Greek PM Alexis Tsipras attends swearing-in ceremony of newly appointed ministers in migration, the economy, and defence at the Presidential Palace, Athens, March, 2018. Angelos Tzortzinis/Press Association. All rights reserved.Costas Douzinas’ Syriza in Power (Polity, 2017) carries a wondrous resemblance to Niccolò Machiavelli’s The Prince (1513). The latter is penned by a state official turned humanist philosopher; the former – by a humanist philosopher turned an accidental state official.
Both works scrutinise without moralization the world of politics at a critical historical juncture – the experimentation with republican rule in Italy and the experimentation with radical left rule in Greece, respectively. In both cases, the authors deem effective truth more important than abstract ideals. As they set out to expose the tensions between the logic of moral rectitude and the demands of public action, they advance positions that are in direct conflict with the dominant doctrines of the time. The insights into the world of politics are invariably delivered with flair and erudition that simultaneously seduce and intimidate.
Three narrative lanes: slow, fast, and furious
In Syriza in Power, three narratives compete for the readers’ attention – I will call them the ‘the fast’, ‘the slow’ and ‘the ‘furious’.
