How Coronavirus Turned Greece From Troubled Child to Shining Star
In the early 2000s, Greece was a poster child for European prosperity. They hosted the successful (but expensive) Athens 2004 Olympic Games, won the UEFA Euro 2004, hosted Eurovision in 2006 after winning with Helena Paparizou’s “My Number One” in 2005, and were a top tourist destination. Greece’s rise from a small, self-contained Southern European nation to a modern European nation was seen as an example of how the European project was working.
Then the infamous financial crisis hit. Years of uncontrolled borrowing and an archaic tax system led to disaster in 2008–2009, leading to record unemployment levels, a massive economic contraction, and above all, a fall in Greece’s reputation as a shining star of Europe. Instead, news organizations had wall-to-wall coverage of speculation on whether “Grexit” would happen, Greece’s tense negotiations with its creditors, and images of unrest in the streets of Athens. Greeks, hard-working people, were being judged by the failings of their government and its unfathomable sovereign debt.
Alexis Tsipras, head of the relatively new and far-left SYRIZA party, was then voted in as Prime Minister, in what…
