1. Greece and the European Project: Canary in the Coal Mine?
- Author:
- Daniel V. Speckhard
- Publication Date:
- 09-2015
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Institution:
- Council of American Ambassadors
- Abstract:
- After serving for two challenging years in the chaos of a war zone as the Deputy Chief of Mission in Iraq, I received word that I would become the next Ambassador to Greece. To be quite honest, I had mixed feelings. I looked forward to the challenge, but I imagined the post would be too sedate compared with the adrenalin-charged days and world-shaping events in Iraq. It was anything but. Within a year of my arrival, the streets were aflame with violent protests over a police shooting of a teenager. A year later, snap elections brought a socialist government to power. And soon thereafter, the onion was further peeled to expose a financial crisis and a crumbling economic foundation built on a corrupt, oligarchic, and debt-addicted system fed by billions of dollars of public and private EU loans and grants.
- Topic:
- Corruption, Economics, Politics, Financial Crisis, and European Union
- Political Geography:
- Europe and Greece