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Living Under Austerity
Greek Society in Crisis
Edited by Evdoxios Doxiadis and Aimee Placas
374 pages, 20 illus., bibliog., index
ISBN 978-1-78533-933-2 $145.00/£107.00 / Hb / Published (July 2018)
ISBN 978-1-78920-832-0 $34.95/£27.95 / Pb / Published (August 2020)
eISBN 978-1-78533-934-9 eBook
Reviews
“Living under austerity is a valid contribution to austerity debates as it furthers comparison across disciplinary approaches…Some of these chapters can be points of reference for future researchers interested in Greece, austerity, crisis, state institutions, and rapid social and institutional change.” • JRAI
“Anyone wondering about the effects of austerity—in Europe, the Middle East, the Americas, Africa, or Asia—should read [this book that] assembles scholars trained in anthropology, sociology, history, political science, criminology, and psychology to trouble accepted tropes about the meaning and effects of economic crisis through the case of post-2008 Greece. One of its most powerful contributions is its complication of the crisis framework. The other is its demonstration of the effects of that framework on people actually living in Greece.” • American Ethnologist
“Interdisciplinary, multifaceted, and with abundant empirical observation.” • Othon Anastasakis, University of Oxford
Description
Since its sovereign debt crisis in 2009, Greece has been living under austerity, with no apparent end in sight. This volume explores the effects of policies pursued by the Greek state since then (under the direction of the Troika), and how Greek society has responded. In addition to charting the actual effects of the Greek crisis on politics, health care, education, media, and other areas, the book both examines and challenges the “crisis” era as the context for changing attitudes and developments within Greek society.
Evdoxios Doxiadis is an Assistant Professor at the Department of History at Simon Fraser University. His research is on Greek, Balkan and Mediterranean history with a focus in the 18th and 19th centuries and a particular interest in questions of gender, law, state formation, and minorities. His publications include The Shackles of Modernity: Women, Property, and the Transition from the Ottoman Empire to the Modern Greek State 1750-1850 (2011), and State, Nationalism, and the Jewish Communities of Modern Greece (2018).
Aimee Placas is a faculty member at the International Center for Hellenic and Mediterranean Studies (ΔΙΚΕΜΕΣ), College Year in Athens program. She holds a PhD in Anthropology from Rice University and has published and presented on consumer debt and bankruptcy, the effect of the Greek crisis on overindebted households, and everyday economic life in Greece. She is currently writing an ethnography on the story of consumer credit in Greece in the 21st century.