Is There Still Need for Grassroots Organizations?
The Role of Grassroots Organizations in Humanitarian Aid – an
Example from Greece, After the Peak of the 2015 “Refugee Crisis”
Filip Soszynski
International Migration and Ethnic Relations
Bachelor Thesis 15 credits
Spring 2021: IM245L
Supervisor: Henrik Emilsson
Word count: 13094
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Abstract
The thesis focuses on the work of Grassroots organizations in Greece after the peak of the 2015 refugee crisis. The research explores their current problems in Greece and their ability to report freely on the migrants situation. The information was gathered based on interviews with key informants from 6 different Grassroots organizations working in Greece. Findings show that there is an anti-NGO movement within the current Greek government. Furthermore, the government has introduced a new harsh registration process for all NGO’s within the migration field, which can determine whether organizations will be allowed to work in Greece or not. This causes fear amongst experts and Grassroots whether they will be able to continue their work in Greece and advocating for the human rights of the refugees and asylum seekers in Greece.
3 Contents Abstract ... 2 Introduction ... 5 Background ... 5 Research Problem ... 5
Aim and Research Questions ... 6
Thesis Outline... 6
Literature Review ... 7
Defining Grassroots ... 7
Grassroots Foundations ... 8
Creation of Grassroots ... 8
Grassroots cooperation with government and INGO’s ... 9
Advocating in Grassroots ... 12 Watchdogs ... 13 Judging Grassroots ... 14 Pro Grassroots ... 14 Critique of Grassroots ... 15 Method ... 17
Main Method of Choice ... 17
Study Design ... 18 Study Participants ... 18 Interview Questions ... 19 Limitations ... 19 Ethical constraints ... 20 Theoretical Framework ... 20 Theory ... 20 Authoritarian Neoliberalism ... 20 Power Shift ... 21 Results ... 22
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Analytical Framework ... 22
The Need for Grassroots Organizations and their Advantages ... 22
Identifying and filling gaps ... 23
Advocacy ... 26
New NGO registration process ... 27
Grassroots perspective on the reasoning for the new registration process ... 29
Critique of the Greek authorities ... 30
Previous Government ... 31
Other ... 32
Grassroots Internal Problems ... 32
Greek Community ... 32
Discussion and Conclusions ... 33
Further Research... 36
Appendix 1 ... 37
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Introduction
Background
World War II has spread across Europe between 1939 and 1945. It is back then, that the Nazi forces quickly managed to set foot and conquer many European countries. It is also back then, that the infamous term “Fortress Europe” has first been coined, in relation to Hitlers plan of building an Atlantic Wall to protect continental Europe from the Allied forces. Most
notably from the direction of the UK (Durflinger & McAndrew, 2020).
During the war that was tearing Europe apart in the 1940’s, aside of all the military activity, regular citizens from all sides of the continent, and from all countries involved started forming the first initiatives to help out those especially in need. These citizen aid movements were the precursors of what in the modern times we call Grassroots (GRO) movements. According to current information, an estimated number of 27 254 people across Europe, stood up to what they believed in, and helped those who needed it most (Yad Vashem, 2019).
Interestingly, the name “Fortress Europe” has reemerged again, decades later. Firstly, in relation to the European Union’s border protection programs, as early as in 2008 (Pinos, 2009). Secondly, the term received even more attention amid the outbreak of the so called “refugee crisis” that started in 2015 and continues to unfold to this day. According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) the number of asylum seekers that reached the “walls of fortress Europe” in 2015, either by land or by sea, was slightly over 1 million people (Clayton & Holland, 2017). After the EU – Turkey deal signed in the first half of 2016, the number of migrants dropped significantly, to the point in which the
migration flow is as prior to the 2015 influx. However, yearly, tens of thousands of refugees continue to stream into Europe (UNHCR, 2020).
