From an article in the New York Times today
The Greek government has come up with a novel solution to a growing backlog of asylum appeals: Abolish appeals.
No backlog. No Problem.
But the problem can’t be dismissed so easily. Greece has a backlog of about 30,000 cases. A part-time asylum appeals board hears about 60 cases a week. At this rate, it would take about 10 years to clear the current backlog alone.
The article goes on to explain the absolute failure of the asylum procedure here in Greece and the concrete solutions that experts have been calling for for years. It also includes an appeal to other European countries to hold Greece accountable for its illegal “system”. Something that Human Rights groups and advocates have been asking for for years too.
If Greece does not put its own house in order, the European Union must hold it accountable. Other E.U. member states should suspend all returns of asylum seekers to Greece under the terms of the Dublin Convention and all E.U. institutions should demand that Greece immediately comply not only with Union asylum standards, but also with human rights norms that should long since have been considered inviolable among European states.
Technorati Tags: greece, asylum, immigration, migrant, refugee, law
Big Fat Greek Mess on January 11th, 2010
Child in Prison on October 7th, 2009
New Asylum Proposals on June 2nd, 2009
Asylum in Greece on February 4th, 2009
Police Halt Asylum Procedures on October 17th, 2008
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Well, the background to this lies over the last year and the press propaganda mounted internationally (see e.g. Time magazine) by the Minister of the Interior and his political lapdogs of IMEPO. As well as looking for a political distraction from their miserable failure to govern, they were touting for large amounts of money from the EU (as usual).
Their response to the HRW and other expert reports of last year? It was a tirade of screaming and abuse, and a denial of the impartiality or scientific standards of all of the expert reports. There is not a single scientific report supporting the position taken by these idiots. In other words, Greece’s semi-educated schoolteachers and politicians claim to know better than the world’s experts…
Furthermore, the disgusting behaviour of these people in private and in public (e.g. shouting insults at speakers, continuous interruptions in formal presentations, or one hour of screaming abuse at Bill Frelick) are clear evidence of the “peasant culture” of Greeks. This is an important thing to establish as a fact, even though it is accepted by all serious sociologists, because it explains why Greece can never sort out policy problems. The mentality of Greek politicians is arrogant and ignorant, and openly dismissive of professional expertise. Long live the Greek peasant!
Xenos, your tirade helps no one, least of all DD. You seem to have succumb to the same kind of narrow minded attitudes that you accuse Greeks of having. Yes, this government’s treatment of asylum seekers is a disgrace and deserves the harshest kind of condemnation, but tarring everyone with the same brush doesn’t help your case one bit.
Instead this energy would be much better expended taking part in actions organised by Greek anti – racist groups or contributing to sites which are fighting the current batch of racist laws being put through parliament.
DD, I’m currently translating a blog post into English which puts a human face on the immigration issue in Greece. You might want to post it here as well.
http://afroditealsalech.blogspot.com/
Excuse me Craig, but what the **** are you talking about? I have given above accurate but privileged information, which I was actually a little wary about putting on the web. And yes, I am directly involved in policy formulation and trying to bang some commonsense into the heads of Greek policy makers. I do not need to post on any blogs: I do so as a source of information that you cannot find anywhere. If you don’t like it, tough shit. That’s the way Greece is.
Well, if you are as diplomatic with them as you are with people here then no wonder you are getting nowhere.
BTW no, it is not the way it is in Greece. There are Greeks who have made the kind of sacrifices we can barely imagine in order to improve this country.
Where can we read about these solutions mentioned in the OP?
I’m asking because there’s nothing of worth to read in the rest of the OP or the subsequent posts so perhaps the sources should be revealed if anyone is to be informed in any capacity around here.
Nothing is going to happen beyond words from both sides. The EU will bark a little, heap a fine and that will be it. And frankly since the EU is coddling the ears of Italy, and other states that are taking harsh measures against illegal immigrants, I would be surprised if they did anything to Greece. And if they do something just to Greece obviously it will be suspect.
Dabad: this was the last detailed report made by HRW on GReece:
http://www.hrw.org/en/reports/.....ft-survive
There is also:
http://www.hrw.org/en/reports/.....ing-door-0
In the last year, there are also about 5 reports from international agencies, focused solely on asylum; and numerous other reports (some involving me) on illegal migration and treatment of migrants. The HRW reports are the easiest to read, anyway: some of the others are rather legal-technical.
To Craig: you fail to understand how Greek politicians behave. They couldn’t give a f*c* about anyone or anything unless it kicks them in the ass. They treat me and all other experts as if we clean toilets, so we treat them like the pieces of shit that they actually are. End of discussion. (I do not refer to the decent people who work in the ministries, many of whom try their best to manage impossible problems with immigration.)
Travle: I think you are wrong. This is not a small matter of a fine from the ECJ. I think they have created a political precedent, and there is a real danger that Greece will be humiliated through the actions of its politicians. Essentially, HRW is demanding that the European Commission enforce the Acquis Communautaire — notably, the asylum soft law provisions and the human rights components of ECHR. It is the job of the Commission to do this, but it has never before been asked to prosecute a member state for human rights abuses.
