Kriminologisches Journal

Resilience and Resistance to Surveillance under the Austerity Regime in Greece 2010-2014

Zusammenfassung

Der Beitrag analysiert Resilienz als Widerstand am Beispiel der Reaktion der griechischen Bevölkerung auf das Austeritätsregime in den Jahren 2010-2014. Zu nächst werden der Begriff der "Austerity Surveillance" (AS) und die grundlegende Mechanismen und Methoden eingeführt. Anhand von Daten aus qualitativen Studien werden die Wirkungen von AS dargestellt sowie die Formen des resilienten Widerstands diskutiert. Zusammenfassend wird gezeigt, dass und warum AS in Griechenland nicht wirksam war. Die Wahlentscheidung gegen die nationalen und heimischen Vorgaben und das Votum für ein linkes Regierungsbündnis verstehen wir als resiliente Reaktion.

Schlüsselwörter: Griechenland, Austerity Regime, Austerity Surveillance, Resilienz, Widerstand

The focus of this article is on the resilience and resistance of the Greek people against the austerity regime and its surveillance systems during the 2010-2014 period and before the election of the leftist government. Thus, we first briefly present the "austerity surveillance" (AS) and its basic functions of grassing, naming, and shaming, which we have analyzed in detail elsewhere (Samatas 2015) and also the electronic surveillance like phone taps and electronic monitoring which supplements the AS. We record some indicative testimonies of some victims of the AS taken by a narrative methodology. Then we provide data on citizens and students´ surveillance attitudes, resilience and resistance, as well as popular resistance and solidarity movements. In our concluding remarks we make an assessment of the inefficiency and failure of AS in Greece compared to other coercive surveillance systems which also use citizens informers, explaining the reasons of its failure. Finally, we consider the electoral resistance of Greeks to the domestic and European austerity regime in relation with the efforts of the new leftist government.

Keywords: Greece, austerity regime, austerity surveillance, resilience, resistance