“And the social science — not a “gay science,” but a rueful –which finds the secret of this universe in “supply and demand,” and reduces the duty of human governors to that of letting men alone, is also wonderful. Not a “gay science,” I should say, like some we have heard of; no, a dreary, desolate and, indeed, quite abject and distressing one; what we might call, by way of eminence, the dismal science.” Thomas Carlyle.
“Economics is a serious subject” Joan Robinson.
“And ‘when laughter and gaiety are found, thinking is good for nothing’- that is the prejudice of this serious beast against all ‘gay science’” Friedrich Nietzsche.
Briefing:
During late October 2011 the E.U. asks Greece to sign a humiliating memorandum that mortgages great part of its infrastructure and demands exhausting cuts and taxes in order to achieve the goals set by the famous loan haircut (PSI). For that same reason, E.U. obliges the Greek Prime Minister (Georgios Papandreou) and his of secretary of economic affairs (Evangelos Venizelos) to commit by signing the deal. They both sign. When they return to Greece, Georgios Papandreou proposes a referendum–a fine move to avoid any responsibility for all the things signed but not yet disclosed in detail to the Greek public. Hell breaks loose and the Greeks who were up until then protesting against the sell out of their country’s sovereignty, back up for the first time in fear of exiting the Eurozone. Right afterwards Papandreou calls for a confidence vote in the Greek Parliament, and as soon as he achieves it, he resigns and plans for an all-party temporary government before the upcoming elections. Its role would be to reach the goals of the PSI in order for the IMF to proceed with a new long-term loan somewhere during late winter. The left refuses to join and the leaders of PASOK (‘socialist’ party), NEA DIMOKRATIA (the Greek ‘conservatives’) and LAOS (a Greek nationalist party) begin discussions. E.U. exerts great pressure to their leaders, to sign the memorandum. Antonis Samaras, the leader of NEW DEMOCRACY, tried hard not to sign it –since his popular politics was based on a “renegotiation” of the loan. Nevertheless, while he did not sign the agreement itself, he sent a signed statement to the IMF pledging support of the bailout plan –a statement that both the E.U and IMF accepted. After theatrical negotiations of the three leaders and the Greek president of democracy, the name of the new prime minister is announced. It is Loukas Papademos, who -among others- was a vice-president of the European Central Bank (2002-2010) and president of the National Bank of Greece (1994-2002) at a time when Goldman Sachs was allegedly cooking up Greece’s financial indicators for it to enter the Eurozone. The new government under Papademos lowered the political tone, implying that no more cuts would be made. Yet, during January even newer cuts were introduced. After the recent IMF report even more taxes are imposed to citizens that are already on the verge of poverty. And although the temporary government was supposed to rule up until the end of February, when elections would take place, today the date has been postponed for April the earliest, given that the requirements of the PSI first need to be met.
In the course of the past month Greeks started to feel in their bones what being within the Eurozone requires: a prolonged state of poverty, the trade of their country’s wealth and infrastructure (under the name of “structural reforms”), the loss of their sovereignty over a debt that by 2020 is going to reach –in the best scenario- 120% of Greece’s GDP. To calm down people’s rage, famous people (e.g. a fashion designer) and alleged economic criminals whose trials were infinitely postponed are now being arrested for debts to the Greek public. But this is not enough. Under the pressure of a potential social revolt and for the first time frightened of their once obedient electorate/clientele, politicians from both ruling parties begin to back down. Members of the former PASOK government who signed the first (June) memorandum bringing Greece into IMF, now claim that they had not even read it ! Other members of the same party claim that all this is done for the sake of Greece, given that this is the only solution. However recent polls give a dreadful view of PASOK –but also a most interesting view of Greece’s political possibilities. The results of the polls are changing from day to day, but a general idea can be given by the following results: 1st place for the conservatives (NEA DIMOKRATIA) with 30.5%; 2nd place for the left reformist party (DIMOKRATIKI ARISTERA) with a 13%; a 3rd place for the traditional communist party (KKE) with 12.5%; 4th place for yet another left reformist party (with the ironic name SYNASPISMOS meaning “coalition”) with also 12.5%; the former ruling ”socialist” party (PASOK) is to be found at the 5th place with a 12%; 6th place for the Greek nationalist party (LAOS) with 6%; 7th place for Greece’s Green party with a 3%.
From a quick look, beyond the fact that there is a great dissemination of votes among 8 parties, it is obvious that the left is attracting most votes. In theory, hadn’t the reformists split into half, they would be close to the top. Had the left been united, it would have won. One can imagine the worries such polls inspire to the IMF and the E.U., who asked for yet more commitments, this time from all the parties. And whereas interventions like these raise questions regarding the nature of democracy in the E.U. and its long-time fear of democratic procedures such as referendums, the real issue lies in whether the parties representing the left, also represent a possible and viable alternative to the IMF solution…
—–Over 150 years ago, Thomas Carlyle labeled political economy as a “dismal science” (though my personal favorite is his less known: “pig philosophy”). He did that within the context of an admittedly racist text (“Occasional Discourse on the Negro Question”), providing good ground for many liberals to counter his etiquette with an ad hominem argument (non liberal=racist). But let’s leave that aside. Carlyle coined the term “dismal” as opposed to “gay science” -the science of song, taken from the Consistori del Gay Saber, the Renaissance poetic academy of Toulouse. Nietzsche picked up on the term to denote the change of style in his writing/thought that was introduced in Daybreak and Gay Science, where poems were introduced. It marked the appearance of a singing philosophy, a philosophy of laughter and gaiety, a philosophy at the service of life -as one of his early texts promised.