Italy can get away with it, because they had some little tricks with their arrangements with Libya. Although they are just as criminally responsible as the Greek government, they are smarter and will escape serious consequences. Karamanlis appears not to realise that he is no quick-witted card sharp, like Berlusconi, and will actually be the fall guy if one is needed.
Xenos you sound like some kind of colonial official from an Evelyn Waugh novel or some exasperated American official in Vietnam, “You just can’t get these people to do anything right”.
Do you really think that these political beasts are going to listen to you? The ruling party has just a one seat majority in parliament and are facing imminent elections. They have screwed up in virtually every area of political life and are fighting for their political lives. Do you really think they are going to listen to any expert’s advice concerning immigration? This is the one of the last cards they have left along with getting tough on law and order.
If you think that your function there is anything other than window dressing then you are seriously deluding yourself. Get out on the street and work with people who at least stand a chance of changing things.
Craig: my function is to tell brain-damaged idiots who think they qre smart that they are idiots. This I and others do regularly, and your lack of respect for expertise is just as arrogant as the politicians’. I suggest you live in a normal country, where politicians are forced to obey the law, instead of a third world Balkan joke where the whole population is in awe of half-wits.
Xenos, please don’t forget to share your parting expertise with the semi-educated peasants on the day MMO closes down – if you’re like this now I can only imagine your attitude on the day you’ll have to go back to a normal country and leave our third world Balkan joke. If you can also take Nemesist with you (so he can convince the rest of the world of the supposed superiority of the Greeks he’s convinced himself of and leave the rest of us alone) that would be the best thing you’ll have accomplished for Greece.
I expect no thanks from Greeks for trying to provide information, serious research, policy advice, international respectability, or generally trying to make things work in Greece. I have learned that Greeks respect only those who abuse them and use their positions to steal money: these people are the supposed “elite” of Greeks, and a few families have “run” Greece for the last 100 years.
Those of us who merely do our jobs to a very high standard for relatively low pay are despised. We are also insulted personally on a continuous basis: this is the Greek peasant mentality, as I keep on mentioning. It is what will keep Greece confined to a backward third world position for eternity, because you have no respect for hard work and skills. Greece is a country run by criminals and half-wits for the benefit of criminals and half-wits. Decent people have no place here.
Decent people have no place here.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
okay so thats not racist or bigoted against Greeks?
also, begs the questions then why are you in Greece?
How kind of you being a superior being sharing your expertise with us lower life forms.
What is your expertise..where do you gain this expertise.
Maybe you just dont get it that we do not want to go along with the NWO flood the West plan to multiculturalize the nations of europe out of existence.
Maybe you should privately talk to the very few Good Greeks and let them evanglize their own mass brood of evil doers and you can go to your own ethnic/religious kinsmen and tell them how to behave as you will have more leverage there.
Hate to tell you this but most countries are run by criminals and half-wits..including the UK, USA, Italy, Germany, Japan, China Israel, SaudiArabia..etc.
the best government is a DE-centralized government where ordinary people have more power. Not huge super states and bureaucracy..
I think greece would be better off being a nation where power over all matters except foreign policy and military are completely handled by the regions or provinces themselves.
I think thats best for all countries really.
Absolute power corrupts absolutely.
So I agree Greece is corrupt but so are all other countries.
PD: actually, I think we agree on a lot of things. I did not mean that there are NO decent people in Greece: but they have a hard time here. Many simply leave for better living and working conditions in the USA or other EU countries.
I do not agree that other EU countries are as corrupt as Greece. This is a popular Greek opinion, but the evidence is clear. Greece, Italy and some Balkan countries are the regional leaders of corruption and criminal activities. You cannot compare other EU countries with the mess here.
On the other hand, of course there is a great deal wrong with many other EU countries — especially lack of democracy. I am the first to criticise the UK for that, or the illegal invasion of Iraq, or… Yet, most of these countries do attempt to conform to the law. Did you see the police interrogations of Blair when he was actually PM, about possible Labour party corruption? Try to imagine that in Greece: it;s out of the question! Greek politicians are absolutely corrupted and out of control, and are very pleased with themselves about that.
Xenos, you keep saying those things: “Greeks have a peasant mentality” and “Greek governments are corrupt”.
I do not think they mean, what you think they mean.
You state that you are an expert (of some thing or other) and claim from authority that the Greek government is corrupt. I will not, for a moment, agree or disagree with you, only ask you: how do you know that? What is your expert knowledge, your privileged information that allows you to make that statement with such certainty and indefatigable fervour?
