Op-ed
Reflections on 2019 – my foreword in THE GUARDIAN BEDSIDE 2019
, 25/12/2019
Every year for nearly 70 years, the Guardian has collected the best of its journalism into a book – the BEDSIDE GUARDIAN. This year, Bedside Guardian 2019 is edited by Aditya Chakrabortty with Paul Johnson, deputy editor, alongside Jonathan Freedland, Zoe Williams Emma Graham-Harrison. The editors were kind enough to ask me to write the Foreword. As it reflects my […]
Labour’s Manifesto is fit for purpose. So, why are the middle classes so hostile to it? THE NEW STATESMAN
, 08/12/2019
What are we to make of a political class that proclaims its ethical commitments but that cannot bring itself to endorse the only concrete actions that would honour them? This general election is unique in ways that transcend Brexit. Over the decades that I have been observing British politics, never before have I witnessed a […]
My review of Banerjee & Duflo’s (this year’s Nobel winners in economics) latest book – The Observer
, 14/11/2019
REVIEW: Good Economics for Hard Times: Better Answers to Our Biggest Problems, by Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo A recent YouGov survey confirmed that economists are the least trusted professionals in the UK today. Brexit is only the latest contributor to the public’s understandable rejection of a profession that has either failed spectacularly to raise […]
With a recession on its way, it is time we demanded an International Green New Deal
, 15/10/2019
Last April, again in The Guardian, David Adler and I called for a particular Green New Deal to be implemented internationally. Now that a new recession is ante portas, we are renewing this call, suggesting that we cannot afford yet another ‘good’ economic crisis to go to waste. Our latest piece in The Guardian follows: […]
Η μόνη καλή λύση για το Brexit – Κυριακάτικη Real News
, 30/09/2019
Οταν το 1946 οι ευρωπαϊστές ενθουσιάστηκαν ακούγοντας τον Ουίνστον Τσόρτσιλ να μιλά ενθουσιωδώς υπέρ της δημιουργίας των Ηνωμένων Πολιτειών της Ευρώπης, μάλλον δεν πρόσεξαν την επόμενη φράση του με την οποία ξεκαθάριζε ότι η Βρετανία δεν θα έμενε εκτός, καθώς, αναφερόμενος στη χώρα και τον λαό του, είπε: «Εμείς είμαστε με την Ευρώπη αλλά δεν είμαστε της Ευρώπης». Η […]
Time for ECB bonds! (Yes , things are this bad) – Project Syndicate op-ed
, 26/09/2019
ATHENS – During his tenure as President of the European Central Bank, Mario Draghi forged a variety of weapons that he deployed to shield the eurozone from menacing deflationary forces. Without them, the euro would have been history. However, the deflationary specter haunting Europe was never truly defeated and is now back with considerable vengeance. In the […]
Boris is doing a troika, not a Varoufakis – IRISH EXAMINER
, 27/08/2019
ATHENS – Ever since Boris Johnson moved into 10 Downing Street vowing to re-negotiate the United Kingdom’s withdrawal agreement with the European Union, the conventional wisdom among many Brexit opponents has been that the UK’s new prime minister is “doing a Varoufakis” and will be crushed in similar fashion. The BBC’s Katya Adler reported from […]
Jeremy Corbyn’s finest hour? IRISH EXAMINER (Project Syndicate)
, 31/07/2019
Jeremy Corbyn must expose Boris Johnson’s no-deal Brexit as a Trump-deal Brexit and put forward Labour’s plan to end the interminable Brexit ordeal immediately, suggests Yanis Varoufakis Boris Johnson is the first British prime minister in a long time who is free of dilemmas regarding his approach to the European Union. For better or worse, Johnson’s […]
Lagarde at the ECB – my take in The Guardian
, 16/07/2019
Christine Lagarde was a key member of the infamous troika – Greece’s official creditors – who crushed our people’s resistance to perpetual debt bondage. The other key figure alongside the International Monetary Fund’s then managing director was Mario Draghi, president of the European Central Bank, who played a central role in that drama by engineering the closure of […]
Against extractive practices (social & environmental). Interviewed by Kate Aronoff for DISSENT
, 15/07/2019
“We have to talk to people in a way that combines addressing these [economic] anxieties with the issues of the environment. Unless we manage to do that, we will fail.” Kate Aronoff Summer 2019 Yanis Varoufakis celebrating the anniversary of the Carnation Revolution in Portugal in 2018 (Pedro Ribeiro Simões/Flickr) The last few years have been […]
How Syriza’s capitulations allowed the Greek right to escape the dustbin of history – The New Statesman
, 09/07/2019
The left-wing party’s embrace of austerity created the conditions for a parasitic and cruel oligarchy to return The Greek right is back: greedier, uglier and more focused than ever. The incoming New Democracy government is determined to reclaim full control of the state on behalf of the most parasitic segment of Greece’s oligarchy and, of course, of […]