Research Problem
After the infamous news about the death by drowning of Alyan Kurdi (spelling differs) hit the media worldwide in the beginning of September 2015 (Smith, 2015), the focus on the refugee situation in the Mediterranean grew. It is around that time that the wider international community started travelling to Greece in order to witness with their own eyes what is happening at the beaches of the Greek islands closest to Turkey. It is also the time in which local Greek residents that formed the first volunteer citizen ran emergency response units were joined by a growing number of their European Union (EU) compatriots (Guribye &
6 Stalsberg Mydland, 2018). It is also the place that soon would be the birthplace of many Grassroots organizations, that would become a major force providing aid at various levels to the continuously coming asylum seekers (ibid, 2018).
The peak of the so called “refugee crisis” in Greece is over, yet Grassroots organizations still operate throughout the country. Small organizations like these, work not only during the outbreak of a crisis, before big actors start their work, but also, they continue their work in the long term. Additionally, they provide a voice and guard the rights of the thousands of men, women and children whose voices and rights would otherwise remain unheard, forgotten or violated (Korey, 1998).
Aim and Research Questions
1. What role do Grassroots Organizations working with asylum seekers or refugees, have in Greece, that the government/big International Organizations do not?
2. What advocacy role do Grassroots working with asylum seekers or refugees, have in Greece and are they able to fully and freely report on their situation in Greece? 3. What (if any) issues do Grassroots have with the State and other actors operating in
Greece?
The hypothesis is that Grassroots organizations fill gaps in the humanitarian sector in Greece and are able to provide a voice for thousands of asylum seekers and refugees in Greece. Furthermore, Grassroots are cooperating and working side by side with the Government and other actors towards a similar goal.
Thesis Outline
Firstly, the literature review section analyses the previous studies on the Grassroots organizations movement in Greece and elsewhere in order to highlight the role and
shortcomings of these type of organizations. Secondly, the theoretical framework is presented. In essence the theory of authoritarian neoliberalism and its seemingly emergence in Greece, coupled with the theory of the governments fear of a shift of power towards
Non-Governmental Organizations (NGO). Thirdly, the analysis of the interviews is presented, highlighting the most important findings in relation to the research questions and hypothesis. Finally, the conclusions are presented, as well as suggestions for further research.
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Literature Review
The topic of Grassroots organizations has been appearing throughout the past few years in research quite a lot. It has been researched in many different ways, from a sociological standpoint on the one hand, to as far as an ethnographic observation on the other. Grassroots are undoubtedly an interesting topic that will continue to be researched, for a variety of reasons, as the number of such small organizations is on the rise. Just in the US alone, there has been around 1000 of such organizations in 1990, and 10 years later the records show that there is more than 11 000 of small non-profit organizations (Fechter and Schwittay, 2019). The situation in Europe seems to follow this pattern. As Fechter and Schwittay report, the number of Grassroots organizations being registered in the UK in the recent years, has
surpassed the number of bigger organizations, whilst in the Netherlands there are between 6 to 15 thousands of such organizations that have been registered in a nearly 30 year time span (Fechter and Schwittay, 2019).
Defining Grassroots
In current research on this topic one can find many names used interchangeably to describe the type of organization at hand. Citizen Initiatives for Global Solidarity, Citizen Aid, Private Development Initiatives, Grassroots International Organization, Grassroots International Non-Governmental Organization (Haaland & Wallevik, 2019; Appe & Schnable 2019). In this research the term “Grassroots organization” will be used, alternatively its abbreviation “GRO”. Some researchers claim that this name is reserved for organizations that have a set annual budget bellow a given number or is depended on the amount of full-time staff members. Smith argues that only organizations that are 100% volunteer ran, non-profit, and fully autonomous can be called Grassroots organizations (1997). However, compared with recent literature, Smith’s definition of what constitutes a Grassroots organizations is standing out as being by far the harshest. The author has decided to operationalize the term “Grassroots organization”, based on how the majority of researchers conceptualize it, as well as his own experience with such organizations. For the purpose of this study, the author will consider a Grassroots organization, to be often created ad-hoc due to a spontaneous need, usually initiated by a person or people who don’t have previous experience in crisis or refugee
management (Kitching et al, 2016). In the opinion of the author, the size of the annual budget shouldn’t influence whether an organization is considered Grassroots or not. If an
organization has especially generous donors and backers, or a strong fundraising team, able to bring in sizeable donations, it shouldn’t change the basis of the organization. So in summary,
8 the author agrees closest with the brief yet on point definition provided by Guribye and
Stalsberg Mydland, who say that a Grassroots organization is one that is “self-organized, by
groups of individuals who are pursuing a common interest(s) through volunteer based, non-profit organizations with low degrees of formality” (2018).