Also as an expert, you claim that Greeks have a “peasant mentality”. My experience, as a Greek woman, is that we don’t have a peasant mentality, but a middle-class one. In the last generation Greece prospered, Greeks today are well-off and the vast majority have completed higher education since it’s free and also absolutely necessary for any hope of professional advancement. Young Greeks are competent and skilled especially in technology and the sciences and you only have to trawl the scientific journals or, indeed, the names of students in technology-related subjects in universities abroad to realise that. We learn foreign languages at school and unlike other European peoples we have no superiority complex that keeps us from using them; there are many Greeks posting in English here, but no Englishmen posting in Greek (except for a couple of words from you). Further, most Greeks proper have not been peasants for about half a century now, since most live in cities and they leave the farming to the immigrants and the elderly. You cannot be seriously calling us peasants in the literal sense.
But to use the word metaphorically is misleading. Modern Greek culture has nothing to do with “peasants” any more. When you say “peasants” you are simply invoking the stereotype of the deprived and unfortunate people of the Balkans in the early 19th century, a stereotype that doesn’t even apply to poor Albania any more. You’re very obnoxiously trying to present that stereotype as your learned opinion on Greece, but it’s just the same old, so tired prejudice of the British against everyone else.
But, prove me wrong. Why do you think that Greeks “have a peasant mentality”? Where the hell did you see all those Greek peasants? Tell me about the government corruption. Use your expertise.
Come on Xenos. Money —> mouth. Make mrs Xena proud.
DeviousDiva, you said we should stick to the issues and not dwell on the past, but I believe the issue is really prejudice and I don’t think that of Xenos is doing anyone any good. I’m sorry for the past too, but what do you propose to do, when the same people keep repeating the same aggravating insults?
Stassa: I agree that these posts are getting off-topic. My point was that Greek politicians and their friends are incapable of dealing with problems, and their behaviour in pubic and private is not acceptable. My first post on this thread merely pointed out that bullying, shouting down, and refusing to accept the expertise of independent and UN experts is peasant mentality.
Personally, I can vouch for all of this and more. That includes stealing my work and giving it to newspapers where it appeared on the front page; attempting to suppress publication of my own work and threatening legal action (this was to enable them to steal it); employment of unqualified persons as experts on immigration to advise the government (they are presumably ND supporters); etc etc.
This is not the behaviour of a civilised country: it is a peasant mentality of corruption, nepotism and fraud. There is no respect for real ability or hard work; in fact, they just laugh at people like myself who are stupid enough to work instead of stealing others’ work…
The result of this peasant mentality is that you have a government incapable of governing, that refuses to use expert advice but employs their friends and relatives instead, that heckles and shouts down anyone who disagrees with their malakies, and produces illegal shit like the Asylum draft Presidential decree law. Until Greeks understand that they are not bourgeois, but people with EU money which is not earned but effectively stolen, Greece can make no progress. You are refusing to accept that the basic problem in Greece is the mentality of both the governing class and much of its population: that mentality can be loosely described as a peasant culture.
For the sake of completeness – though some of these texts have been posted earlier by DD:
Human Rights Watch, Greece – Halt Crackdown, Arrests of Migrants, Press Release, July 27, 2009
http://www.hrw.org/en/news/200.....s-migrants
GREECE: Zero Tolerance, Zero Concern
By Apostolis Fotiadis
http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=47898
Greece: UNHCR walks out of “unfair and ineffective” asylum procedures
http://cm.greekhelsinki.gr/upl.....nglish.doc
Xenos
Why use the “peasant” metaphor. First peasant means different in different civilasational contexts. SO it is not a universal word. Why not simply use nepotistic-patronage culture, which is more accurate(yes yes apples and oranges, but some people prefer one more then the other).
Travle: there is an academic literature on this topic, which identifies one source of problems with political parties and political life in the Balkans as being the predominance of agriculture for economic activity in the region, until very recently. In many Balkan countries, there is a corresponding lack of a bourgeoisie: this is certainly the case in Greece, whose only middle class was in Constantinople but were turned into refugees and humiliated when they arrived as refugees from the Asia Minor catastrophe. THe merchants of Salonika were primarily Armenians, Jews and others, with Greeks as a small minority.
Therefore, I am not using the word loosely, nor as a metaphor: it is an historical and important fact. Nepotism and patronage are but a few of the results of this: other attributes (such as trying to destroy other people’s achievements; refusing to accept the rule of law) are equally important. What is remarkable is that you Greeks deny your own history. No German would deny the Nazi period, or Brits the colonial past: why do Greeks have to be so screwed up about coming to terms with themselves?
Nothing is off-topic, Xenos, we’re discussing nationalism and cultural prejudice, the gravest threat to the spirit of the united Europe.
You are by no means justified to “loosely describe” a population in offensive terms just because the whim took you, much less to claim that your “epxertise” allows you to do so. In any case, you don’t make any “loose” description, you’re doing our heads in the way you keep chanting it like a mantra.
All that you half-heartedly produce here as “proof” of the government’s corruption and the Greek’s “peasant mentality” is simply your personal experience. Since you’re an academic I shouldn’t need to point out the difference.
I will, never the less, in very simple English: you can say whatever you like for whomever you like. As long as you don’t explain why you say those things, they’re so much gossip. And you are not explaining anything. You just keep banging on about your “expertise” and your academic credentials. However, your obvious bias discredits any academic value your observations might have, if indeed they are such and not simply hearsay or fabrications.