MeRA25: Greek progressives’ chance to take the fight against austerity back into Parliament – JACOBIN
, 11/06/2019
Amid the bad results for the Left in the European elections, the Greek outcome was particularly poignant. In the last such contest in 2014, Syriza rode the revolt against austerity to become the largest single party, in its final step toward national office. Five years later, in last month’s election, it finished ten points behind the […]
Since the Withdrawal Agreement cannot be re-negotiated before Brexit, only a stark General Election can clear the air – The Telegraph
, 05/06/2019
Theresa May’s sequence of strategic errors has rendered impossible a soft Brexit. By adopting red lines consistent solely with a hard Brexit, while denying herself the option of walking out without a deal, the Prime Minister engineered the current stalemate. Now, Mrs May is about to bequeath a poisoned chalice to her successor. The next […]
Why we are running in this EU election – FORTUNE magazine’s report
, 24/05/2019
Nothing has ever been subtle with Yanis Varoufakis, the leather-jacketed, motorbike-riding economist who was finance minister of Greece for six of the most tumultuous months in that country’s history. Plain-spoken (to say the least) and a self-professed radical, he is, at 58, not nearly done waging war on Europe’s major power players. This week, he […]
A Greek Canary in a Global Goldmine – Project Syndicate op-ed 17 May 2019
, 20/05/2019
ATHENS – The eurozone country that has become synonymous with insolvency is today proving to be a treasure-trove for some. Traders who bought Greek assets a few years ago have good reason to celebrate, having banked returns that no other market could have provided. But, as is often the case, an opportunity that seems too […]
The European elections could be an opportunity for a transnational Green New Deal – Adler & Wargan in The New Statesman
, 17/05/2019
Forget the People’s Vote: the upcoming elections for European Parliament have become the new second referendum. To one side, Nigel Farage hopes to gather the Leave vote behind his new Brexit Party. To the other, a splintered coalition of Greens, Changers, Lib Dems, and Labour candidates are campaigning for Remain. Both sides agree on the […]
Should Jeremy Corbyn commit to a second referendum? The Independent
, 12/05/2019
Should Jeremy Corbyn adopt an unequivocal commitment to holding a second referendum? Under normal circumstances, it should be an easy question to answer: democrats who think of referendums as a useful injection of direct democracy into our system of representative government, should be in favour. And those who are sceptical of referendums should be against. […]
Tageszeitung-TAZ: DiEM25 as the best hope for overcoming Europe’s nationalist resurgence
, 12/05/2019
Europe is in deep political crisis, and without renewal, the Union could soon fall apart. This is shown by Brexit, the strengthening of Euroscepticism in Italy, in Germany and many other countries. Many now rely on the French president as a renewal and saviour. But Emmanuel Macron is not the right person to stop the slow dying of the European […]
“DiEM25 is something I’m really pouring my heart into and I’m learning every day.” Pamela Anderson in FT Alphaville
, 11/05/2019
Pamela Anderson explains to FT Alphaville’s Jemina Kelly her enthusiasm for DiEM25: “The fact that a Greek economist, Yanis Varoufakis, and a Croatian philosopher, Srećko Horvat, are running in Germany show that these elections are not about national politics but about the future of Europe as such. I am glad to see that Europe finally […]
It is time the world unites around an International Green New Deal – The Guardian
, 24/04/2019
By Yanis Varoufakis and David Adler: In times of crisis and catastrophe, children are often forced to grow up quickly. We are now witnessing this premature call to action on a planetary scale. As the adults in government accelerate their consumption of fossil fuels, children are leading the campaign against our species’ looming extinction. Our […]
First they came for Assange…
, 17/04/2019
So, here is an idea: Let us join forces to block Assange’s extradition from any European country to the US, so that he can travel to Stockholm and give his accusers an opportunity to be heard. Let us work together to empower women, while protecting whistle-blowers who reveal nefarious behavior that governments, armies, and corporations […]
FT Alphachat 28 MAR 2019: On Democracy, Europe, the UK and Greece
, 05/04/2019
Alphaville’s Jemima Kelly and Izabella Kaminska sat down with Yanis Varoufakis, former finance minister of Greece and current organiser of a trans-European group, DiEM25, of what he calls “radical Europeanists” — in favour of union, without deflation or austerity. Mr Varoufakis answers criticism from the left, pointing out that even if the euro or the […]