Grassroots Foundations
Based on the increase of the number of Grassroots organizations in Europe, the question arises - what do these organizations actually do? Are they simply duplicating services that already exist and are provided by either the government or by big and established
international organizations working on the governments behalf? Or perhaps they are created due to a gap in the official procedures or services? By looking into research from the last 5 years the author will try to answer those questions based on a general European sample from the post-2015 “refugee crisis”.
As with any major humanitarian disaster in the recent years, also during the ongoing European “refugee crisis”, there has been an increase in spontaneous social action (Kitching et al, 2016; Haaland & Wallevik, 2019). The need for such action is usually determined by basic observation of the media, politics, or just by regular by passers of the places in which the unfolding influx of refugees can be seen most – at train stations, beaches, and others (Haaland & Wallevik, 2019). Situations like these, also attract small NGO’s, and are a perfect ground for the formation of Grassroots organizations (ibid, 2019). The existence of the need to help one another, has been with humanity ever since. An example brought up in the introduction to this research shows that firsthand.
Creation of Grassroots
Grassroots organizations usually come to exist after a niche or gap is identified, in the governments refugee aid services. For example, in Amsterdam during the ongoing crisis, the Dutch government provided temporary housing for those refugees in need, however, they did not provide information on how to get to the apartments from the train station where most of the refugees would end up at. Therefore, a group of locals created an “escort” service to help those in need, reach the government accommodation center (Boersma et al, 2018).
A different example of services provided by Grassroots organizations, can be the case of Lesvos, Greece, in which spontaneous groups of Volunteers that later united under various small organizations, were aiding the government in assisting with beach landings (Guribye & Stalsberg Mydland, 2018). Their work would include coordinating various shore teams which
9 would be responsible for searching the horizon for incoming boats and dinghies, and then assisting the refugees on the shore, making sure everybody is off the boat, that emergency blankets are provided, first aid is accessible and water available. They would later assist in reaching the official transfer and registration center before being sent to one of the many emerging refugee camps on the island.
Additionally, one of the commonly pointed out abilities of Grassroots organizations, is the amount of flexibility that they have. As with any new crisis, the needs might change several times, not only in the early stages of such, but along the line as it evolves. As a crisis unfolds, it’s upon these Grassroots organizations to provide aid and support in the so called “front” line. Especially due to the fact that big organizations such as UNHCR or the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) require governmental approvals in order to commence their work, which takes time and detailed planning (Guribye & Stalsberg Mydland 2018). With private funding, and not being “tied down” by laws that require them to request approval from the authorities to operate (in the early stages), Grassroots organizations, are much more capable to react quickly, sometimes even quicker than the government, and with a great dose of
flexibility, in terms of the type of aid that they provide (Milan, 2019). In Austria for example, researchers found that Grassroots organizations, were more flexible and direct in responding to changing needs, compared with other actors in the field (Simsa, 2017). The flexibility in such organizations is not only demonstrated by the temporary ability to shift the type of services they provide. As an organization develops, it often identifies new gaps in the system – which, if it has the capability – it can cover, without the need of bringing in another
organization. So often there would be an organization with a specific aim, but with time and experience, it would develop to cover other fields of need as well, not necessarily in the same field as the prior area of expertise (McGee & Pelham, 2018).
Grassroots cooperation with government and INGO’s
Grassroots seem to be able to approach the rapidly changing field of a humanitarian crisis, with an immense ability dose of flexibility. This of course is an advantage that allows them to target and resolve issues at hand, without taking a big strain on the organization itself.
However, by no means does it suggest that the organizations are better than the government or that they could deal with a crisis on their own. This is merely a sign that perhaps the
cooperation between the governments, Grassroots organizations and big established international organizations can be of mutual benefit.
