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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsTwilight of the idols - Rise of Golden Dawn an outgrowth of Greece's crumbling establishment
Many people had hoped that a number of high-profile, controversial incidents that occurred after an inconclusive vote last month would put voters off by exposing the true character of the party.
They were wrong. Golden Dawn eventually managed to hold its ground and once again secure some 7 percent of the national vote, vindicating those experts who claim that the structural conditions are in place to guarantee that the Greek neo-Nazi party won't be just a flash in the pan. This would mean that even if the economic crisis were to disappear, the extremist threat would remain.
I think that Greece's historical conditions and institutional shortcomings have played a more important role in the party's rise than the economic crisis, says Vassiliki Georgiadou, a political science professor at Panteion University in Athens. Golden Dawn has been strengthened by the collapse, or in any case perceived collapse, of the country's party and political system, she adds. The party has tried to exploit this by relying on anti-systemic, highly divisive discourse to attract support. I'd like to thank the hundreds of thousands of Greeks who did not correct their vote, as they were urged to do by paid journalists and propagandists, and stayed on the side of Golden Dawn, party boss Nikos Michaloliakos said in a televised message after Sunday's vote.
http://www.ekathimerini.com/4dcgi/_w_articles_wsite3_1_21/06/2012_448354
freshwest
(53,661 posts)This is the part I don't understand:
Under the EU's Dublin II regulations, Greece has to accommodate all migrants entering the bloc via its borders; transit to other EU countries is not permitted.
Is this saying that immigration to Greece is a one-way street? What am I missing here? It seems that would be impossible to sustain.
The article explains some of the problems below, but forcing Greece to handle more people than it could, was predictable.
With the economic downturn resulting in a lack of jobs, many of them are stuck in limbo, unable to move into another European country or back home. Some resort to crime to survive.
jwirr
(39,215 posts)responsible for them. Kind of like the people coming across our southern border and heading for Canada.
freshwest
(53,661 posts)Then this is just a matter of them not funding their government to adjust to the immigration or to provide border security. The link mentions the government putting up a fence between at the Turkish border but claims it's merely a zenophobic gesture to placate angry natives, not really a plan to deal with the situation. Thanks for the ideas.
FarCenter
(19,429 posts)Most illegal immigrants would be economic immigrants, so I don't see why Greece doesn't simply make that determination and send them home.
But yes, in order not to have assylum seekers shopping around from country to country, Dublin II places the responsibility on the country where they entered.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dublin_Regulation
freshwest
(53,661 posts)They seem to be like the Tea Party who are against these immigrants for racial reasons. Those called economic refugees have a moral right like asylum seekers to have a better life. Where does one draw the line in a global economy?
From other threads it appears that the Greeks did not pay their taxes to maintaing their social order, or at least they did not make the wealthy pay their taxes. This might be a lesson for all of us.
Much more immigration, legal and illegal, will happen with climate change, as predicted by the seventies Pentagon study. This is just the human and social cost of overpopulation and less places to live. There is a new thread saying that half the world's land mass in no longer producing what people need to live and that it is approaching critical mass.
Thanks for the input.
FarCenter
(19,429 posts)freshwest
(53,661 posts)Will belief in equality be reduced by this trend?
I wonder how a belief in human rights can survive if birthright is the main consideration to access to the means to maintain life.
FarCenter
(19,429 posts)Usually people starve or die of disease pretty much in place, rather than migrating. In many cases those starving are subsistance farmers whose crops have failed. The Sahel a few years ago is a good example.
What is unclear is what will happen when populations in the subtropical and tropical megacities start to die off.
Egypt may be an interesting case to follow, since it is the largest importer of wheat in the world, and if it loses its susidies it has little means of generating foreign exchange to pay for food.
FarCenter
(19,429 posts)[link:http://www.aljazeera.com/news/africa/2012/06/20126205545931365.html|
Burkina Faso food crisis worsened by influx - Drought-stricken country struggles to cope as more than 60,000 Malians cross border to escape fighting]
Interactive: Mapping the Sahel drought
jwirr
(39,215 posts)had been the case when our ancestors left an over crowded Europe.
FarCenter
(19,429 posts)This has generally been the case, whether Middle Eastern agriculturalists spreading out over Europe, the expansion of rice farming cultures in Asia, and the Bantu expansion in Africa.
North and South American, Australian, and South African hunter gatherer cultures did not have the resources to oppose their military conquest.
Other areas, which already had agricultural populations (e.g. India and China) were more successful in opposing and eventually expelling Europeans.
But since agricultural societies are now everywhere, it is less likely that there will be any more large scale migrations that are able to overwhelm defenses.
jwirr
(39,215 posts)make immigration an option except to nearby countries. Too many are too weak to make it feasible.