Abstract
Greece, a unitary state with a long tradition of centralism, followed in the last decades, due to the European integration a process of administrative decentralization to modernize public administration and strengthen citizens’ participation. Economic and financial crisis has mostly affected the decentralization process, meaning that in a realm of weak public institutions dealing with social fragmentation and political polarization, recentralization seemed to be the only path to cope with disintegration trends. This is a major outcome from the Greek experience. The crisis-related rigid austerity measures and policies imposed since 2010 brought the long-lasting “decentralization process” to a crucial turning point. Even if centralist patterns offer efficient implementation of austerity measures, can this new centralism be sustainable in the long run or opposing forces of territorial cohesion will finally prevail?
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Notes
- 1.
The memoranda, as well as any other document related to the EU financial support to Greece, may be found on the page http://ec.europa.eu/economy_finance/assistance_eu_ms/greek_loan_facility/index_en.htm
- 2.
The MoUs are multiyear policy programmes with the final aim for Greece to regain market access and at the same time introduce several legal and institutional reforms for the Greek state/administration. Austerity and other measures are attached as conditionality of the international loan agreements, and their implementation is monitored by international observers on a regular basis.
- 3.
156. Art. 103, para. 2.
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Kyvelou, S.S., Marava, N. (2017). From Centralism to Decentralization and Back to Recentralization due to the Economic Crisis: Findings and Lessons Learnt from the Greek Experience. In: Ruano, J., Profiroiu, M. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Decentralisation in Europe. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-32437-1_12
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