By Alexandros Petersen For many, the realities of life in pre-crisis Greece, now exposed to the world, conjure images of large-scale corruption and petty bribery more associated with the Middle East than Europe. In the Western and Northern European mind, not to mention many in North America, the question of whether Greece should have ever […]

A soon-to-be-released book by Charles Wheelen called The Centrist Manifesto is described thus on the web site of amazon.com. “A vision—and detailed road map to power—for a new party that will champion America’s rational center. From debt ceiling standoffs to single-digit Congress approval ratings, America’s political system has never been more polarized—or paralyzed—than it is […]

Two very symptomatic editorials featured in the Sunday news, both tending to focus blame for Greece’s woes on specific elements in Greek society. In the first, an editorial in the New York Times by Kostas Vaxevanis, the editor who published a version of the so-called Lagrarde list with names of Greek citizens having large deposits […]

By Kostas A. Lavdas Greeks know a thing or two about politics. But the reasons why they do – the conditions that help nurture a political culture prone to intense politicization – are diverse and, at least some of them, divergent. In fact, as I have suggested elsewhere, political development in modern Greece can be […]

By Logan Harper For many, Gov 2.0 is about putting government in the hands of citizens. Whether it’s a mobile app alerting residents to a local meeting or checking social media networks to see which roads are clear for the morning commute. The term should be defined primarily by its utility in helping citizens or […]

This bit was posted by a wag yesterday on the BBC web site, relative to the transfer of soccer star Mario Balotelli from Manchester City to AC Milan (the latter owned by Sylvio Berlusconi). “When Inter president Massimo Moratti said yesterday that Silvio Berlusconi would have many uses for Mario Balotelli he was absolutely right. […]

By Damian Mac Con Uladh The growth in popularity of Golden Dawn in the country’s secondary schools and the wider problem of how to deal with fascism in the classroom is the subject of a conference at Athens University that starts on Wednesday. Over 20 university historians, social scientists and a psychoanalysist specialising in youth […]

By Anna-Maria Konsta In today’s insecure globalized world, where state and supranational structures seem to be collapsing, there are good reasons to reconnect citizenship with the city, especially if we focus on a “bottom-up” approach of citizenship and on citizenship as practice and participation. Contemporary urban theorists emphasize a number of characteristics of cities and […]

By Brian Newby I’m blessed to be in a job that truly feels like it matches against my skills. There are many facets to overseeing elections, from public relations to candidate relations, from high-tech to situations that require a human touch, from logistics to statistics, and everything in between. I have a hard time considering […]

By Maria Patsarika Browsing a Sunday paper and a series of depressing articles on politics, one article made me think of the word “crisis” on a broader eco-systemic level, and also ponder the distressing consequences of our collective ignorance. Permissions for gold mining in Chalkidiki and protesters’ prosecutions are scandalous according to George Triantafyllidis, lecturer […]

By Andreas Akaras February is Black History Month, a monthlong celebration of the African diaspora’s contributions to America. During this month long observance, we Greek-Americans are reminded of the many outstanding Hellenes who stood with the African-American community in its struggle for freedom and dignity. From grade school, we come to know that America is […]

By Krysta Analyze Greece is a decent left-wing analysis of the current situation in Greece. They are not hiding what they are, they state that they are on the left and they stand on their left background to bring forward reports, articles, interviews, etc. They report in English and they actually have a large team […]

Political and economic liberalism have come under heavy and sustained attack as many countries struggle to find responses to the prevailing economic malaise. But for the staleness of much left-of-center political thinking, liberalism might be long dead and buried. Some in the UK think otherwise, however. Today’s Guardian has a nice clip with bits and […]

  “It is my heartfelt conviction that in Germany more Europe does not mean a German Europe. For us, more Europe means a European Germany.” — Joachim Gauck

By Javier Solana Once again, Europe has peered into the abyss. But the tentative agreement between Cyprus and the troika (the European Commission, the International Monetary Fund, and the European Central Bank) probably means that the worst has been avoided. Big losses for large depositors in Cypriot banks will now be imposed, and the country’s […]

By Nicholas Burns In Athens, a popular far-right party condemns Jews as a source of the country’s misfortune and recycles the ancient lie depicting them as “Christ killers.” In Hungary, the prime minister fails to disassociate himself convincingly from an anti-Semitic and increasingly powerful fascist group. Scenes from Europe in the 1930s? No. Both examples, […]

By David Wisner A few months ago I filed my Greek tax return, as I have every year since 1995; just recently I payed the first installment of my remaining income tax obligation for 2012. This year, like last, I had to submit all the receipts I had amassed over the course of the calendar […]

                                Originally posted by Vaggelis Papavasileiou for Eleftherotypia on March 23, 2013).

By Alexander Besant The office of Greek app-maker Taxibeat is located in a modern building, surrounded by shuttered shops and streets with cracked pavement, in the upscale Kolonaki neighborhood in Athens. The contrast between the office and its surroundings is more than aesthetic—it’s the difference between where Greece is, a low-tech economy based on tourism […]

By Alexia Apostolina A cloudy morning in November we woke up, dressed as warm as we could with a smile on our faces, bags with pullovers, raincoats and everything else we wanted to give to those people. Heroes.  In the bus everyone seemed unsure, wondering about what we would come across in Eidomeni. Many feelings, many […]