CL

I do not think that we can directly connect the shambles of Syriza with the Eurocommunist tradition. There were many historical currents of the Left that went into Syriza. Some came from Eurocommunism, but some of the most prominent ones came from the Stalinist tradition of the Greek Communist Party. A good proportion of Syriza’s leading cadre were straight down-the-line Communist Party cadre and not Eurocommunist by any stretch of the imagination.

The real problem with Syriza was not Eurocommunism but how the party was constituted, and what it became. It began in an uncertain way in the early 1990s, mostly as Synaspismos, effectively an offshoot of the Communist Party that was always top-heavy and not rooted in the working class. It became Syriza in the 2000s, a small outfit that saw itself as potentially an important player in Greek politics because it seemed to be offering a new way of doing politics that would be pluralist, democratic, and so on. The major change in Syriza occurred under the leadership of Alekos Alavanos, who was probably the most talented politician of his generation on the Left. Syriza acquired the features of a new mass party that could attract many different currents of the Left in an environment of constant discussion and exchange of opinion. It was also consciously movementist.

The disastrous mistake that Alavanos made was to appoint Tsipras and his small group as the new leadership of Syriza, thinking that he was opening the way for a new, fresh, and radical generation. Tsipras proved enormously ambitious and equally adept at taking over the party. He pushed Syriza toward great electoral success in 2011-12.

Around 2010, Syriza was just a small party among many on the Left and, to be frank, it spouted the greatest nonsense regarding the nature of the unfolding crisis. Tsipras boldly pushed it to take part in the mass protests that then occurred in the squares of the Greek cities. Above all, Tsipras was prepared to say that he was ready to govern, unlike all the other leaders of the Left. The combination of his willingness to govern and the involvement of Syriza in the movement of the squares propelled the party forward in the elections of 2012. It became the government in waiting.

For a short period of time it seemed that Syriza represented a new form of organization that could be the future for the Left not only in Greece, but in Europe. A loose alliance of various currents engaging in constant debate, with a powerful cadre, which could attract electoral support and become the party of government. The reality became clear in 2015. Syriza was not a new way of doing politics for the Left, but merely the latest way in which the Greek political establishment could continue to rule. Endless political debate and movementism proved neither a guarantee of internal democracy nor a challenge to capitalism. Syriza has shown itself to be completely undemocratic in government, an amorphous political body with an all-powerful leader at the top and no real political debate. It’s an electoral machine that has become imbricated with the Greek state and seeks only to maintain itself in power. There is no future for the Left in the Syriza model, that’s for sure.