We were concerned that the SYRIZA response, while good in many respects, is not adequate, and we found that several young SYRIZA members and supporters we spoke with also thought that more was needed. One young woman, for example, told us that when she had seen a Golden Dawn thug menacing an immigrant on the metro, she walked over and confronted him, demanding that he stop. Which he did. But, she said, if there had been five Golden Dawn thugs instead of just one, she doesn't think she would have been able to intervene in the same way. SYRIZA has to mount some kind of organized physical defense for the beleaguered immigrants, she thought.
Another young SYRIZA member told us that recently in response to the repeated physical assaults on immigrants a group of young anarchists had beaten up a number of Golden Dawn members. He said that while SYRIZA wasn't able to confront the Golden Dawn this way, he was very glad that this had happened. It was a blow against impunity.
When we asked SYRIZA leaders whether Golden Dawn could attack SYRIZA, they replied that Golden Dawn "wouldn't dare," suggesting that SYRIZA was so much stronger and more numerous that such an attack would be foolhardy. But we were concerned that, in addition to the moral imperative to defend immigrant victims, a failure to respond to Golden Dawn more forcefully now could embolden them for broader aggression a gainst the left down the road. Even now, as we noted above, women, journalists, human rights activists and leftists have been targeted on occasion.
There is a battle between the left and Golden Dawn as to who will be able to tap into and organize the rage of Greeks responding to their desperate conditions. We were told by a young SYRIZA member how this struggle emerged as early as the 2010 occupation of Syntagma Square. As we knew, the lower part of the Square was occupied by SYRIZA supporters and other leftists, but we learned that the upper Square was occupied by non-political people and right wingers who were waving huge Greek flags and saying that all politicians, including leftists, are corrupt and hopeless sell-outs.
Large sections of the Greek population are cynical about all politicians, and this cynicism is justified by the record not only of avowedly conservative and centrist parties but also purportedly left parties like PASOK and Democratic Left, which have shown themselves unwilling to challenge the Troika's austerity prescriptions. The June elections of 2012 were marked by a historically low participation rate, which reflected this popular distrust of all political parties.
The Challenge Ahead
This is the challenge now facing SYRIZA: Can it sustain resistance to the Troika and crucially, if elected, can it carry out a radical program that addresses the needs of the Greek people? Admittedly this won't be easy. There is a good chance that Greece will be forced out of the Eurozone if there is a SYRIZA government, though it seems that the country may be ejected even before that. Greece today revives many of the old questions about whether one can build "socialism in one country," and we saw the disastrous consequences of the attempt to pursue that path in the Soviet Union. SYRIZA will need to implement the maximum possible anti-capitalist program at home, while at the same time engaging in the critical task of winning support for a radical, democratic socialist alternative from the rest of Europe -- from o ther countries with weak economies like Spain and Italy, to the countries of Northern Europe which, while more prosperous, also suffer from inequality, insecurity, and down the line, instability.
Solidarity
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