10 In recent literature there are a number of studies regarding the European refugee crisis, and how the newly emerging civil society movements, such as the creation of Grassroots
organizations, have aided the crisis in its early months. However, one of the most common issues with these Grassroots organizations involvement, is that often they have ignored
cooperating with big organizations such as UNHCR and the given countries government or its appointees (Guribye & Stalsberg Myrdland, 2018; Haaland & Wallevik, 2019). As with any multilateral cooperation, it requires good will from each party involved, in order to be successful. Many of the Grassroots organizations have been created by people with no previous experience in this topic, so it can’t be a surprise that lack of trust to the government might have been an issue. However, this works both ways. One of the examples of this unfortunate lack of cooperation could be seen in Austria in 2015. As one of the researchers reported, due to the lack of proper and timely communication between the authorities and the Grassroots organizations, a number of requests for additional support turned out to be futile (Simsa, 2017). Such miss-happenings only caused the tear in cooperation to grow bigger. Causing the authorities to lose a potential partner, in the time of heightened need. On the other hand, there are examples of people who openly contended cooperating with big international organizations or the authorities due to personal philosophical differences. As Guribye and Stalsberg Myrdland report in their studies from Lesvos, many of the newly created Grassroots organizations, emerged from spontaneous volunteers who did not trust the old-fashioned NGO structures, and preferred to create their own management models (2018). Thus, adding to the number of newly established small-scale organizations on the island, that needed coordination. As a result, nearly 120 organizations were reported working on Lesvos in the early months of the refugee influx (Guribye & Stalsberg Myrdland, 2018). On the one hand, the two researchers report that UNHCR in Lesvos, was trying to coordinate the aid efforts of all the parties involved on the island (ibid, 2018). At the same time, despite the many
difficulties in coordinating a vastly growing number of organizations, the coordination efforts were not without success. UNHCR did a vast amount of work, to promote and implement cooperation. In order to make the coordination easier, the island was divided into two zones – North and South – each with an appointed coordinator and assistant (Guribye & Stalsberg Myrdland, 2018). Furthermore, processes were implemented with cooperation between UNHCR, Greek authorities and the amass of NGO’s and GRO’s. Coordination meetings of various levels such as: camp meetings, north-south meetings, overall island meetings etc. were implemented on a set timely basis (ibid, 2018). However, on the other hand due, to the quickly growing number of Grassroots organizations, the task of trying to coordinate them,
11 making sure duplication of services was avoided, and that aid was distributed effectively and accordingly to the needs seemed to be a Sisyphean task, even though an effort much needed from UNHCR (Guribye & Stalsberg Myrdland, 2018).
The cooperation between all parties involved, should be the aim and goal of bringing together authorities and their appointees, established NGO’s and Grassroots organizations. This is sometimes easier said than done, as seen in the example from Lesvos, especially in the mentioned distrust towards the “old fashioned” NGO management structure (Guribye & Stalsberg Myrdland, 2018). Other research, also from Lesvos, found that another issue is that Grassroots claim that the established International Non-Governmental Organizations (INGO) are often doing the work that should – in theory – be provided by the Government (Haaland & Wallevik, 2019). Based on this critique, it’s easier to understand the negative approach from Grassroots towards INGO’s. Another interesting finding coming from the research conducted by Haaland & Wallevik, is that according to the researchers, many of the newly found
Grassroots organizations have been created due to a disappointment with the long existing humanitarian aid ‘establishment’ (2019). According to this, the newly found organizations were to avoid the bureaucratization that can be found amongst the big INGO’s, and the standardization of services (ibid, 2019). This finding is later underlined by another pair of researchers who go further and claim that these organizations intentionally remain on the outskirts of the established humanitarian approach, as a form of resistance to it (Fechter & Schwittay, 2019).
