Democracy in Greece

The prime minister of Greece sprang a surprise by calling for a referendum on the proposed Greece rescue package. He has done well by looking for a democratic solution to the European problem.

The first point to note is that the problem is one of the European Monetary Union (emu), not of Greece. In rushing to a common currency across many countries, and forcing them to give up the sovereignty of a monetary policy to a European Central Bank a highly unstable situation was knowingly created in the interests of the strong European capital – banks in Germany and France that own most of the Greek debt. Italy is in trouble too, not because it is insolvent, but because there is no central bank in Italy.