Greek State plagued by clientelism and elitism, warns Dr Aris Trantidis, with PASOK’s collapse leading to a dominant clientelist network in power
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Dr. Aris Trantidis, a senior lecturer in International Relations and Politics at the University of Lincoln in the UK, will conduct a virtual seminar entitled “The Greek State’s Curse of Sisyphus: Clientelism” at 7pm on April 20, 2023, for the Greek Community of Melbourne (GCM).
Dr. Trantidis is a renowned author and has contributed to several top international publications. In addition, he authored the book “Greece and the Crisis: Clientelism and Economic Policy. Talking to Neos Kosmos he said that “clientelism is a very rational approach that essentially is the rule of politics worldwide and the question is why it hasn’t happened that much in very few places around the world, like Sweden.”
“Most countries have rampant levels of clientelism and corruption, all the countries in Africa, in Latin America and Asia.”
“There are few countries that had less clientelism, or a different form of clientelism, like those in Britain that only affects very high-level deals behind closed doors between big businesses, big donors, and politicians.”
In in the United States, (and possibly liberal democracies like Australia), Dr Trantidis argues, there is a different form of clientelism.
“Clientelism is happening in the United States because many appointments are partisan appointments.”
In many ways clientelism he argues is a synonym for patronage “in which politicians and the political groups select those who are able to give much more than a single vote.”
“You join a party, you give your energy, and your time, you help the campaign, and this is a much more valuable contribution, and your behaviour as a party member is monitored.”
In return he argues, you expect “some perks out of this and if there is an explicit agreement, or a very strong implicit understanding that you’re going to get something out of that.”
People approach power, and then they got rewarded.
He says that the Bernie Sanders campaign was a stark contrast to the normal way of political patronage as “nobody was expecting to be appointed by this administration, they were driven by ideology, but ideology alone is not sufficient for a very strong campaign.”
“You need money and that kind of money, the large sums of money, very rarely come from multiple small contributions in any money in that case.”
In the United States, and no doubt in Australia and Great Britain “where clientelism doesn’t concern the average citizen, it happens behind closed doors in lobbies and interest groups and big corporations.”
Dr Trandidis argues that when the Panhellenic Socialist Party, PASOK came into power in the 1980s it built an alternative clientelist network.
“PASOK built an alternative clientelist network to counter the longstanding clientelist network built by right wing governments, New Democracy for instance.”
It was the only way, according to him, that could “keep active and be highly mobilised”.
Over time the amount and the quality of “clientelist perks and benefits degenerated.”
“You couldn’t hire people permanently in the public administration because the public administration was full, so they created an exam process which was quite objective and supervised by an independent authority, but they found another way through fixed term contracts.” In effect, providing internships in the public service with the implicit aim of securing jobs for their clients.
“They continued with internships which give you job experience and you have the feeling that now I can apply for a job because I have certain points on my CV.”
In the post-crisis Greece, PASOK and New Democracy have in effect become one party says Dr. Trandidis says that clientelism has now become evident at the “elite level and does not get noticed in the popular press”.
“It doesn’t make the headlines because civil society in Greece was never independent of parties.”
He argues that in the past when you had two major parties both with strong clientelist networks and supporting newspapers, one side was exposing the other side’s mistakes and liabilities. “With the collapse of the PASOK, its clientelist network has integrated with New Democracy, because they were sharing power together for a while, and created a very strong and dominant clientelist network which is currently in power in Greece.”
He adds that it is necessary to have a strong civil society and media “that exposes this practise and the politicians found to be involved in those practises get somehow punished by the electorate.”
Dr. Trandidis laments that Greece has very weak civil society and except for some young people, that care for there is insufficient checks on power and clientelism.
“Civil society has been atrophied, either one is with the dominant party, or they are ostracised and excluded from the perks and benefits and it’s a much worse situation now because while clientelism was rampant in the ages, at least you had two alternative networks.”
Dr Trantidis interdisciplinary background’s seen him receive degrees from several renowned institutions including King’s College London, the London School of Economics, and the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki.
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