Research, focusing on the cooperation between all the parties involved in providing humanitarian aid in Austria in 2015, has found that established Non-Profit Organizations (NPO) should provide a greater deal of support to the newly created Grassroots organizations, especially in helping them to find their area of expertise (Simsa, 2017). It also raises questions - as shown in Guribye’s and Stalsberg Myrdland’s 2018 study - whether Grassroots
organizations would want to cooperate with the more established and bigger NPO’s. However, Simsa also reports that in the course of the research, NPO’s and Grassroots
organizations have been recognized by the Austrian government as the “bridge” between the national authorities and the refugees (2017). Furthermore, due to being constantly present on the frontline of refugee aid, as mentioned before, gives Grassroots organizations the firsthand knowledge of refugees and their struggles.
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Advocating in Grassroots
A number of Grassroots organizations as they work starts, and the momentum is reached, decide to advocate for the people they work for, and for the cause that they believe in. Some of these organizations are purely advocacy oriented (Milan, 2019). As mentioned in the previous chapter, in order to cooperate with INGO’s or governmental organizations, it is expected that certain established humanitarian standards will be respected by all sides. However, as there is a growing distrust coming from Grassroots towards these standards, and a disappointment in the bureaucratized humanitarian aid approach, that is seen in the INGO’s, many Grassroots don’t trust their potential bigger partners. By resisting cooperating with the humanitarian actors, these Grassroots are not afraid not only to do so, but to openly
communicate this and the reasoning behind it to the world. There are many ways in which organizations can advocate. Because of the increase in use of new technologies, also in the humanitarian aid sector, advocacy has become even easier than before (Haaland & Wallevik, 2019). As research shows, the unrest amongst some of the actors from the Grassroots sector, is shown openly throughout social media channels, blogs, vlogs and other outputs (Haaland & Wallevik, 2019). They share the situation of the refugees – as it is – bypassing the official media information, and the government-controlled information outputs.
Generally, advocacy can be a great tool to raise people’s awareness on events that unfold. In some cases, organizations use this tool, to highlight a specific pressing need. Like an example from Lesvos, where the Grassroots organizations would organize campaigns in their countries of origin, to underline the situation and the biggest needs – specifically Non-Food Items (NFI’s). And have not only successfully gathered these but also managed to raise their compatriot’s awareness on the situation of asylum seekers (Kitching et al, 2016). Other organizations understood that they couldn’t be apolitical. Due to the nature of the crisis, being apolitical stood against many of the values which the organizations represented. Researchers such as Kitching et al, reported this struggle to maintain neutral, amidst the actions of the government (2016). Especially around the EU-Turkey deal, many of the Grassroots on Lesvos have become somewhat forced into activism, when basic human rights became violated in their opinions (Kitching et al, 2016). These were not stand-alone cases, limited to Lesvos. The protests against Europe’s approach to refugees and their reception in Europe spread like wildfire. For example, in the Netherlands, informal Grassroots organizations have been advocating against the lengthy and overcomplicated Dutch asylum policies, calling for a simplification of the procedure, if it was impossible to speed it up (Boersma et al, 2018).
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Watchdogs
The rise of Grassroots organizations can be dated back to the post World War 2 era. It is then that one of the results of an active civil society took its form in establishing NGO’s and Grassroots. Their first major victory was the successful lobbying and putting pressure on the newly established United Nations (UN), in creating the UN Charter in 1945, in which human rights stood out amongst others (Korey, 1998). This was a major step towards the ratification of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which came to life 3 years later. According to Korey, parts of it were drafted by NGO representatives (1998). Furthermore, it would be the NGO’s rather than governments that would stand guard of the Declaration. As Korey puts it “(…) it was they who would assume the function of implementing the demands of
international morality” (1998). The idea was that NGO’s would be the fact finders and
watchdogs guarding human rights world-wide (Korey, 1998). Soon their actions - over decades - would prove this to be true, but also in some cases this would lead to various forms of opposition from those who rule.
