The tension is high. The markets are preparing for the worst and the central banks of the main countries of the world are developing a joint strategy to avoid catastrophes. To unleash this turmoil are the elections of the new Parliament and the new Greek government, which will take place today from 6 to 18. A country with just over 11 million inhabitants, a GDP that weighs no more than 2% on the European one but on which the fate of Europe hangs these days. And not only.
The analysts of Bank of America Merryll Inch have simplified it into three options what will happen: 1) greater probability: the elections will be won by pro-European parties and the response of the EU authorities will be limited 2) low probability: parties opposed to Europe will win and the EU authorities intervene heavily 3) medium probability: no parties in favor of the EU win but in any case the intervention of the authorities will be limited.
La catastrophe would occur in the second scenario: the exit of Greece from the euro and the return to the drachma would result, in addition to the huge devaluation of assets of the countries of the monetary union, one massive flight of deposits from banks, an increase in the difficulty of raising credit and asoaring spreads with all that this entails. In the third case there would be a more limited ruin.
Also for this reason, the high probability that BoA associates with the election of a pro-European government seems absolutely plausible. On the other hand, the two favored parties have no intention of abandoning the Union. New Democracy, the conservative faction led by Antonis Samaras, calls for compliance with the agreements made with the European Union and, until recently, did not rule out an increase in austerity measures. While the radical Syriza party, led by the young Alexis Tsipras, does not ask for an exit from the euro but for one revision of the austerity agreements imposed by the Troika (EU, ECB and IMF). The right question to ask therefore is not whether a pro-EU party will win or not, but whether European countries, primarily Germany, will be willing to accept Syriza's demands in the event of its victory.
However, everything will depend on the ability of the winning party to find the right allies. Indeed, to form the government, it is necessary to have a majority of seats in Parliament. Thanks to the bonus that the winning party receives (50 more seats), in order to create the executive it is necessary to obtain between 36,2% and 42,4% of the votes. However, 32 parties will present themselves in the elections: according to polls, only seven of these will pass the barrier at 3,6% and no one will go beyond 30% of the vote. New Democracy knows it can count on the support of the Socialist Party (Pasok) of Evangelos Venizelos, which obtained 13% in the last elections. Syriza's alliances, should it be entrusted with the task of forming the government, are more uncertain, and even more radical since they would almost necessarily involve an agreement with the Communist Party.
Yet in the last month the crisis in Greece has worsened and the positions of the electorate have become radicalized: Samaras and Tsipras reflect two opposing but symptomatic moods of the situation of the Greek population. On the one hand, the fear of the unknown and of the loss, of those who still have some, of their savings. On the other anger at the impossibility of having control on a situation that will bring hard sacrifices in the coming years.
New Democracy is Cassandra's party that foresees a difficult but secure future, austerity but in the complete hands of Germany and the ECB who will certainly be able to do something to save the country, because it is in their own interest.
On the other side is Tsipras, a young man with ambitious ideas who, superb like Pandora, he wants to open a vase of alternative and counter-current policies. But the measures he proposes reek of populism and we don't know the extent of the evils they could bring out of the vase, especially if Merkel continues to put her foot down. However, many Greeks at this moment feel they have nothing to lose and, as Hesiod teaches, in the end Pandora also lets hope out of the vase, which is always the last to die.
