MA Sultan - محمد سلطان
A country's sovereignty is defined as having a full independence and supreme authority to make its own decisions or set its agenda, either nationally or internationally, without any sort of internal or external intrusions or dictations. The relationship between Greece and the European Union (EU) has been always very sensitive since 2009 when the euro crisis occurred. The story began by the creation of the European Monetary Union, between 1990 and 1999, which one of its four fundamental goals and requirements is to have currency stability and the budgetary deficit should not exceed 3% of GDP. Concerning Greece joining the EU, the requirements were not applied strictly on all the candidates, for Greece it had a very high budgetary deficit and debt which rings a bill why the EU leaders were very flexible and allowed Greece to join the union disregarding its critical financial situation. The creation of the EU was meant to increase and preserve the freedoms and the rights of the Union's members to achieve and continue in establishing reformations that are deemed as democratically political and financially prosperous approaches. Having said that, the laws and plans decreed by the EU had to be abide by all the members and for the sake of the members' goodness.
During the global financial crises in 2008, Greece had been already exhausted with the fiscal burdens because of its very crucial and vulnerable capability to pay the overdue high debts and the miserable life the citizens are living which ensued more problems especially when the government was not acting responsibly. Such dramatic status lead major EU countries like German, French and other banks to intervene and help or exploit Greece by financing it. In my opinion, such step was the first intrusion in Greece's sovereignty, for that made the major powers financing Greece can have a say in the internal and external politics of Greece. By the advent of the amendments in the Europeans Treaty by Lisbon Treaty, it explicitly said that "No bailout Clause" and that was a shock for the financing countries for Greece. However, the amendment came into effect in 2009 and it was like a war for who will bear the losses of such disaster. It was not solely a financial crisis for Greece, but for the entire union because of the assistance made by the major powers who bought the bonds in the banks.
In fact, the financial foreign assistance reminds me of what the former CIA agent, John Perkins, said in "Confessions Of An Economic Hitman" explaining how the financial burdens were used to impose the American views on Panama, Latin America or even the Arab Gulf countries. For Greece to survive this disastrous economic wave, it had to abide by the repercussions proposed by the European Union. Similarly, all the requirements were challenging the sovereignty of Greece, such as making extraordinary cuts and increasing the taxes. Surprisingly, almost 75% of the public expenditure is dedicated to pensions and public wages which if got restricted, the working class and even poor people will suffer dramatically. Also, following the taxation approach will lead to deflation of the economy which will affect the poor class directly because the indirect tax is meant to be levied on goods not the annual income and that will insanely lead to inflammation and high prices. Both approaches were more or less about intervening the sovereign arena of the state, Greece is no longer free to make it is own decision.
In conclusion, I consider the Greece-Europe crisis as a new form of colonization represented in the contemporary form of corporationalism. It is the new form of how the old powers manipulated it by chartered companies in Africa or even the metropolitan-peripheral analogy in Europe. Yet, the financial intervention in Greece was not entirely proper and safe because it exacerbated the problems and in an indirect way assisted in worsening other EU member countries, like Spain, facing the same fate with high debts. Ironically, such an outcome was used as an alibi for the northern European countries that intervened to stabilize and fix the decline of the financial situation.
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