Yanis Varoufakis: A Hero Worthy Of His Heritage.

Dropping The Pilot: The classical character of Varoufakis’s departure as Greece’s Finance Minister was made even more poignant by the fact that his own personal defeat was announced amidst the echoing tumult of a victory that he, more than anyone, had secured for his people.

 

“WE OF THE LEFT know how to act collectively with no care for the privileges of office.” How long has it been since a left-wing leader talked like that? Yanis Varoufakis may have used a blogpost to announce his resignation to the world, but the sentiments he expressed were straight out of Homer. Like the hero of an ancient Greek legend, he showed that he understood both the duty he was bound to fulfil, and that he embraced it with a glad heart.

 

The classical character of Varoufakis’s departure as Greece’s Finance Minister was made even more poignant by the fact that his own personal defeat was announced amidst the echoing tumult of a victory that he, more than anyone, had secured for his people.

 

Across the whole of Greece, from Thrace in the north to Crete in the south, the Greek people had delivered a resounding “Oxi!” (No!) to the European Union’s demands for never-ending austerity.

 

Beneath a frenzy of flailing flags, in Athens’ Syntagma Square, tens-of-thousands of supporters of the Syriza Party-led coalition government shouted their defiance of the hated “Troika” (the European Commission, the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund). But, even as the Oxi voters celebrated, Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras was delivering the “Eurogroup’s” lethal ultimatum to his Finance Minister.

 

In Varoufakis’s own words: “Soon after the announcement of the referendum results, I was made aware of a certain preference by some Eurogroup participants, and assorted ‘partners’, for my… ‘absence’ from its meetings; an idea that the Prime Minister judged to be potentially helpful to him in reaching an agreement. For this reason I am leaving the Ministry of Finance today.”

 

If, as Troy burned, King Agamemnon had asked Odysseus to appease its tutelary deities by falling on his sword, the shock of injustice and ingratitude could hardly have been greater. But Varoufakis did not demur. “I consider it my duty to help Alexis Tsipras exploit, as he sees fit, the capital that the Greek people granted us through yesterday’s referendum.”

 

And yet, even as he abandoned his portfolio for the back-benches, Varoufakis could not resist one final, parting shot at the European hierarchs who, in their petulant fury, had demanded his political head.

 

“And I shall wear the creditors’ loathing with pride.”

 

This undisguised contempt for both the intellect and the character of Greece’s European creditors was, almost certainly, Varoufakis’s hamartia (in Classical Greek literary tradition, the fatal character flaw that causes the hero’s downfall). The son of a wealthy Greek industrialist, Varoufakis was never for a moment overawed by the European Union’s political bureaucrats and bureaucratic politicians. That he was, himself, an accomplished academic economist and author merely heightened his conviction that he had nothing to fear, and even less to learn, from the Eurogroup’s “participants and assorted partners”.

 

That Varoufakis’s professional analysis of Greece’s economic position was correct (as confirmed by at least two Nobel laureates – Stiglitz and Krugman – and, more recently, by the IMF itself) only made him more insufferable to the likes of Germany’s 72-year-old Finance Minister, Wolfgang Schauble. The hard-working German ant did not appreciate being lectured at by some upstart Greek grasshopper with a PhD – and no neckties.

 

Varoufakis’s sartorial insouciance was, of course, as carefully calculated as his economic analyses. His leather jackets and brightly coloured shirts (all-too-often unaccompanied by the required necktie) signalled his determination to carry just a little Mediterranean sunshine and machismo into the grey, staid and deeply conventional world of European finance. That these ageing Teutons in their dark suits and sensible ties felt upstaged by Varoufakis’s big fat Greek virility was as obvious as it was disruptive. A rock star at a Rotary meeting could not have been more out of place.

 

But disruption and non-conformity were essential ingredients of the Varoufakis shtick. What better way to demonstrate his radical new approach to doing business with the “suits” than by refusing to turn up in one? In a world increasingly informed by images rather than words, Varoufakis was signalling that Neoliberalism is not the only game in town: that economic alternatives do exist.

 

His people got the message. And even if he is not there to deliver it in person, Varoufakis’s vision of a better world will continue to dazzle the eyes of the “gods” who demanded this Greek hero’s sacrifice.

 

This essay was originally published in The Waikato Times, The Taranaki Daily News, The Timaru Herald, The Otago Daily Times and The Greymouth Star of Friday, 10 July 2015.

Wisdom's Mirror: Can Grant Robertson Slay The Neoliberal Gorgon?

Reflected Gory: The Greek hero, Perseus, used Athena's bright shield to defeat Medusa. If Grant Robertson means to slay the neoliberal Gorgon he should, like Perseus, be guided by what he sees in Wisdom's Mirror. Neoliberalism can only be slain by the thing it set out to negate: the political economy of solidarity and generosity.

