Revision, again
It is often said that Greece has an excessive number of laws. The same can now be said of Greece’s constitutional revisions. The constitution has been revised twice in just the past 30 years, while the conservative administration of Costas Karamanlis appears to be bracing for a third review. Such constitutional overactivity is exclusive to the nations of Old Europe and reflects the failure of Greece’s political system to hammer out the basic characteristics of the country’s political identity in the long run. In a confession of incompetence, the Greek political system has decided that a rewriting of the constitution can take place every five years – that is, a bit longer than a government tenure. The right to frequent constitutional reviews has bred a superficial approach among lawmakers – recently manifest in the ban on deputies holding second jobs which was imposed halfway through the MPs’ terms. Furthermore, the so-called major shareholder stipulations did not prevent media owners from getting access to state contracts. Most importantly, national constitutions have gradually lost their power and EU member states are obliged to elevate community legislation above national law. The constitutional debacles in the French and Dutch referendums suggest that a single European treaty will not be around for some years to come. But in a sense the whole debate over a new Greek Constitution is merely a pretext, as EU states are giving up ever greater chunks of their sovereignty. National law is increasingly being shaped by the Eurocrats in Brussels. As for the Greek people, they will be made to watch a lengthy, specialized and largely fruitless debate.
