Think Greece's current economic malaise is the worst ever experienced in Europe? Think again. Germany, economic historian Albrecht Ritschl argues in a SPIEGEL ONLINE interview, has been the worst debtor nation of the past century. He warns the country should take a more chaste approach in the euro crisis or it could face renewed demands for World War II reparations. Former German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer ...

Dear All, The issue of the fortune that the Papandreou family has made by the buying and selling of credit default swaps (CDS) is "old news" in Greece.   The first time that this issue was raised within Greek parliament was by the MP of the Conservative Party (ND) P Kamenos. The revelations that "Mr"  P Kamenos made provided the first base of evidences regarding the very profitably activities concernin ...

[Swedish reporter] Kajsa Ekis Ekman visited this misunderstood country with a broken social contract where... everybody agrees with each other. How would it feel if all that belong to us were sold to pay back loans, from which we never received any benefit? If our salaries were cut down to half and the money went directly to foreign banks? And if, while we were preparing ourselves to struggle for a bare livi ...

By VPRO Kort na aanvang van de financiële crisis van 2008 verzamelt de socioloog Manuel Castells op verzoek van de vermogende Gulbenkian Foundation in Lissabon een kleine groep van internationale topintellectuelen om zich heen om dieper over de crisis na te denken. Terwijl de crisis zich ontpopt en steeds nieuwe vormen aanneemt, doopt Castells zijn groep The Aftermath Network, een verwijzing naar de nieuwe ...

As Greece's children are forced to make do with photocopies instead of books, the true cost of this debt crisis is clear Aris Chatzistefanou and Katerina Kitidi for guardian.co.uk Last week marked the beginning of the school year in Greece. Children's faces were full of smiles but their schoolbags were empty, since the state didn't manage to distribute the school books. Instead, the government resorted to l ...

by ERIC TOUSSAINT In July-September 2011 the stock markets were again shaken at international level. The crisis has become deeper in the EU, particularly with respect to debts. The CADTM interviewed Eric Toussaint about various facets of this new stage in the crisis. CADTM: Is it true that Greece has to commit to paying about 15% interest rates to be allowed to contract ten year loans? Eric Toussaint: Yes, ...

In July, 2008, on the eve of the biggest financial crisis in memory, the European Central Bank did something both predictable and stupid: it raised interest rates. The move was predictable because the E.C.B.’s president, Jean-Claude Trichet, was an inflation hawk; he worried about rising oil and food prices and saw a rate hike as a way of tamping them down. But the move was also remarkably ill timed. The cr ...

by Silla Sigurgeirsdóttir and Robert H Wade Can’t pay back, won’t pay back The people of Iceland have now twice voted not to repay international debts incurred by banks, and bankers, for which the whole island is being held responsible. With the present turmoil in European capitals, could this be the way forward for other economies? The small island of Iceland has lessons for the world. It held a referendum ...

by Jérôme E. Roos on July 11, 2011 Economic collapse and police brutality bring back painful memories of years of military dictatorship and decades of financial hardship. Syntagma Square, Monday July 11th Like so many other words in the English language, the words trauma and crisis trace their roots back to classical Greek: τραῦμα literally means ‘wound’, while κρίσις means so much as a ‘turning point in a ...

The Grapes of Wrath is a 1940 drama film directed by John Ford. It was based on John Steinbeck's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel of the same name. The screenplay was written by Nunnally Johnson and the executive producer was Darryl F. Zanuck. The film tells the story of the Joads, an Oklahoma family, who, after losing their farm during the Great Depression in the 1930s, become migrant workers and end up in Cal ...