Troika’s Economic Adjustment Programmes for Greece: Why They Fail Systematically?

The three Economic Adjustment Programmes for Greece have been agreed by the Greek government and the EU-ECB-IMF troika as a remedy for the Greek crisis. This paper first analyses the theoretical origins of these programmes which lie in the neoconservative notions of pro-cyclicality and growth-creating austerity and follow the blueprint of IMF’s 1990s Structural Adjustment Programmes. Then it shows how, in the Greek case, the initial blueprint underwent crucial modifications that impede seriously its already problematic applicability. The subsequent sections identify the main technical and political-economic deficiencies of the Greek programmes and on this basis explain their systematic failure in achieving their own goals. The main argument is that the neoconservative restructuring strategy of these programmes, while being obligatory for the dominant interests of the EU, violates fundamental economic and social equilibria of the Greek society. This makes it an overambitious and concomitantly extremely precarious strategy.