One of the main tools of NGO’s to fulfill their most fundamental task of defending the oppressed, is openly speaking and reporting about the violation of law. Organizations such as these, have many tools to do so, but yet again their ‘symbiosis’ with worldwide media is of the highest efficiency, in reaching and influencing public opinion (Korey, 1998). Historically, such actions undertaken by NGO’s were subject to retaliation from governments. In an example, Korey brings up the case of a Jewish organization B’nai B’rith, advocating for the Jews living in Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) and their right to travel to Israel (1998). The result of their action was a blackmail approach from the USSR and its allies, threatening the NGO’s status of an advisory to the UN (Korey, 1998). USSR and current Russia have an infamous approach to NGO’s. The former Soviet Union, in 1969 throughout a nationalized media outlet called out NGO’s as “rubbish which should be thrown out”, and later on comparing these organizations to “weeds in the field” which should be uprooted (Korey, 1998). This is yet one example of many, of the attempts by various state officials to silence the uncomfortable voice of NGO’s.
Finally, as claimed by Korey “without NGO’s the entire human rights implementation system at the UN would come to a halt” (1998).
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Judging Grassroots
As with every type of organization, there are pros and cons to its structure. So is the case of Grassroots organizations. Of course, not all of the pros and cons will be applicable to each organization in existence, as these widely differ amongst each other, with their level of organization, structures and processes in place. The author believes that it is important to be aware of the positives as well as negatives of Grassroots, in order to better understand the dynamics at play.
Pro Grassroots
The most commonly repeated positive in regard to these organizations, is the fact that Grassroots organizations are as gap fillers (Simsa, 2017). These gaps seem to appear both in situations of emerging crisis’s as well as in slower paced long-term situations. Grassroots organizations seem to be able to not only fill in the gap quickly but also identify it long before the government or its appointees (Simsa, 2017; Milan, 2019; Kitching et al, 2016; Haaland & Wallevik, 2017).
Another mentioned positive coming regarding the Grassroots sector is their ability to help in organizing and conducting in the integration process. This has especially been seen in Austria during the 2015 influx of asylum seekers (Simsa, 2017). According to Simsa, the integration process will not be as effective if done without the support of Grassroots organizations (2017).
An additional characteristic that sets Grassroots apart from bigger NGO’s or INGO’s is their financial situation. First of all, many of the Grassroots organizations have a smaller overhead, as most of the organizations are fully or partially volunteer run (Smith, 1997; Appe & Schnable, 2019; Fechter & Schwittay, 2019; Milan 2019). Moreover, the donors can vary in size, and with the use of technological solutions such as crowd funding platforms, the reach to potential donors is easier and can be done on a more personal level – without having to deal with the façade which might be an issue for big INGO’s (Fechter & Schwittay, 2019).
Another benefit of being a Grassroots organization in the financial meaning, comes from the fact that the organizations don’t have to organize a public tender in order to find the cheapest supplier. They can simply rely on their donors to send money their way, and then spend it according to their best knowledge of the market, additionally having a positive economic input into the local economy. This ability was especially useful in the early days of the crisis,
15 within the ad-hoc Grassroots organizations, which were adjusting their services to the need, and could spend the donations according with the current needs as well (Kitching et al, 2016). A trait that definitely sets Grassroots aside from other types of organizations is their high level of flexibility and versatility. Due to the size of the organization and their ability to quickly contact their donors to whom they answer to allows them to quicker adapt to the changing environment. Additionally, as shown before, Grassroots organizations tend to have less bureaucracy within their ranks, which also adds to the ability to quickly change direction if need be. According to Smith, Grassroots are able to adjust their work so that they can reach any person in need to some degree (1997). As the case of Lesvos from 2015 shows, many of the newly found Grassroots were created as the need presented itself (Kitching et al, 2016). Furthermore the reason why so many organizations have been created on Lesvos – which is the focus of the researchers – is attributed to the fact that no INGO’s have been present in the early months on the island (Kitching et al, 2016). The responsiveness of Grassroots
organizations has been at a high in the early phase of the crisis across Europe – partially as a form of protest towards the slow responding European authorities (Milan, 2019). As Milan claims, in many cases the response from self-organized ad hoc Grassroots organizations was way faster than the first responses from the state’s authorities (2019).
