Elections

The left is ideologically exhausted. But this is just as true for the right, no matter where you’re looking, whether it’s at the buzzwords of the FPÖ (Freedom Party of Austria), at UKIP, the Front National or the radical-primitive opposition of the Tea Party in the United States.

It was a pleasure to keep counting the Green vote and realising that we have a lot to celebrate: Caroline Lucas’ well-deserved win, Darren Hall’s massive increase in the Green vote, and the fact that the #GreenSurge held fast and delivered over 1 million votes for the Greens across the UK in spite of an electoral system stacked against us.

Since 2000, the EU has deployed about 140 election observation missions. Below you can read my experiences as EU EOM-Chief Observer for the 2013 general elections in Honduras.

Even if SYRIZA is defeated at the end, forced to comply with Europe’s inflexible neoliberal doxa, it has already achieved a first small victory: political disagreement, that is at the very heart of democratic dialogue.

By electing a new radical left government determined to oppose the corruption, clientelism and tax-evasion, the Greek people have opted to exit the vicious circle of austerity that has left the country with no prospect for recovery. However, it is not only Greece at the crossroads but Europe as a whole. The new Greek paradigm is not written in stone and it is therefore inviting all those who are interested in the political future of the European Union.

Syriza’s victory in Greece once again raises a crucial question for Europe in the coming months: can a leftist policy be followed in the eurozone without changing the treaties or monetary rules now in force? It is renewing the discussions which divide the left in France and elsewhere in Europe about the virtues of the euro and the margins for manoeuvre of left-wing governments in a common monetary zone.

As European ecologists, we have duty to support the Greek left after their success, and to promote our alternative model throughout Europe. We will do this today with Syriza now, and tomorrow with Podemos based on how it progresses in the future, etc. We have the responsibility and the historic chance to take part in giving Europe a new direction. However, we should not take the Greek results as a way to resolve our national electoral challenges…

There is a remarkable extent to which Syriza is in practice a Green government. First, the Greek Green Party is a part of the Syriza coalition – they got one MP elected, who was promptly promoted to deputy environment minister. Secondly, they adopted the entire Green platform: look through the policy commitments of Tsipras’ government and the manifestoes of the Green parties in the UK, and you’ll find little to separate them.

After the Greek elections, Syriza’s Alexis Tsipras won’t get everything he wants – but he will probably get enough to paint it as a victory for beleaguered Greeks.

What is at stake in the upcoming national elections in Greece? Can Syriza surge to power? And what role do the Greens play in this constantly shifting political environment? However many questions there are, one thing is certain: these elections are different to any other held in recent decades. The results could change Europe permanently…