May 12, 2012
Alexis Tsipras, a left-wing upstart who first won a parliamentary seat less than three years ago, could be the man who takes Greece out of the euro. His Syriza (Left Coalition) party, which unites a handful of fractious radical groups, massively increased its vote in the general election on May 6th, mostly at the expense of the Panhellenic Socialist Movement (Pasok). It has gone from the fringes of politics to being the second-largest party in the Greek parliament.
The centre-right New Democracy was the largest party; Pasok, previously New Democracy’s coalition partner, came in third place with just 13.2% of the vote, its worst election performance in over 30 years. Most important, parties which, like Syriza, are opposed to the austerity measures that Pasok and New Democracy had agreed to as the price of a €130 billion ($169 billion) international bail-out earlier this year ended up with 70% of the vote. This, the recent fall of a budget-cutting Dutch government and the election on May 6th of a Socialist president in France are seen by some in Greece and elsewhere as a widespread challenge to Europe’s politics of austerity.
In a fissiparous display of national desperation the Greek electorate gave no party much support. New Democracy’s 18.9% won it 108 seats, thanks to a rule that gives the front-running party an extra 50 seats; Syriza’s 16.8% got it 52 seats, and Pasok got 41 seats. The other parties elected were the Communist Party; Independent Greeks, a right-wing splinter group; Democratic Left, a splinter from Syriza; and the neo-fascist Golden Dawn (see chart).
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