Gone are the days when the jeering of public figures found apologists who justified insults or even violence as an expression of righteous indignation.
The grim routine of contract killings and bombings shows that organized crime in Greece is booming. It has spread its tentacles so far that it is even gripping institutions and critical services of the state – first and foremost the police.
With their selection, voters always have the final say on the representatives they send to the Greek and European parliaments. Political parties, however, define the range and quality of the available choices.
Athens has numerous aging buildings that need renovation. The process, however, is plagued by two serious problems: In order to issue the relevant permits, one needs to endure the bureaucratic delays, and after the permits are issued, no one checks whether their terms are respected by the contractors.
The inability to set clear and permanent building regulations is one of the perennial failures of the Greek state. But now the conditions exist to fix this deficit as well. T
The deployment of new technologies has made Greek authorities more adept at detecting tax evasion. Inspections are more targeted, more extensive, more transparent.
One of the objectives of the Culture Ministry is to provide support to Greek artists and ensure the establishment of an efficient and transparent mechanism for the collection and distribution of copyrights.
It’s been just 10 months since the last national election and the government won by a landslide. So, it is ludicrous from both a political and democratic standpoint that its legitimacy should come into question.
A chain of failures have wounded citizens’ sense of security. When lives are lost on a train, when citizens are murdered on the doorstep of the police station, faith in the state’s ability to fulfill its fundamental mission is shaken – with serious political consequences.
The state of public transport in the Greek capital is disheartening, but without reliable public transport, traffic cannot be dealt with. Nor can the problem of pollution in the city be drastically reduced.