So, once more, Xenos: what do you know about the Greek government’s corruption? Tell us. How do you know that EU money was stolen? How much of it and by whom? When? Those are serious accusations.
As to my refusal to accept etc, of course, I refuse to accept that you can describe eleven million people in “loose” terms accurately, let alone objectively. It doesn’t matter that you call Greeks “peasants”- the mistake is to assign such nebulous attributes to any population.
You seem to assume that people are not individuals, but agents of their culture. What kind of expertise informs such opinion, if you don’t mind?
And how is such a thing as a peoples’ “mentality” quantifiable, let alone falsifiable? How can you know the “mentality” of a whole population? Who says that such a thing even exists? Is it in the Gret Book of Common Sense? So you’re just an expert of popular misconceptions and uninformed opinion, are you?
You hold a degree in old-wivery? From the school of everybody knows?
Hogwash.
Far be it from me to miss the opportunity to make my point: you ‘re talkign drivel.
Stassa: fuck off. You deserve no respect, so I will give you none. You are a typical peasant.
Xenos can you furbish some citations? I am not going to look for them because I have my own research. But I would appreciate some citations.
“And how is such a thing as a peoples’ “mentality” quantifiable, let alone falsifiable? How can you know the “mentality” of a whole population?”
Things like corruption, attitudes to science and so on can be quantified. But then interpreting them is the big problem. Xenos and his share of academic (the citations he will give) say it is “peasan” culture. But I am pretty sure there are alternative and counter arguments in the academic literature(in the social sciences there always are, just as in the life sciences).
Xenos “sin” is to present one academic interpretation of data as “truth”. Well there is no “truth”. He should had presented the counter and alternative arguments. The data is out there but interpretation vary. And if there is one good thing post-modernism gave us (among the many bad) is to be cautious with interpretations. How you interpret some data, even how you name it, is influenced by one’s biases, and itself a statement of “power”.
As usual Xenos cannot avoid historical fallacy:
a) The Greek merchant middle class within the Ottoman Empire was not only in Constantinople (latter Istanbul), but also in Smyrna (Izmir), the certain Aegean islands (Poros/Spetses/Andros/Chios) and Salonica. Outside the Ottoman Empire they were found in the Ionian Islands, the Crimea, Central Europe (mainly Austrohungary) and in Italy. Most of the educated class that tried to shoehorn Romiosene into the Ancient Hellenic shape was actually composed of “returnees” from this diaspora.
b) Armenians before Jews in Thessaloniki? When? Armenians formed the 3rd merchant pole in Constantinople and Smyrna but certainly not in Salonica – there were far too few of them to have any weight. Even after the diminution of Greek populations in the late 17th and early 18th century in the city it was still clearly 3rd in size (behind Jews and Muslims and not counting other Balkan Christians). Unlike the Turkish population the Greek one was a middle class merchant one in constant friction with the dominant Jewish presence.
c) The Greeks of Constantinople were not turned into refugees by the population exchange – in fact they were excluded specifically from it! This is such a basic piece of knowledge that no so called “expert on Greek matters” can claim to be an expert after uttering it.
Yes the Greeks of Constantinople were “prodded” to leave by raging mobs in 55, and punitive taxation (at least one of the responsible parties this time, Menderes hanged).
I am bored to discuss this matter any further with people who are determined to claim that Greece is a normal modern western society. I have better things to do with my time than argue with students and amateurs.
This thread is about the behaviour of the Ministry of Public Order in recent years in relation to asylum seeking. If you have a better explanation of what is happening, then please offer it. I have firsthand experience of Greek political and bureaucratic life, as well as a good knowledge of Greek 20th century history. I do not see anyone else here who knows much at all of these things.
“this is certainly the case in Greece, whose only middle class was in Constantinople but were turned into refugees and humiliated when they arrived as refugees from the Asia Minor catastrophe.”
Holy fuck. This is what your theory is based on? Have you EVER read ANYTHING on Ottoman Greek history?
“Why not simply use nepotistic-patronage culture”
Ha-ha-ha. Judging by his expert comments, I doubt he is even familiar with the basic work of people like Clogg and Herzfeld.
Xenos
Just offer the citations so we can judge for ourselves. No one claims that Greece is a “normal” Western European country. What we question is your term of choice and explanation, and refusal to offer citations.
Alternative explanations?
Bureaucratic inertia and sclirosis coupled with dominance of the bureaucracy by the executive which a)prohibits outside experts (policy enterprenuers) from effecting policy change b)raises the costs of reform.
This is something that almost all bureaucratic-managerial states face. You think experts face any better in the US? or France? Just take a look at Congressional committees and how experts are handled. Anti-intellectualism can be found in northern Europe and the US as well. It is hardly a
In Greece it is made worst by messy economics, competing and unclear authority competencies, nepotism, and corruption.
