pool that supports the Greek government and,
on the other hand, it refuses to comply with the request of the IMF
that says Greek issues will not be solved if we do not accept
a reduction of the Greek debt.
Here, Germany took a step in the right direction.
But it does require a lot of time indeed.
But, getting back to the plan decided in July-August 2015,
I think that it is different from the previous ones.
It is less drastic in terms of austerity and smarter
in terms of structural reforms.
I am thus more optimistic regarding the chances that this plan
will help the Greek public finances,
even if there is still a lot of work to do, of course.
I was satisfied to see that the government of Tsipras
managed to have its parliament vote almost all the reforms
that were requested.
It means that he is able to control this majority
even if it is extremely fragile.
He must currently have approximately two seats of majority.
I think it shows that this government is responsible.
-You are saying this, but what would you reply to some of your colleagues?
You mentioned Varoufakis, an economist who was briefly a Minister,
who became an economist again and who started a political movement.
Or I think about Galbraith Junior and others.
We could think of the economists who signed the Manifesto
of the appalled economists, for example.
What would you reply to your colleagues
who almost say that Greece is being subjected or colonized
by the rest of Europe?
-I think that Greece has been suffering
since the beginning of the 19th century, since its independence...
-1830.
-That is it. With the help of France, England and Russia.
If suffers from a serious issue related to state legitimacy,
administration quality, cronyism in public administration, etc.
These structural issues that are really...
-You are almost talking about a failed State.
-Yes, but I think it is linked to its history.
Greece was a province of the Ottoman Empire.
The Greeks think that they won the Greek independence war,
but actually without France, England and Russia,
Greece would have never become independent.
Greece never managed to get a non-corrupt and efficient state
and administration. There is still no Land Registry in Greece.
The Greek administration possesses really alarming archaisms
when seen from Europe.
I think that Europe is partly responsible for the fact
that it lasted for so long.
In particular, when we included Greece in the European Community in 1981,
we never did what we have done for the Eastern countries
in 2004 and 2007,
that is to say help them upgrade their legal system,
their administration, etc., beforehand.
Between 2000 and 2004, we did it for the new members that joined.
We spent a lot of money.
We massively supported them on a technical level.
Those were former communist countries, everything had to be rebuilt, etc.,
but we did it. But we never did for Greece.
Thus Greece, today, is almost in the same situation as it was
a century ago, yes, a failed State. Something like that anyway.
We need to take the bull by the horns.
At some point, even for their own good,
we must force them to make reforms that would not be made otherwise.
It does not shock me even if, of course, it can sometimes
seem a bit neocolonial on certain points
to impose such or such reform.
But, at the same time, we are all members of the same union.
This union possesses a certain number of standards
in terms of administration quality, legal system quality, etc.
We have imposed these standards on the new members when they joined.
We never really did it for Greece, it is now time.
So, from that perspective, it does not shock me.
Then, I would say that this plan is better than the previous ones
because there are less government spending reductions
than in the previous ones, but there is also a full section,
that will hopefully come true, regarding financing, investment,
reinjection of European money in the Greek economy that should avoid
the extremely recessive character of the previous adjustment plans.
-Indeed, because in the meantime, the Greeks suffer,
poverty has been massively progressing, inequalities have grown,
the Piraeus has been privatized, it was sold to Chinese investors.
When one is not an economist, it seems hard to accept.
-Yes it is very hard and, at the same time,
I think that what we see today,
I will be rather tough on the governments before Tsipras,
is the consequence of policies that were really unbalanced.
In the previous austerity plans...
Tsipras did not win the elections in December 2014 by chance.
The previous governments had targeted a major part of the measures
in order to protect certain categories of the population which, eventually,
did not really suffer.
Thus misery, etc., is also a consequence of the poor targeting
of the previous austerity plans.
I think that the Tsipras government can be credited with trying
to put things right, trying to preserve
at least some minimum allowances, etc., implementing,
recently voting, a pension reform which is, so does it seem to me,
rather fair since it preserves low pensions
and mostly reduces the highest, etc.
I can credit the current government with that
and I am waiting for the consequences.
But I think that they will be less negative, even more favorable,
than that of the previous plans.
-Listening to what you say, we get the feeling that Greece
is a particular case and that we cannot consider
the Greek policy of the European Union,
towards one of its members, Greece,
as representative of other aid plans that were implemented.
I am thinking about Ireland, Portugal, Spain, especially,
in the context of this new European stability mechanism.
Can it be said?
-It is true that at a European level, be it the European Commission
or a majority of the members of the Eurogroup, for example,
especially the German government but also the Finnish government,
the Dutch government...
-The Austrian government.
-There is a certain ideology, what we call structural reforms in fact.
This idea that a certain number of reforms must be achieved
to bring greater flexibility to labor markets,
reduce the cost of social security,
that it is better to reduce government spending than increasing taxes
in order to reduce budget deficits, etc.
It does exist and it is the European doctrine.
It is not specific to the Greek case.
It is something that can be found everywhere,
even in the European Commission recommendations
given to the French government last week
in the context of the European Semester.
-In June 2016.
-Yes. All this can be found, it is undeniable. There is this way.
But I also wanted to say that, in the Greek case,
there is a specificity related to...
When you look at the rate of tax contributions, tax incomes,
inequalities, the Greek public service, etc.,
there are a few very striking Greek particularities.
-Thank you very much. -Thank you.
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