The Depoliticisation of Greece’s Public Revenue Administration: Radical Change and the Limits of Conditionality

This book analyses the reform of Greece’s public revenue administration promoted by its international lenders under the successive bailout agreements put in place since 2010. In particular, it shows how an integral part of the finance ministry was converted into an independent agency operating largely outside the direct control of the finance minister. The authors focus on the implementation of this major reform and demonstrate the impact of domestic decisions on the increasing specificity of the international lenders’ demands and the concomitant lack of confidence in the Greek political élite’s commitment to the reform package. This book helps readers understand the response to the eurozone crisis (especially, the conditionality of funding), Greece’s reform capacity with a focus on its tax administration, and the expansion of the scope of non-majoritarian institutions in Western democracies.

Table of Contents:
Introduction.- Non-Majoritarian Institutions, Conditionality and Domestic Reform.- The First MoU: Piecemeal Change and External Assistance in Conditions of Crisis.- The Second MoU: Externally Imposed Change Despite Domestic Opposition.- The Third MoU and the Establishment of the Independent Authority for Public Revenue.- Conclusion.

About the Author :
Dionyssis Dimitrakopoulos is Senior Lecturer in Politics at Birkbeck College, University of London, where he directs the MSc programme in European politics and policy. He has won research funding from, inter alia, the ESRC, the British Academy, the Leverhulme Trust, and the European Union. He has published widely on the politics of European integration.  His work has appeared in leading academic journals such as Political Studies, the European Journal of Political Research, the Journal of Public Policy, the European Journal of International Relations, the Journal of Common Market Studies and the Journal of European Public Policy. Anargyros (Argyris) Passas is Associate Professor of State Administration and European Integration, with the Department of International, European and Area Studies of the School of International Studies, Communication and Culture, Panteion University and holds a Jean Monnet Chair in Public Administration & European Integration (2014-2017).  He is the founding Director of the Centre for Institutional and Policy Analysis of the Panteion University, President of the Governing Board of the Hellenic University Association for European Studies (ECSA/Greece) and co-director of the book series "Public Policy and Institutional Analysis", Papazissis Publishers, Athens.  He teaches at Panteion University, the Hellenic Open University, the National Centre of Public Administration and Local Government and is a regular research and teaching associate with the Cyprus Academy of Public Administration. He has published books, articles and studies in journals and edited volumes in Greece and abroad, in the fields of European Integration, Public Policy and Public Administration.