Furthermore illegal immigrants were championed by a party that has small influence and eroding support among citizens. Which makes it harder for them to have a voice.
Also the situation is further spurred by EU indifference, and now widespread anti-immigrant status. You expect Greece to change when Northern Europe is simply sipping coffee? This is a pan-European matter and demands pan-European solutions, but frankly the North is just talking, talking, talking. They put forward a schizophrenic attitude that while this is a problem of all, the front-line countries need to act by themselves.
So that is what they are doing. And it is messy, and morally questionable what they are doing, but the Northerners are happy. They will just bandy some more words around, and let the southern European countries get on with it.
I am not saying that there isn’t a problem of perceptions, and endemic corruption (and even that is not as bad. I grew up in Greece, and we used mesa or bribes very few times, mostly for serious medical reasons). The bigger problem is the lack of professionalism. But this is only a small part of the causal chain leading to the immigration problem. Greece succeed well or bad to more or less absorb a million Albanians. Even in Alfa 1, LAOS party newspaper Albanian immigration is taken as a given. So why succeed (however incomplete there) and fail now? That is variation that requires an answer. Your answer does not show variation. And in the Social Sciences something that doesn’t vary cannot explain something that varies.
Again I seriously wish to read the material on which you built your argument. Please offer citations.
Xenos,
Respect? You wuss, you don’t even have the balls to stand up for what you believe, even if it’s the toxic hate you spew all the time. Why should I need your respect? Unlike you, I have the respect of my own self, and I don’t blame everyone else for my own faliings.
Oh, you’ve been ignored by those corrupted officials, have you? They don’t listen to your advice because they’re nepotistic frauds and peasants, eh, your most aristocratic highness? Tell us what you advised you twit, and let’s see why nobody ever takes you serious in this country, where we know frauds and cooks very well indeed.
Konstantine,
don’t give Xenos credit of any “expertise”. He doesn’t have a clue what he’s talking about.
Notice how he calls Greece a “third world” country? There’s a good reason why nobody uses that term officially anymore: because it’s a moral judgement on the ability of people to manage their affairs, and on their “level of civilisation”. It carries obvious connotations of assumed superiority to boot and Xenos uses it exactly for that reason. Greece neither is nor has by any definition been a “third world country” for the last half century. Neither did any commonly accepted definition of “third world” ever hinge on government corruption, let alone the “mentality” of its population.
And even as he uses those offensive terms with glee, Xenos pretends to care for the migrants and the refugees. Aaaw. As if the people who come here from Afghanistan are not largely peasants in the literal sense, or theirs and all migrants’ countries are not in the developing world, and I’m not even going to touch on the state of their regimes.
Expert my foot. The only thing I give Xenos credit for is that he noticed how Greeks have this superiority/ inferiority complex and constantly whinge about how “thost things don’t happen abroad”. And he’s trying to use it to put the peasants in their place.
Seriously, the guy is a fraud. He has bogus written all over him.
Konstantine, something else: I think another parameter of the problem is that Greece has mostly had majority governments since the metapolitefsi (the one exception I remember was the coalition of Pasok and Synaspismos). Most European countries are ruled by coalitions, which of course limits the ability of government officials to play favourites with the voters.
It does seem that this is about to change, and that it’s the reason why ND is pandering to the right and sucking up to LAOS. But we’ll see how things turn out in the next election.
Too true. I don’t like the way Syriza is treating the issue. It’s not like they have a plan either, they’re just happy being rhetoric about it, pretending to be all militant about “human rights” and so on. They just manage to scare people even more.
Er,sorry. Forgot to quote this:
Stassa: I believe in giving the benefit of a doubt:)
The coalition vs. majority government debate is interesting. Greece chose to create an electoral system that created strong governments to avoid the very real dangers of Isreali and Italian coalition governments. The cost is that the government is very powerful.
There was a ND-Communist Party coalition government before Andreas.
Coalition governments make sense only in states were the government bureaucracy is professionalized enough that the mechanisms of the state can survive government instability. Were this is not the case, and Greece faces that problem, coalition instability will bring the whole state to a stop. So in Greece we need to reform the civil service and it’s relationship with the government, before we even think of a coalition democracy.
As far as ND and LAOS what is going on is that LAOS is hedging it’s bet that ND’s anti-immigrant policy will not steal to many votes from it, and that it will gain enough votes from KKE to keep a steady electoral result or raise it(KKE voters tend to be LAOS target constituency, poor and middle class workers,traditionalist in culture, perceiving, with some element of truth, immigrants as competitors.)
LAOS was brought to a bind by ND.It knows that the anti-immigrant policy will steal voters from it, but it can’t go against it because it would lose voters. So they can only support and hope people will by the political pressure argument. At the same time it uses the media to assault KKE on the party property question, it’s position on immigration, and cosmopolitism (just open Alfa 1, not an issue dosen’t pass with a full assault at the KKE). So I would say it is highly unlikely that a coalition government is going to happen. And they don’t need it. The elecotral system is such that it will make sure that even a small margin of victory gives a comfortable majority.
