International Viewpoint - online socialist magazine

The Zemmour moment

Stathis Kouvelakis — 2021-10-26T03:24:42Z

Éric Zemmour's rise on the French political scene may seem dazzling — but it certainly didn't fall from the sky. The likely transfer of the main far-right media heavyweight into the party-political arena is a symptom that encapsulates the deeper trends of the current period.

- IV561 - October 2021 / France, Far Right

The “Hot Spring” Showed That Greeks Were Willing to Fight

Stathis Kouvelakis — 2021-10-03T08:45:01Z

“It is thus crucial that the lessons of this tough experience not be lost. The first is that even a mass movement of such magnitude cannot alone provide solutions to the problems posed by its own emergence. ”

- Features / Greece

Against the Repression in Greece

Costas Lapavitsas, Stathis Kouvelakis — 2019-02-03T06:43:16Z

In 2015 the international left invested its hopes in Syriza and its promise of a break with austerity. Today, it must call out the repression of social movements in Greece by Alexis Tsipras's government.

- IV529 - February 2019 / Greece

What's Next for Nuit Debout?

Stathis Kouvelakis — 2016-05-31T13:54:38Z

Nuit Debout, France's massive mobilizations against a proposal to dismantle the country's labor code, has drawn comparisons to similar international movements â€” Occupy, Turkey's Gezi Park, the movement of the squares in Greece. This wealth of experience helps us look at Nuit Debout and its prospects going forward.

- Features / France, Greece, Youth and student movements, Trade unions/workplace organizing

Europe's Border Guards

2016-05-21T07:21:33Z

Last year, the attempt of Greece's newly elected radical-left government to resist austerity policies imposed by the European Union institutions and the International Monetary Fund put the country at the center of world attention. This battle was definitively lost when Alexis Tsipras capitulated in July to the demands of the creditors, signing up to a third memorandum only days after a referendum in which Greeks had rejected a softer EU proposed austerity package. Since that moment, the plight of Greek society has only deepened. But it is now a silent suffering, deprived of the expectation of change and hope that had fueled the mobilizations of recent years. But 2016 again made Greece headline news, this time for a different reason. The laboratory of neoliberal shock therapy is also Europe's entrance gate for the millions of people leaving countries devastated by war and poverty. Syriza's capitulation to the troika has made the plight of refugees even worse.

- IV496 - May 2016 / Europe, Greece, Migration, European Union

What is to be Done with the Banks? Radical Proposals for Radical Changes

2016-04-14T07:55:54Z

Nine years after the outbreak of the financial crisis that continues to produce damaging social effects through the austerity policies imposed on victim populations, it's time to take another look at the commitments that were made at that time by bankers, financiers, politicians and regulatory bodies. Those four players have failed fundamentally in the promises they made in the wake of the crisis – to moralise the banking system, separate commercial banks from investment banks, end exorbitant salaries and bonuses, and finally finance the real economy. We didn't believe those promises at the time, and for good reason. Instead of a moralising of the banking system, all we've had is a long list of misappropriations that have been brought to light by a series of bank failures, beginning with that of Lehman Brothers in 15 September, 2008.

- IV495 - April 2016 / Economy, Debt

Towards a pro-austerity “grand coalition”?

Stathis Kouvelakis — 2015-12-10T08:32:45Z

The avalanche of austerity measures (all included in the 3d Memorandum signed by Tsipras) passed by the Greek parliament in the last weeks (possibility of home repossession for the bad-payers, series of new taxes) - and the imminence of new ones - combined with the first surge of social mobilization (successful general strike of 12 November, multiple sectoral mobilizations), provokes the first cracks in the Syriza-Anel majority.

- IV491 - December 2015 / Greece

An exchange of views on the situation in Portugal

Catherine Samary, Stathis Kouvelakis — 2015-11-11T13:53:48Z

What will happen now in Portugal? This discussion is gripping the international left. Here we publish an exchange of views between Stathis Kouvelakis, leading member of the Left Platform in Syriza and now of Popular Unity, and Catherine Samary leading member of the Fourth International in France.

- IV490 - November 2015 / Portugal, New parties of the left, European Union

After Syriza

Stathis Kouvelakis — 2015-09-02T22:43:05Z

When Alexis Tspiras resigned his premiership earlier this month and called for a snap election, it signaled a new round in the ongoing battle between Greece and its creditors.

- IV488 - September 2015 / Greece, European Union

“Popular Unity” is born

Stathis Kouvelakis — 2015-08-21T20:01:44Z

Early this morning, 25 Syriza MPs left the parliamentary group of the party to create a new group under the name of “Popular Unity”. Most of these MPs are affiliated to the Left Platform, but some others also joined like Vangelis Diamantopoulos or Rachel Makri, a close collaborator of Zoe Kostantopoulou.

- IV487 - August 2015 / Greece