Research shows that people who share a common belief are more likely to unite to help those that are in need (Boersma et al, 2018). These forms of Grassroots organizations have emerged, after people of various background found through a variety of platforms, their colleagues – people of a shared belief system – and formed together in order to provide aid to those in need (Boersma et al, 2018).
Critique of Grassroots
One of the most common issues that any Grassroots or NGO’s face, is the lack of properly trained workforce. As many of the Grassroots organizations rely heavily on volunteers, it can be somewhat difficult – especially in a time of urgent need for manpower – to do an in-depth screening of the future volunteer. This leads to such events that were witnessed in the early days of the response across Greece. As the example from Lesvos shows, there were
volunteers who were more focused on taking a picture with children, than on helping the actual cause altruistically (Guribye & Mydland, 2018). To add to this situation, it seemed – according to the researchers – that some of the volunteers came to Lesvos with a specific ethos in their mind, especially regarding the work they would be doing. When asked to do
16 cleaning tasks, many thought of them as ‘below their dignity’, and cleaning was not
something they set out to do in the first place (Guribye & Mydland, 2018). These examples show that relying heavily on volunteers can be an issue in Grassroots organizations.
Additionally, the picture example is the ‘classical’ type of the infamous white savior complex (Bandyopadhyay, 2019). This complex is something that the more established (over time) Grassroots organizations try to avoid by introducing a number of policies such as code of conducts and safeguarding policies.
The fore mentioned issues are the backbone of many of the other ideology-based problems in the Grassroots sector. Another example proving this point, is the often-arising issue with cooperation between Grassroots and other actors – state, their appointees or even different Grassroots (Guribye & Mydland, 2018; Appe &Schnable, 2019). The reasons behind this particular issue can vary. One of the commonly cited in research reasons is the lack of trust towards other organizations solutions to the problems (Guribye & Mydland, 2018). As the Grassroots organizations were growing in numbers whilst contributing to the massive
decrease in cooperation, this resulted in a higher risk of duplication of services and unevenly provided aid (Guribye & Mydland, 2018). Furthermore, this inner battle between
humanitarian aid actors led to an unwillingness amongst the Grassroots organizations to provide information about available support in other sectors, provided by a variety of different actors: state, appointees or other GRO’s (Haaland & Wallevik, 2019). Most notably the existence of services catered to the specific needs could have been more successful, if they were linked to, by all actors within their reach.
As mentioned, the financial structure in GRO’s is quite different from those in INGO’s or governmental organizations. However, the Grassroots model in terms of finances is not without its limitations. One of the biggest disadvantages is the unreliability of the money flow (Simsa, 2017). Basing fully on donors, can lead to situations in which the amount of money varies, therefore complicating the projects ran by a Grassroots organization. It seems to be even harder for those organizations which do not want to receive EU or state grants (Haaland & Wallevik, 2019).
Another major critique of Grassroots is focused on their lack of will to employ local citizens. According to research, internationals starting Grassroots organizations out of their country of origin, tend to have an urge to do everything on their own, without the aid of the local community who can be as able or even better suited to do the job due to the local knowledge (Appe & Schnable, 2019). Local aid providers are often overlooked by newly
17 emerging Grassroots and are of no interest to them as a potential employee or partner (Fechter & Schwittay, 2019, Guribye & Mydland, 2018). More so, often international Grassroots are so focused on their project and the impact it has on the people they serve, that they completely omit the local community, which could benefit from partaking in various projects (Haaland & Wallevik, 2019).
Finally, a big problem with Grassroots organizations comes from their foundation.
Majority of Grassroots have been founded on an ad hoc basis, out of an immediate need. The founders of these Grassroots organizations were mostly people who did not necessarily have any previous experience from working with refugees, vulnerable populations or in crisis management as a whole (Appe & Schnabble, 2019). This lack of experience in the subject was often demonstrated by the lack of knowledge of humanitarian aid standards and procedures (ibid, 2019). Furthermore, the lack of adhering to such standards, created a situation in which the government which was unable to coordinate all the Grassroots
organizations, couldn’t guarantee that the services provided were of factual quality and first and foremost – not providing further harm to the asylum seekers (Simsa, 2017). The lack of knowledge of internationally established aid standards and policies, as well as national policies (Haaland & Wallevik, 2019) can lead to not only legal issues for the aid providers who seem to ignore the laws, but first and foremost the refugees who they decided to serve.