But hey thinks change. We will see.
Which is not what most people are claiming – just that it is not what you make it to be.
Well that’s very rich given that last time I bore the title of student was more than 10 years ago while your own CV claims (as a qualification) that you’re a doctoral candidate (in absentia?) at the University of Amsterdam. As for amateurs, your own expertise (by undergraduate training Music and Economics/Politics and by practice migration policy) makes you as much an amateur as the rest of us when it comes to matters of history and social or cultural anthropology.
This thread is about the behaviour of the Ministry of Interior which sets immigration policy. The Ministry of Public Order (which has not existed for almost 2 years now with the demise of Polydoras) simply enforces it.
Simply put the government sees a broken system of asylum and illegal migration where Greece is (1) stuck as a gateway country with the bulk of illegal immigrants entering the EU via the Middle East, (2) the Dublin rules do not allow it to share this bulk, (3) most illegal migrants, given that there is no other way for them to try and stay legally will apply for asylum, falsifying or destroying their paperwork if necessary and (4) there are not nearly enough interpreters and staff to deal with trying to figure out which of the asylum applications represent true cases of people fleeing persecution etc. Instead of trying to fix (4) the government chooses to try and reduce (1) by developing a “bad name” for would-be illegal migrants as a country which will kick them out ASAP, irrespective of whether they pretend to be asylum cases or are truly asylum cases.
Your arrogance is beyond bounds. Other participants have grown up and lived in Greece far longer than you have and have had to deal with the mind-boggling bureaucracy not as a matter of choice (as you did) but as a matter of necessity. So you’ve had to deal with a few Greek politicians and that makes you an expert? Others know members of the government from the days they were still going to school and have a far more intimate knowledge of both their capabilities (or lack thereof) and how they view the world and think yet they don’t go around parading as “experts”. I don’t need to comment further on your knowledge of Greek history, be it 19th or 20th century, your constant mistakes prove you wrong. I mean I gave you an unintended gift of writing Poros instead of Hydra when talking of the merchant class of the early Greek state and you did not even catch on to that.
I am no longer willing to host personal arguments between people on this blog. You are all adults and KNOW what winds people up or is offensive to the majority of us. Please stop it. If you can’t discuss the issues without resorting to tired cliches, racist remarks and personal attacks then please refrain from commenting.
This is not directed at just one person but to everyone. And please don’t harp on about how disappointed you are in me or this blog or moaning on about censorship. I have appealed to you several times to behave like grown-ups, to stick to the issues etc but to no avail. I am not your parent or babysitter and I don’t have the time or inclination to become that even though it seems that you want to force me into that position. (an then turn round and tell me I am being unfair!) Parents and babysitters are always the enemy aren’t they ? It’s pathetic.
Honestly, there are better ways to engage people and to have your opinions considered than to insult and offend people. None of this is news. I have said it before so many times, I am bored of myself !
I warned all of you that I was going to be away more and more over the summer holidays. I have a lot more serious things going on in my life than sorting out your squabbles. And the issues of my posts are more important than them too.
if you can’t behave decently and politely here, please find another blog or forum to vent. You will not turn this place into a sideshow. I have worked too hard to give it over to the few who can’t control their mouths (fingers)
Thank you.
Yes, DD: I agree. The personal attacks and pure nastiness which arise here are totally unacceptable. I should also say that the complete lack of respect for professionals is indicative of WHY Greece is such a mess. The irony is that those who get so upset about the analysis of “peasant culture” insist on behaving like uneducated peasants even on this blog.
Nevertheless, it is not essential for me to continue saying this, because it is self-evident anyway. What is not self-evident is why Greece refuses to accept basic principles of law, or its relatively minor obligation to deal correctly with asylum-seekers. Nobody here has offered the slightest comprehension of this, yet they all seem to think they are experts. That’s Greeks for you.
But you see, Xenos, this is exactly what I want to put a stop to. The continuing use of the “peasant” label is offensive to most people and keeps the conversation coming back to it and your use of it. No-one else uses the term and most of us are against your insistence on using it in practically every comment you make. You are not the only one I am addressing in my comment but you are part of it.
And your generalisations of all Greeks (as many have said before) is also offensive. I think most of us agree that Greece is not adhering to international and European law on immigration and asylum and has been utterly incompetent and unwilling to correct that situation. But simply saying “That’s Greeks for you” is unhelpful at best. My opinion is that people (those that my blog is designed for not politicians who have no interest in what a blogger has to say) need to be informed about the issues that are affecting other people living here in Greece and able to discuss those issues without fear of being called an ignorant peasant. Do you understand what I mean ? Your experience or expertise would be much more helpful to people if it wasn’t patronising to the rest of us who are not experts or insulting to Greeks who really are interested and trying to bring about change in this country, in fact to all Greeks. By insulting everyone you make your opinions worthless. Do you see what I mean? There is a difference in pointing out the failures of the system,government and politicians and painting everyone with the same brush. Yes, we are all part of these system and must question what the few are doing in our name but we have the right not to be insulted because of the hopeless corrupt few.
