Andrea Mammone the UK historian and political commentator has published an article on Aljazeera on the potential damage from the austerity measures titled Austerity v’s solidarity: Democratic legitimacy and Europe’s future. In the article Mammone states, “The rebirth of ethnic-based nationalisms, the rise of right-wing extremist feeling and Europhobia are a likely new threat and will be forged with mounting social and workers’ protests. Yet, the Euro-dream was specifically to bypass these nationalistic divisions and create an all-inclusive porous European citizenship. This led to a reconsideration of concepts such as space, borders and belonging – and is, with some difficulties, aiming to create a European public sphere. The “market” economy was only one (though very important) of the pillars that had to contribute to build all this, but it was not the unique one. “Solidarity” was the other (at least implicit) pilaster. It is known that Germany was in fact helped after the Second World War without imposing severe austerity plans. Some of the measures now imposed upon Greece and perhaps tomorrow upon Italy, Spain, Portugal or some central or eastern European nations, may be to some extent necessary – but some political-economic flexibility and democratic legitimacy are essential, too.”
Inspired by Andrea Mammone http://ow.ly/ahTpl image source twitter http://ow.ly/ahTAO
