"The "Greek Crisis" in Europe: Race, Class and Politics, critically analyses the publicity of the Greek debt crisis, by studying Greek, Danish and German mainstream media during the crisis' early years (2009-2015). Mass media everywhere reproduced a sensualistic "Greek crisis" spectacle, while iterating neoliberal and occidentalist ideological myths. Overall, the Greek people were deemed guilty of a systemic crisis, supposedly enjoying lavish lifestyles on the EU's expense. Using concrete examples, the study foregrounds neoorientalist, neoracist and classist stereotypes deployed in the construction and media coverage of the Greek crisis. These media practices are connected to the "soft politics" of the crisis, which produce public consensus over neoliberal reforms such as austerity and privatizations, and secure debt repayment from democratic interventions"-- Provided by publisher

motw/The Greek Crisis in Europe - Yiannis Mylonas.pdf

Mylonas, Yiannis;

Studies in critical social sciences, volume 138, Leiden, 2019

Studies in critical social sciences, Leiden ; Boston, 2019

Netherlands, Netherlands

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Memory of the World Librarian: outernationale

The “Greek Crisis” in Europe: Race, Class and Politics 4
Copyright 5
Contents 8
Preface 12
Acknowledgements 17
List of Figures and Tables 18
1 Introduction: the Study of the Greek Economic Crisis in Europe through the Media 20
1.1 Contextual Issues, Critical Political Economy and Cultural Studies 22
1.2 European Mass Media as the Empirical Material of the Study 25
1.2.1 A Brief Excursion on Liberalism and its Discontents 27
1.2.2 Greek, Danish and German Mainstream News Media 29
1.3 On Method: Thematic Analysis, Discourse Theory Analysis, Critical Discourse Analysis 33
1.3.1 The Relevance of Discourse Theory 34
1.3.2 Critical Discourse Analysis Perspectives 37
1.4 The Analytical Pillars: Race, Class, Politics 39
1.4.1 On Race 39
1.4.2 On Class 49
1.4.3 Theorizing (Post)Politics 58
1.5 An Outline of the Chapters to Follow 64
2 Greek Crisis, Eurozone Crisis, Global Capitalist Crisis 67
2.1 Setting the "Greek Crisis" in Perspective 67
2.2 A Crisis of Capitalism and Capitalist Crises: A Brief Excursion into Marxian Analyses 75
2.3 Crisis and Restructuring: Neoliberalism, Globalisation, Financialisation 82
2.4 The Greek Crisis as a Symptom: Centre (Core) and Periphery Divisions 88
2.5 The EU, the Euro, and Austerity 92
2.6 Debt, Austerity and Primary Accumulation 97
2.7 Concluding Remarks: Understanding Capitalism as Religion 104
3 The "Greek Crisis" in the Media: Hegemony, Spectacle and Propaganda 106
3.1 Media Aspects 106
3.2 Political Communication and the Public Sphere 107
3.3 Understanding Hegemony 111
3.3.1 The "Greek Crisis" in the Media: A Critical Overview 112
3.3.2 Hegemony, Propaganda and Biopolitics 116
3.4 Spectacular Dimensions of the "Greek Crisis" 124
3.5 Concluding Remarks: Interpellating and Disciplining the Working Class 129
4 A Cultural Failure: Reification, Orientalism, Nationalism 132
4.1 Introduction: (I)liberal Uses of Culture 133
4.2 Hegemonic Constructions of the (Occidental) Self and the (Oriental) Other 134
4.3 Greece as a non/quasi-European Other 139
4.3.1 The Culturalisation of Greece and its Crisis 140
4.3.2 Greece as a Commodity: Media Rituals to Sustain Ideological Myths 153
4.3.3 Nationalism, Narcissism, Anxiety: Europe as a Panopticon and a Benchmark 159
4.4 Concluding Remarks: The Occident, the Orient and the Liberal Meritocracy Cult 169
5 Under a Middle-Class Gaze 172
5.1 Governing Inequality 172
5.2 The Middle-Class Gaze and the Media 173
5.3 "The Loser" as a Master Class Frame 175
5.4 The Greek Crisis and the Construction of "Losers" 177
5.4.1 The Irrational: Ignorant, Irresponsible, and Frustrated 179
5.4.2 The Immoral: Lazy, Profligate, Deceitful and Bankrupt 183
5.4.3 The Threatening Other: Resentment, Spite, and Loath 189
5.4.4 Idealising the Bourgeois; the Enduring Myths of a Peripheral Upper Class 195
5.5 Concluding Remarks: Reaction, Diversion, Division 198
6 Exceptionalising the Crisis, Normalising Austerity 202
6.1 Technocratic Politics 202
6.2 Establishing the Crisis and Austerity in Depoliticised Terms 203
6.2.1 The Eurozone Crisis as an Apocalyptic Spectacle: The Mediatised States of Exception 204
6.2.2 Naturalising Austerity; the Only Solution (Without an Alternative) 210
6.2.3 The "Extreme Center" and Constructions of "Realism" 218
6.3 Concluding Remarks: Authoritarian Capitalism with Fascist Dispositions 228
7 Conclusions: Context, Politics, Negativity 232
7.1 Reinventing Critique, Reinventing Politics 232
7.2 Debunking Hegemony's Crisis' Myths 234
7.3 The Making of Regimes of Entitlement: Class is at the Heart of the Matter 238
7.4 Capitalism is Apocalyptic: Politicising the Crisis, Austerity, the "Free Market", and the (Capitalist) Economy 240
7.5 Negativity and Utopia 242
Bibliography 248
Index 270

2025-10-27