Going back home after an evening at the
pub, a young man bumped into a drunken old man who was grumbling around a
street lamp. “I lost my keys, and I cannot go home, please help me finding my
keys”-he said. The old man could not stop circling around the lamp again and again.
The young guy helped the drunken even though it was clear that the keys were
not there. After a while he said: -“we have looked for a while, your keys are
definitely not here. Why you insist in looking here?” The old man: it is
obvious why: here there is light and we can search better!
I was told this joke many years ago in a
business context and I keep using it when someone is trying to look for a
solution to complex issue by circling the same area or problem.
I cannot stop thinking about it when I read
about the Greek crisis. The debt crisis, as Mr Varoufakis seems to have said,
cannot be solved. Not by traditional means. What is the sense of issuing new
debt adding to the old one? Why should Greece dismiss their important assets
when their value is low (because of the crisis)? And why should the Greek
people even listen to the reprimands of the northern European counterparts, who
blame them for not having chosen the right politicians? Nobody likes the
“know-it alls” or the “smart-arses” (in German there are two very appropriate
expressions such as “Klugscheisser” or “Besserwisser” which I would use if they
weren’t so inappropriate). Imagine yourself you are a Greek worker who always
have paid taxes and lost his job, and you are very angry. Then watch carefully
videos of the meetings between Greek and European authorities without the
comment or audio. The body language of the parties will tell you more than
thousand words. You will not like what you see. Nobody likes the “know it
alls”.
The Greek people have suffered beyond any
imaginable limits, for a problem that they have inherited from their
inefficient past. Should they be
punished for that? Perhaps, perhaps not. I personally do not think so.
So what is the solution? I am not qualified
enough in macroeconomics to indicate a possible highly financially engineered
solution. What I know for certain are three things:
1.
The FMI, the ECB and all
authorities involved are looking for the “keys around the lamp”. The keys are
not there and yet they keep on looking
2.
The second thing I know is that
all parties involved are using this discussion for internal political
discussions, mostly for own small political advantage, always blaming Europe.
You can here on tv or read in the press “my party and I will not allow Europe
to waste or taxpayer money to feed these parasites”
3.
The solution to this problem
(as well as to other problem I will mention below) is too important to be let
to economists, let alone politicians
Again what is the solution? Or better where
should we be looking for the keys? Knowing very little or nearly nothing, I
know where not to look for: near the lamp!
I think that keys for the solution might be
somewhere else, perhaps close to three elements: the idea of Europe, Imagination
and Courage.
What
does it mean?
Idea: The Idea of Europe, an entity aggregated around common values of
human rights, democracy, Christian values (yes even if we do not believe they
are embedded in our cultures, we like it or not), and respect of the rule of
law is something a lot grander than the pitifulness of these EU accountants.
Great people after the war have imagined a peaceful continent, politically
united, longing for prosperity and human development of as many citizens as
possible. If you look at the Greek crisis and the way it is handles this idea
is nowhere to be found. I hope we do not
need another war to discover how intensively we European are a single nation.
Imagination: Imagine for a moment that a country like Germany or a group of
countries including France, Italy, The Netherlands, Great Britain, decide to
relief Greece from the debt burden totally or partially under certain
conditions (for example the effective implementation of a better and more equal
fiscal policy) and decide to create the nucleus of a political union, for
example by creating a common army or a common centralised fiscal system. What
would happen then? Difficult to explain to the own voters? Perhaps. But the step of one State or more States
helping another one on a basis different that mere selfish interest, would be a
unique one in the history of mankind. Could this step destabilise the financial
markets? Perhaps. But we have been destabilised by the real estate bubble and
the trash bonds in the US. Were they worth the risks? Certainly not. That risk
we have taken once. Why not betting on a better future? Can you imagine a
European political state with common fiscal, defence, justice and foreign
policy ground? Can you imagine a large country with strong regionalisation were
the local languages and identity live together with large efficient state
infrastructure? Can you imagine such state embracing also Russia?
I
can.
If you can’t you can keep looking for your
keys around the lamp. And maybe some more booze would make you see those keys.
Courage:
"Courage, if you don’t have it, you can’t make
it up"- Don Abbondio, in Alessandro Manzoni’s “I promesi sposi”
(“Betrothed”) 1840-1842.
As Nelson Mandela said, "I learned
that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it. The brave
man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear."
The CLEARCUTCASE is that I whish that, for
a change, our politicians would be brave enough to overcome their short-sighted
pitifulness and use the imagination I hope they had once when they were young.
_______________________________________________
Imagine
there's no heaven
It's
easy if you try
No
hell below us
Above
us only sky
Imagine
all the people
Living
for today...
Imagine there's no countries
It isn't hard to do
Nothing to kill or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Living life in peace...
You
may say I'm a dreamer
But
I'm not the only one
I
hope someday you'll join us
And
the world will be as one
Imagine
no possessions
I
wonder if you can
No
need for greed or hunger
A
brotherhood of man
Imagine
all the people
Sharing
all the world...
You may say I'm a dreamer
But I'm not the only one
I hope someday you'll join us
And the world will live as one.
(John
Lennon)
The plot of this masterpiece of the Italian literature takes place
in the 17Th century in an unnamed Lombard village
in Northern Italy. Renzo and Lucia, a couple, are planning to wed on 8 November
1628. The parish priest, Don Abbondio, is walking home on the eve of the
wedding when he is accosted by two "bravoes" (thugs) who
warn him not to perform the marriage, because the local baron (Don Rodrigo) has
forbidden it.
Scared by the bravoes Don Abbondio refuses
to marry the couple, which starts a series of turbulent events, on the tragic
background of the plague, which struck Italy in those years.
