Charming star with rhetorical skills: Yanis Varoufakis, former minister and economist
Photo: dpa/EPA/matt dunham
The cinema has been sold out for weeks. “Babylon” is the name of the long-serving Berlin cinema, just around the corner from the Karl-Liebknecht-Haus, next door to the “Volksbühne”, which once stood for exciting, rebellious theater. “In the Eye of the Storm” is the name of the documentary from Great Britain, subtitle: “The Political Odyssey of Yanis Varoufakis”. 85 minutes can be seen, almost an hour and a half, but these are only part 1 and part 4 of the six-part Varoufakis series by the young filmmaker Raoul Martinez.
Who is Varoufakis? A dazzling self-promoter in any case. His worldwide fame came from his short, exciting time as Finance Minister of Greece in 2015, from January 27th to July 6th. Since then, the myth of Varoufakis has lived and flourished; he is a hero of the left. His analyzes are razor-sharp, his criticism of capitalism is relentless, and his economic expertise is extremely precise.
In the first part of the documentary, the 62-year-old star talks about his parents and his youth. “I grew up in a fascist country,” he says. When the military staged a coup in Greece, Varoufakis was six years old. His parents’ home is political, his father was interned as a student leader for four years, and his mother only talks to her son about politics.
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In Part 4, which is shown afterwards, there is a crash course in economics with the special area of financial market capitalism. Anyone who knows Varoufakis’ books will be able to follow to some extent. Others may be overwhelmed by the flood of information and technical terms. The whole thing is mounted powerfully and poetically with a chronology of contemporary historical backgrounds.
After the film screening, the world explainer spends an hour on stage, eloquent like few others. The current status of the left is “tragic,” he says, “we are defeated.” But still: “We don’t give up, we keep going.”
The campaign for the European elections next June has begun. Varoufakis’ pan-European, i.e. transnational, grassroots movement Mera 25 plays a role on the fringes, fearing for parliamentary seats everywhere. Even the Greek branch has now been kicked out of parliament. “We’re making the revolution,” laughs Varoufakis with the gallows humor of a loser. The pandemic is over, he is happy, “and we are sitting together in a room again and discussing things.” What could be nicer?
“Germany has run down,” he then says. For 15 years under the Merkel government there was no investment, “all technology comes from China.” Europe is in “intellectual suicide” and austerity policy, i.e. “the class struggle against the poor,” as he makes clear, determines politics. And the USA and China invested decisively in the future and pursued opulent debt policies.
There is currently no one in Europe who represents the confederation as a whole; Europe is “bankrupt in every respect.” But his biggest fear is the rise of fascism in Europe. The “comedy of errors” is being continued today by leading politicians and the dissatisfaction of the masses is growing. A real gold mine for fascists: racism, anti-Semitism – and the ruling politics continue as usual.
The news website “Business Insider” once named the economist “the most interesting man in the world.” Varoufakis likes to bask in this light. It is difficult to respond to this thinker, self-promoter and rhetorician. But his persuasive power only reaches a small minority.
Economics is not a science, he argues in the film, but an ideology that is used as a weapon to defend the powerful. “Either we overcome capitalism – or we die.” Sentences as if made for slogans. To this day, Varoufakis’s findings are hardly worth a reaction to the prevailing realpolitik. Wolfgang Schäuble and Angela Merkel, for example, refused to participate in this documentation. An indictment.
»In the Eye of the Storm. The Political Odyssey of Yanis Varoufakis”, Great Britain 2023. Director: Raoul Martinez. 85 min. Only in English. Streaming on Vimeo for €18.99.
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