Pardon and promise

Σύντομη παρέμβαση μετά από την ομιλία του καθηγητή Maurizio Ferrera στην εκδήλωση του Πανεπιστημίου Πελοποννήσου προς τιμήν του (Κόρινθος 23 Μαΐου 2014)

Maurizio Ferrera’s use of Hanna Arendt’s principle of “pardon and promise” to draw an analogy between the current impasse and postwar Europe is certainly intriguing. Ferrera suggests that just as young Germans coming of age after the war were allowed to make a new start free from the guilt of their parents’ generation, so must young Greeks (and young Spaniards, and young Portuguese and so on) be allowed to live their lives unburdened by the crippling debt accumulated as a result of the previous generation’s imprudence: pardon and promise.

Well, yes and no. Even though denazification was less than complete, young Germans growing up in the 1950s were unrelentingly drilled about German guilt – not just Hitler’s guilt, or that of his closest associates, but the guilt of millions of Germans who cheered him when in opposition, brought him to power with their vote, sustained his rule with their enthusiasm or indifference to his brutality, actively participating or turning a blind eye to his war crimes.

We shouldn't stretch the analogy too much: after all, those responsible for the Greek crisis didn’t actually kill anybody – they just squandered a few billions. But, to pursue it further, I believe that in order to deserve pardon and promise young Greeks ought to go just as deep: denounce not just ‘corrupt politicians’ (that’s easy), or German politicians (that’s even easier), but the false promises on which their own prosperity rested – and draw the appropriate conclusions.

If young Greeks fail to do so, if they choose to spend their energy on a state of permanent indignation, eschewing reflection, ready to follow the next demagogue who flatters their narcissism, then they will resemble a postwar generation of young Germans all right – but not the one of the 1950s: they will resemble the bitter and vengeful generation of the 1920s.

And we all know how that played out.