Crisis in Greece

For nearly five years the international press has been gripped by and reported at great length on "the Greek crisis," with news stories gradually filtering out from the deeper recesses of the economic section to the front pages, as the crisis has intensified and mass protests in Athens have caught the world's attention. Meanwhile, what began as a localized fiscal deficit problem grew to be a crisis that challenged the political and social fabric of the nation and at times seemed destined to undermine the very existence of a global currency, the Euro.

This book, written in an accessible and non- technical manner, tells the story of the lengthy crisis that has beset Greece and the wider Eurozone. Is it a purely economic phenomenon or something wider and deeper, as many Greeks would suggest? Are its causes to be found in the prevailing international financial environment or the economic and political system which has evolved in Greece since the early 1970s? Have many of the choices made by both domestic and international actors, such as the IMF and the EU, merely exacerbated the crisis? Most importantly, what has been the impact of the crisis on the daily lives of the country's inhabitants?

1. The tempest of progress: the search for economic stability after the dictatorship

2. These games with numbers have to stop: Greece in the euro area

3. An unprecedented crisis: the second Kostas Karamanlis government, global financial turmoil and a local economic downturn

4. Even in our worst nightmares: the Papandreou government, the sovereign debt crisis and the signing of the memorandum

5. Faltering at the Rubicon: the growing difficulties of the memorandum

6. Surprised by the surprise: the wider euro zone crisis and the collapse of the Papandreou government

7. Marathon is indeed a Greek word: the Papademos government and the restructuring of the sovereign debt

8. Reform and resistance: politics during the crisis

9. Internal devaluation and depression: the economy during the crisis

10. The Great Crisis

Peter Siani-Davies is an Honorary Senior Research Associate in the School of Slavonic and East European Studies, University College London, and was previously Senior Lecturer and Director at the Centre for South-East European Studies at the same institution. His books include The Romanian Revolution of December 1989.