It does not take too much effort to sense the false dilemma here: gay science, the science of unwariness, the science of light hearted thought, written in language poetic; dismal science, the petty science of calculations and decisions, written in numbers dry. As if decisions were not taken by Nietzschean great men of laughter and calculations were only related to the miser concept of scarcity. As if dismal (economic) calculations do not uphold our merriest self-deceptions, and the happy harvesting of surpluses does not threat the very gayness it produces. Today, as happens in times of political dearth, political discourse is contaminated with this rhetoric dilemma. This contamination is often due to the fact that the peril of an imminent financial collapse is often turned into a spectacle and celebrated as the long-anticipated fall of capitalism. And Greece, the land where disputes are raised into an art, is not only a fine example, but also a quite interesting and dangerous symptom.
In Greece, the dilemma (between dismal and gay politics) presents itself as a choice between two different strategies: on the one hand the miser calculations of eurocrats and their Greek followers ready to sacrifice a country’s sovereignty for the sake of a financial stability reduced to saving the banks; on the other hand those who are not willing to give up the country’s sovereignty and plan to rescue it by either renegotiating the IMF loan or by exiting the euro tout court. One can imagine that the latter stance (with its two alternative “solutions”) comes from the left. The Communist Party proposes an immediate exit from the EU while the two reformist parties ask for a renegotiation of the debt within the EU. Both of these stances show to what extent politically impoverished the left has become.
A minimum degree of political wit would have indicated that the debt is non-negotiable –neither with the IMF nor with the E.U. at least at this particular point. Still the reformist parties not only believe that they can renegotiate with the entire E.U. on an issue that has acquired super-national proportions, but that they are also in position to negotiate with the banking system that they (rightly) indicate as corrupt, power hungry and merciless. Not a word on their means of negotiation. Not a word on the (very) real possibility of a complete rejection of their proposals. On the other hand, the traditional communist party that advocates an exit from the E.U. does not give the slightest hint on how this would amount to a viable solution, the reforms that will have to take place and the questions that will have to be met. All these leaders that have been anticipating the fall of capitalism for decades and decades and were supposed to enlighten the masses and mobilize the working class have amounted to miserable party leaders addressing themselves to their electorate in the most dismal gay tone possible. But a cheap emancipatory discourse backed with cheap “proposals” and “theses” all glased up with an emancipatory tone, just won’t do the trick. While E.U. terrorizes us on the seriousness of the situation and the IMF steps in to loot whatever we got left, our miserly gay leftists have nothing viable to offer. For the very task of rendering a possibility real is to be able to point out to or even create those conditions that will allow for a non-European Greece to sustain itself as a sovereign nation.
At this moment Greece –if not all Europe- is lacking serious left-wing politicians. The striking difference are those politically involved (but not identified with any party policy) economists such as Dimitris Kazakis and Yanis Varoufakis who daily inform the public on the intricacies of the financial markets and the loans that bound the future of our country. Some of them offer political solutions on the national level with exit from the E.U. (Kazakis) while others have a much more international-European critical scope (Varoufakis). Still there is no political party willing to take them seriously and no political figure influential enough to assume the cost of taking them seriously (in that respect the fact that Papandreou consulted Varoufakis on economic matters until one year before we entered the IMF is more than ironic..)
But who are we kidding? Political instabilities such as the one Greece is experiencing right now have always been signs of very dangerous outcomes that not simply deprived people of the opportunity to decide upon their fate, but also (and most importantly) forbidden them to do so. Instead of rising up to the expectations of the event, our gay (read: “dismal emancipatory”) politics treat matters of economy as dismal with the alibi that our sovereignty is at stake. As I tried to make clear in an earlier entry (here and here), this is not only a Greek phenomenon but it concerns the left almost globally. It represents a will to rescue the content of an emancipatory discourse without dealing with the dismal practicalities that could well put the integrity of this discourse in danger. Zizek called for action even if we did not know what to do. But, at least regarding left politicians, not to know what to do in moments such as these is not only a disgrace but also an indicator of dismal (or in Hegelian terms “pot-house”) politics:
“The less education a man has, or in other words, the less he knows of the specific connection of the objects to which he directs his observations, the greater is his tendency to launch out into all sorts of empty possibilities. An instance of this habit in the political sphere is seen in the pot-house politician.” (G.W. F. Hegel, Encyclopedia of the Philosophical Sciences)
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