The twenty thousand protesters who cheered outside an Athenian court for the conviction of Greek neo-Nazis sent a clear message of democratic resilience at a time when it is badly needed.
A few years back, many of those convicted were freely marching through immigrant-rich neighbourhoods and colourful squares with swastika-like symbols, flaming torches and black uniforms.
Amid one of the biggest and most protracted economic contractions in postwar history, an unemployment rate of 27% and a collapsing party system, the parading neo-Nazis drew global attention and encouraged comparisons between crisis-ridden Greece and Weimar Germany.
What a turn around. In 2019 Golden Dawn was defeated in the court of public opinion, losing all its parliamentary seats, and this month it was defeated in a court of law.
Its leadership, former MPs and a few dozen militants were sentenced to between five and thirteen years in prison. The judges unanimously decided that they should be held accountable for a series of attacks against left-wing opponents and dark-skinned immigrants carried out during its electoral ascendance in the early 2010s.
Read also Jean-Yves Camus, “Not your father’s far right”, Le Monde diplomatique, March 2014.
A deceptively simple story, then, could be made out of the Greek experience with neo-Nazism: two pillars of liberal democracy, elections and courts, helped deflate and defeat one of the most extreme political parties in Europe.
Or, more broadly, liberal democratic institutions survived the extreme crisis and the extremists.
To many worried observers of troubled democracies across the world, the message from Greece might be that, given time, democracy will prove resilient. As long as there are fair elections and independent courts, democratic polities can protect themselves from anti-democrats.
This narrative of democratic resilience, however, is problematic.
The automatic quality ascribed to the democratic process and the assumed tolerance of democrats towards anti-democrats is historically inaccurate. As Giovanni Capoccia at Oxford University points out, in the interwar years some European democracies (for example, Czechoslovakia, Finland and Belgium) took legislative and administrative measures to defend themselves from anti-democratic parties. And, running against the odds of their time, they survived. In modern times, too, countries like Belgium, the Czech Republic, the Netherlands and Slovakia, have taken measures to defend themselves from anti-democrats.
The first line of defence against neo-Nazism in Greece was not politicians, prosecutors and police but civil society. Long before Golden Dawn members’ criminal prosecution, civil society groups sprang up in most urban centres, complicating the organisational efforts of Golden Dawn to grow roots in local societies. At a time when Golden Dawn tried to dominate in the streets, dozens of small but well-organised groups — from teacher unions to human rights advocacy networks — put aside their differences and pooled resources to organise thousands of neighbourhood demonstrations, protests and meetings against it. Although a small segment of antifascist protesters turned violent, the vast majority were peaceful, broadening the antifascist coalition and forging alliances with institutional and political actors. Non-violent tactics allowed antifascist groups to go beyond street mobilisation and use institutional mechanisms. In 2013, Greek civil society groups convinced institutional and political actors to stop sitting idle in the face of extremism. In 2020, a group of antifascist lawyers convinced the judges against the acquittal originally proposed by the state prosecutor for the neo-Nazis.
The second line of defence was institutional. Societal mobilisation compelled the previously inactive Greek police to take decisive steps against the violent activity of Golden Dawn. In 2013, after large mobilisations triggered by the stubbing of an antifascist activist, Pavlos Fyssas, Greek police arrested the leadership of the party. Amid a large wave of antifascist mobilisation, the Greek parliament passed legislation that curbed the racist social activism of Golden Dawn (for example, the distribution of food to ‘Greeks only’). Moreover, many Greek municipalities decided to condemn Golden Dawn mobilisations in their areas. Societal reactions to Golden Dawn also compelled the Greek police to change its administrative structures to improve its handling of racist violence and to more effectively monitor extremism. Police officers with links to Golden Dawn were shown the door.
The third line of defence was political. The Greek political system is known for its high levels of polarisation and the economic crisis accentuated political conflict. Yet, when it came to addressing the neo-Nazis, Greek legislators showed rare unity, getting together and passing legislation that denied Golden Dawn state money during the trial. The broad consensus of Greek political parties sent a signal that its practices went well beyond what was democratically acceptable. Without public money flowing into party coffers, Golden Dawn had to shut down a number of its local branches and curb its controversial ‘social’ activism. By the 2019 elections, at least half of its local branches had closed and a number of the remaining ones had become empty shells.
Long before it was defeated in the elections and in court, Golden Dawn was defeated by societal pressure, institutional action and political isolation. Democracy proved resilient but only because so many people mobilised to peacefully defend it.
Antonis A. Ellinas