Most people here over the years have been polite, interested, informed and genuinely curious about the issues (some have never read or thought about these things before). I find it extremely sad that most recent conversations have revolved around a few people who insist on their absolute rightness in all things and are unwilling to simply offer an insight or opinion without resorting to the (let’s be honest here) childish bickering and name-calling. (I include calling Greeks “peasants” as name-calling)
As I have asked before and I can see that I will have to continue battling this one because no-one seems to want to give up their stance for the sake of decent discussion, can we please…once and for all… give up this insistence that Greeks are peasants. They are not and it’s insulting and hurtful to keep insisting that they are.
Thank you
Well, DD, you are wrong. I am not interested to debate with people with closed minds, as most of those here have. Greece is a peasant culture, and has all of the problems associated with that mentality. You will not make any impact on Greeks if you continue to humour their self-important and arrogant mentality.
In terms of my own qualifications, I have lectured, examined and presented my work in Europe’s top universities over the last 18 years. I was appointed a junior professor with only a first degree because of the outstanding quality of my work, and I have worked closely with governments and international agencies for the last 15 years. My international reputation is of the highest order and is cited widely in books, journals and web pages.
Yet, you see some snivelling Greeks here, trying to mock my achievements. You see others saying that I am a fraud. (This in a country where most of the university professors are half-wits appointed through connections!) All of them think that they know better than me, when they know nothing about this topic. This is how Greeks are. Maybe you don’t like this as a generalisation, but Greeks themselves say this: “in Greece, you are what you say you are”.
So, I am happy not to waste my time talking to bigots. You did a very bad job of dealing with the English idiot, and now you are telling me that I don’t know what I am talking about. Fine: it’s your blog, you can chat to the idiot Greeks here without the benefit of my expert practical knowledge and academic experience. I am weary of talking to self-important ignorant people who are incapable of respectful dialogue.
Quite.
Look, Xenos, we all understand that if you were really some brilliant academic you wouldn’t be trawling teh intrenetz trying to prove it. You give me the impression that you must be -how can I put it? Rather strapped for rewards, in your personal life. Which must be why you are trying to blame it all to the Greeks and the system and so on. Greeks are nepotic frauds and that’s why your talents are not recognised, not because you’re useless.
Well, we’ve all been there. It’s always someone else’s fault.
Here, have some well-meaning compassion vibrations. Hope they help.
“Yet, you see some snivelling Greeks here, trying to mock my achievements.”
HAHAHAHAHAHA
“Fine: it’s your blog, you can chat to the idiot Greeks here without the benefit of my expert practical knowledge and academic experience.”
Piss off already.
Xenos
just post the citations sir.
You claim that the whole peasant term is a scientific fact (questionable in the social sciences), and probably it is, so just post the citations so we can decide for ourselves if it is relevant for Greece. Seriously is this how you teach? This is the facts and you have to accept it. Man the University of Amsterdam has a very different educational culture then either the University of Chicago, or the University of Illinois.
Sorry DeviousDiva.
I ain’t gonna stop it though, you know.
Interesting article concerning FRONTEX (the EU office responsible for border security ) and Turkey’s unwillingness to help on immigration.
Here is the link
http://www.in.gr/news/article......gDtrID=244
Travlo: I have no idea what you are talking about. My academic style is visible in my publications, and accepted as serious scholarship. Furthermore, I referee widely and am one of the international arbiters of what is or is not scholarship. It has nothing to do with any particular university and I resent the implication that my work is somehow derivative. I have no association with Uni. of Amsterdam because I lost interest in the value of absurd verification procedures for student degrees.
I presume you have fallen into the student trap of focusing on formal qualifications. Let me tell you that I have never come across such assholes as some of the Greek professors with PhDs from supposedly good unis: I don’t mean merely that they are idiots, but that their work is of low quality.
For my part, if you want to know how I teach then I suggest you ask my former students. Snide remarks based on synoptic internet discussions are in poor taste. I have no intention of spending time posting references here, as if I am some sort of student seeking approval. Find them yourself.
Stassa: you are a supercilious bitch, and I repeat my previous comment that you exhibit peasant characteristics. Bourgeois people tend to be polite, respectful to those with education, and assume that others are not lying. Peasants have the exact opposite characteristics.
Xenos: Snide remarks or not, I am expected when lecturing to provide citations to me students and reference material. The way you are behaving reminds me of my undergrad profs in Greece and I have little respect for there arrogance and belive because I tell you attitude.
Well then just post the title of one of your articles (available through J-Stor or Scopus or on the internet) , and I will look it up. Don’t put the citations up if I can look them up in the bibliography or reference sections. I can’t very well look up articles written by a Mr.Xenos right? And I do not know your name. Thereby I cannot look your work up, eh no? Don’t tell me your name. Just post me a title of an article. I vow not to divulge your name on this forum or any other.
