Populism and Greek Political Crisis

Abstract

This article analyzes the phenomena of Populism in Greek political scene. Greece is known as the first European state that has such a phenomenon. It was found that the first rise of Populism in Greece was in the 1980s under the leadership of Andreas Papandreou, the Greek prime minister. His populist discourses were created to rally people against the Greek military dictatorship and the domination of American imperialism at that time. The populism has arisen again during the economic crisis from 2009 to 2012 under the leadership of Alexis Tsipras, the SYRIZA Party Leader and Prime Minster of Greece between 2015 and 2019. He used his discourses to attract people in order to oppose the political elites, particularly the long-standing two political parties which accepted the requirements established by creditors, namely the European Central Bank (ECB), the European Commission (EC) led by Germany, and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Meanwhile, Tsipras contended against the European Union about capitalism without reform. This article indicates that Greece’s populism does not either disrupt democracy or threaten to its political system, but it affects its political polarization that has existed since the post-Cold War era.