Greek Sovereign Defaults in Retrospect and Prospect

Lefteris Tsoulfidis () and Michel Zouboulakis

South-Eastern Europe Journal of Economics, 2016, vol. 14, issue 2, 141-157

Abstract: This article focuses on and critically reviews the four Greek sovereign defaults (1827, 1843, 1893 and 1932) and puts them into historical perspective. The argument is that each and every one of the defaults was not an isolated episode in the turbulent economic history of capitalism, but, rather, a manifestation of the internal weaknesses of the Greek economy magnified during the downturn phases of the 1815-1848, 1873-1896, and 1921-1940 long waves. Crucial for understanding the conditions that triggered these defaults were the short-sighted and often opportunistic policies adopted by the Greek governments of the time, which were eager to increase public spending based on borrowed money, thus contributing to a mounting public debt. As a consequence, Greek sovereign defaults of the past are worth studying in an effort to derive useful lessons and draw economic policy conclusions.

Keywords: Sovereign default; depression periods; long waves; Greek economy (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: B50 F34 N13 N14 N24 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.asecu.gr/Seeje/issue27/issue27-tsoulfidis-zouboulakis.pdf (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: Greek Sovereign Defaults in Retrospect and Prospect (2016)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:seb:journl:v:14:y:2016:i:2:p:141-157

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in South-Eastern Europe Journal of Economics from Association of Economic Universities of South and Eastern Europe and the Black Sea Region Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Ms. Melina Petromelidou ().