“one of the international arbiters of what is or is not scholarship.”
i.e you are a journal editor. Once I read one of your articles I will check up with faculty in the University of Chicago and Illinois to corroborate. For now I only have your word that you hold such a high position.
“Let me tell you that I have never come across such assholes as some of the Greek professors with PhDs from supposedly good unis: I don’t mean merely that they are idiots, but that their work is of low quality.”
You will find some frauds, and incompetents in any field. So what because there are some bad drivers we give up on driving tests or licenses? Were is the logic in that?
Sorry for harping DD, but I am genuinely interested on reading those articles.
Xenos, you keep escalating the offensive language. Whose point do you think that helps you make, yours or mine?
As about your cludzy attempts to bully me into showing some respect to your superior authority, yeah right. Why not pull the other one? ‘S got bells on.
Oh and- “peasants” vs “bourgeois”? Are you talking about social classes now, or did the conversation turn to Dungeons and Dragons when I wasn’t looking?
Konstantine, I think Oath Given remembers Xeno’s name from a previous exchange between him and Michael Scowcroft and from what he said I think he’s supposed (or pretends) to be Bill Frelick of Human Rights Watch. That would surely be a disappointment.
Anyway, I’m sorry for sort of criticising you for giving him credit etc, before. You know what you’re doing. I just meant that no self-respecting academic with a reputation to protect would troll the netz acting like a high-school student, like Xenos does.
Er. Which is probably why he is not telling us who he is- because he knows full well that such sophomoric behaviours would seriously damage any academic credibility he might have.
On the other hand he may be an editor in “Parapsychology Monthly” or perhaps “Homeopathic News”. Dunno if his cred would take a blow then. Huh.
Xenos is not Bill Frelick. He lives and works in Greece and the organization he co-directs for is affiliated with my father’s alma mater (unfortunately). He actually is an expert (by practice as opposed to training) on migration issues and I presume his advice via IMEPO and other organizations has been ignored (I wonder why). Back in the 1990s he was a founding editor of South European Society and Politics.
Oath Taken: you know only a fraction of what I do, whom I advise, and where I work. FYI: every single recommendation I made to the Greek government was adopted in the report you refer to. You might also care to question your idea of expertise — what is “training” to be an expert? Do you mean student diplomas? Bill Frelick (whom I know personally) is also not formally “trained”: in fact, there are no experts trained as such. Expertise is gained by experience and proven by published work and professional activities — something Greeks don’t understand.
Xenos
a) I can only go by your actual public persona as seen from your CV and your publications, reports, testimonies, presentations etc. – if some of your activities are clandestine I would of course not know about them.
b) I can only go by your very own claims on this blog that your recommendations are ignored by the idiots in government…
c) Given that you admit dropping out of your own Ph.D. (which for whatever reason you still put up on your CV as if it’s still active) I have no interest in debating the negatives of the established system of training experts in a structured way.
d) Suffice to say that I agree with you that an expert need not have a doctoral (or even undergraduate degree), especially in the so-called soft sciences, but lack thereof makes one far more suspicious of self-proclaimed expertise. The fact that you have managed to publish in a respectable peer-reviewed journals means you are not a kook – on the other hand the fact that instead of working for a top university you’re running MMO makes you less of a worldwide authority than you seem to present yourself as. And certainly your published works do not make you an expert on history or social/cultural anthropology – in those fields you’re as much an amateur as the rest of us.
e) Bill Frelick is a human rights activist – I guess in today’s world that also makes him an expert (as opposed to an advocate with an agenda). He is not an academic – which is what we’re talking about. As for the name-dropping, I’m more interested in the fact that you know the ECRI people personally as I’m sure your bile will surface in their forthcoming report on Greece.
PD: I have been unable to remove my CV of some 6 years ago from the website, which is why out of date info exists. My activities are not clandestine, and directly involve all 27 EU governments, the UN and other international agencies.
You will not know this, but historically the PhD in the UK is a degree for failures, for people who were not good enough to publish. It is not accidental that Isaac Newton (and others of that calibre) never took a PhD. Thus, I am far from impressed by the continental system, especially as practised in Greece, which requires a student degree of its professors, but does not require serious published work. The consequence of this policy is visible for all to see.
As far as my activities are concerned, you are out of touch. I operate in an international environment and do almost no work in Greece: this is in fact essential, as the Greek money for research is caught up in corruption and handed out to political friends. I also referee for all the international specialist journals and many of the social science journals. Since I have taught (and examined) university courses in economic and social history, sociology, politics and political economy, I do not think that my knowledge is “amateur”. That is not to say that I would consider myself expert in these broad areas, but then very few people are.
I see that you resort to gratuitous insults in your last sentence; why is all criticism of the appalling Greek policies on race, minorities and immigration described as “bile”? Does this mean that you consider ECRI to be full of hate for Greece? Most people applaud the calm and reasoned reports that they issue, which are primarily concerned with adherence to legal norms and promotion of good practices in the management of minority and immigration issues. I doubt that there will be any major difference between their next report and the recent reports of the Synigoros tou Politi.
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