Featherstone, K., (2014), “The political challenges of institutional reform in Greece”, Policy Network, 11 Φεβρουαρίου.
Since 2010, Greece has endured deep social and economic pain. Indeed, its recession is now comparable to that of the Wall Street crash. No other European state has undergone such pain in the last fifty years or more. And, of course, Germany followed a more benign path towards the GDR than it has insisted upon with Athens. We should note the IMF’s admission of a year ago that it has wrongly estimated the effects of the Greek austerity programme: the calibration of the ‘multiplier effects’ was misconceived.
Eventually, tough austerity can overcome a government’s fiscal imbalances. Thus, in 2014 Greece will have achieved a primary budget surplus and should return to economic growth. Business confidence is rising, as is foreign investment. Greece has seen the biggest fiscal re-balancing in the OECD’s history.
Does this mean that the bail-out strategy is working? The answer is only partly and that bigger challenges remain. Removing a deficit is one thing – and when the IMF comes to town that’s what their prime aim is – and deeper, structural reform is quite another. Even if Chancellor Merkel had thrown money at Greece to ease its debt crisis, no serious analyst could have claimed that the public institutions – and the state administration in particular – were ‘fit for purpose’.
Σχετικές Αναρτήσεις
- Hatzis, A., (2013), “Greece’s Reforms Have Only Cracked the Surface”, The Wall Street Journal, 05 Δεκεμβρίου.
- Bastian, J., (2013), “Debt relief or debt restructuring for Greece?”, MacroPolis, The Agora Blog, 08 Δεκεμβρίου.