 

HOW TO ELIMINATE one’s rival without getting one’s hands dirty? It’s a problem with a prodigious political pedigree. King David’s lust for Bathsheba drove him to order, Uriah, her unfortunate husband, placed in the front line of battle – where he was promptly and conveniently slain. King Henry II, thwarted in his ambition to dominate the English Church by his old friend, Thomas Becket (whom he’d foolishly made Archbishop of Canterbury) cried out: “Will no one rid me of this turbulent priest!” Whereupon four of his knights immediately took it upon themselves to terminate the Archbishop’s turbulence with extreme prejudice. In neither case, however, did matters end well for these errant kings. God was watching David, and Henry had a Pope to placate.

 

Then again, there’s the legend of Perseus. If they’d had opinion polls on the Greek island of Serifos back in the days of King Polydectes, then the hero, Perseus, would have been the people’s preferred monarch. To protect his throne (and get his lustful paws on Perseus’ beautiful mother, Danae) Polydectes tricked the hero into promising to bring him any gift he cared to name. Without missing a beat, the King ordered Perseus to bring him the head of Medusa – the monstrous Gorgon who had only to look upon a man and he was instantly turned to stone.

 

Now in the ordinary run of things, Perseus would have been a goner. But, of course, as Zeus’s son, he had friends in the highest of places. And so, with the help of the gods Hermes and Athena, he was able to cut off Medusa’s head without being turned to stone. Returning to Serifos, Perseus bore the monster’s head to Polydectes who was, predictably, petrified.

 

Now, it strikes me that Andrew Little was born too late to have been enthralled (as I was) by the Children’s World Record Club’s magnificent rendering of the legend of Perseus and Medusa. [It’s how middle-class Kiwi parents entertained their children in the years before television!] Nevertheless, there is more than a hint of Polydectes deadly errand in Mr Little’s decision to confer the Finance Spokesperson role upon his most formidable political rival, Grant Robertson.

 



"Slay what?" Labour's Finance Spokesperson, Grant Robertson. 

 

The confident predictions of right-wing political commentators notwithstanding, Mr Little is expecting a great deal more from his Finance Spokesperson than yet another recitation of the neoliberal catechism. Mr Robertson has been given twelve months to come up with something new in the way of economic policy. Something that moves the Labour Party on from its 30 year infatuation with neoliberal dogma and introduces it to a practical and progressive set of economic alternatives.

 

Polydectes would be proud. Because Mr Robertson’s quest is full of perils. If ever there was a menagerie of solid rock, it is that vast collection of economic ideas upon which the neoliberal Gorgon has cast her petrifying gaze. Mr Robertson would not be the first social democrat to have his career turned to stone for the capital crime of embracing heterodox political economy. Just consider the fates of the US Democratic Party’s Walter Mondale, or the German SPD’s Oskar Lafontaine.

 

But perhaps the very myth that exemplifies Mr Robertson’s predicament also points the way to its solution.

 

According to story, Perseus was gifted with several crucial items by Hermes and Athena. From the god he received winged sandals, upon which he could fly; Zeus’s sword, that cut through brass and iron; and Hades’ helmet, which made him invisible. From the goddess he received a mighty shield in whose polished surface he could safely view Medusa’s harmless reflection. It was Athena’s – the Goddess of Wisdom’s – gift that guided his sword-arm at the critical moment.

 

What, then, is the mirror image of neoliberalism? To learn the answer, Mr Robertson need look no further than this morning’s (12/12/14) NZ Herald editorial. Responding to the recent OECD report in which New Zealand is singled out for the size of the gulf separating its richest and poorest citizens, the leader writer wrote:

 

“In one sense this is not a surprise. New Zealand was a highly protected economy until the mid-1980s with a strongly unionised labour force, high taxation and universal benefits. It had removed these arrangements rapidly by the mid-1990s, conscious that it was opening itself to world markets later than most and with trade disadvantages of distance and scale.”

 

It would seem that Mr Robertson’s search for an alternative to the iniquitous neoliberal prescription should begin with the things that neoliberalism was intended to replace: policies that enable New Zealand-based businesses to grow and prosper; laws that ensure the rights of employees are protected and that their remuneration is both fair and adequate; and finally, the overarching determination that (as the OECD’s report itself recommends) the nation’s wealth be redistributed in ways that permit all of its citizens to aspire to full, productive and happy lives.

 

An economic policy elaborating these three themes would, indeed, be a mighty sword in the hands of a Labour Finance Minister – especially one who had taught himself to see, in Wisdom’s mirror, exactly where to strike.

 

Reviewing the tasks Mr Little has set Mr Robertson, it is possible that I have done him a disservice in comparing him to the evil King Polydectes. If the Labour leader’s true purpose had been to send his rival upon a quest he could not complete, would he have put him in charge of Labour’s broad-ranging inquiry into the future of work? Is it not more likely that, by giving Mr Robertson this responsibility, Mr Little has indicated the direction in which he wishes Labour and its finance spokesperson to march? To a New Zealand where the rights of citizens and their prosperity are inextricably bound together, and where the true purpose of political economy is to ensure the continuance of both.

 

Sometimes the best way to eliminate a rival is not to turn him to stone, but to allow him to blossom and bear fruit. The Gods, they say, help those who help themselves – and each other.

 

This essay was posted simultaneously on The Daily Blog and Bowalley Road blogsites on Saturday, 13 December 2014.