Building Hope in Times of Crisis
‘There is a big need for the solidarity movement in Greece. It started in late 2011 and has nearly doubled now to around 400 groups – even more if you add the more loosely networked ones,’ Christos Giovanopoulos says.
We sit in the central Athens office of Solidarity for All, a project that aims to facilitate the solidarity movement. It provide spaces and tools for co-ordination between different groups.
‘The government is friendly to these structures, but they have the bigger picture to consider,’ Giovanopoulos says, describing the attitude of ruling Left party Syriza. The self-organized social solidarity economy has grown quickly since the economic crisis hit Greece and the country was strangled by austerity measures imposed by the European Union (EU) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
Since 2009, unemployment has nearly trebled to 26%. As those who lose their jobs only receive benefits for the first year of unemployment, poverty and depression have skyrocketed. Even more strikingly, those without employment lose access to public healthcare services after a year. ‘About 50,000 people have died because they have no access to public healthcare. It is a human rights violation,’ Tonia Katerini, also a member of Solidarity for All, says. ‘When people are thrown out of social protection they don’t feel part of the system any more. It is dangerous because if there is no progressive movement these people are easily affected by fascists and the far-right party Golden Dawn.’
As a response to the humanitarian crisis many activists and local people started organizing food distribution and healthcare for those who had fallen through the cracks.
– See more at: http://newint.org/blog/2015/06/09/hope-in-times-of-crisis/#sthash.PGZ5Sk34.dpuf