Method
Main Method of Choice
The main method of choice is the generalizing case study approach. This method serves the purpose of generalizing on the field usually based on one example. However, in the case of this study, the researcher decided to broaden the research group, by interviewing a limited number of examples, out of which a few outstanding cases within the same research area, were selected. Therefore, creating somewhat of a focus group of case studies. The idea behind this multiple case study approach, is to be able to generalize based on more than one example. The researcher believes that this way, the information gathered will be of bigger significance to the academical world, and to our understanding of the subject. The research’s subjects are the Grassroots organizations that still operate or have operated in Greece during the ongoing, so called “refugee crisis”, that began in 2015. However, the theme of the research is focused on the last 2 years so on the period between mid-2018 and mid-2020. The researcher is taking into account that the findings might focus on a specific time period, depending on the
18 information provided in the interview. Because the focus of this research is to be as up to date as possible, a slight change in the time frame might occur in order to provide information exact to the time of the interviews.
Study Design
The main research material was gathered from semi-structured interviews with directors, point persons and other permanent/management staff of selected Grassroots organizations that currently exist or have worked in Greece up till 2020. This time span has been chosen for two reasons. Firstly, to make sure that the information is relevant and time specific. Secondly, to allow place for organizations that ceased to exist to have a say in the topic. Interviews were chosen as the method for data collection, as this is this was the best method that would allow for an in depth understanding of the operations of the interviewed organizations, the
challenges they face, the gaps they fill, and to give the researcher a better chance to find answers to the research questions. Finally this method seemed to be able to provide the most up to date information.
Study Participants
A shortlist of candidates was made based on the authors experience from working in one of the refugee camps in Central Greece. Additionally, a supplement list of active
organizations applying for grants from a funding hub were contacted in order to extend the interview base. The researcher decided to not focus on a specific area of Greece. But rather to give voice to as many different organizations as possible, in order to avoid creating an area specific outcome, but to be able to generalize about the whole of the country. If there was any data collected which was specific to an area, it will be highlighted accordingly.
The interviews started in the end of May 2020 and took more than a month to complete. The last interview was conducted in the last week of June 2020. During this time period more than 20 Grassroots Organizations were contacted, including hub organizations that work as umbrella organizations for more than 50 smaller Grassroots each. Out of these 20, 10 replied to the request for an interview. Out of these 10, 3 organizations have refused to participate in the interview, due to the fact that Greece was opening after the lockdown caused by COVID-19 and were therefore too occupied with restoring services. And additional 1 organization has eventually failed to show up for the continuously rescheduled interview. Finally, a total of 6 Grassroots organizations have been interviewed. Out of these 2 were Grassroots organizations focusing on supporting their counter parts with know-how, recruitment, funding and other
19 support; 3 were Grassroots organizations currently working in different locations within Greece; 1 was an organization that withdrawn from a camp and moved to a big city in 2019 due to firstly lack of funds and later change of approach. Each interview lasted an average of 45 minutes, and was conducted by the author, and recorded with the use of either Zoom or Skype. Each interview has then been transcribed and sent for approval to the interviewees. The transcriptions covered a total of 52 pages. All of the interviews have been anonymous and all references to locations – which could help to identify the speaker or the organization – have been subtracted. Finally, the data was compiled, and the main topics have been identified throughout all interviews and grouped based on the respective topics.
Interview Questions
The questions for the interview were based on the research introduced in the literature review of this study. Special focus was put on the main issues within Grassroots, as highlighted by the various authors. Additionally, questions about current existence and problems have been introduced, in order to find an answer to the main research question. The list of the main questions can be found in Appendix 1 at the end of this thesis. Since this was a semi-structured interview, in many cases there were additional questions asked in order to gain deeper knowledge of the subject at hand. These questions varied from interview to interview and therefore are not listed in Appendix 1.
Limitations
The world pandemic of COVID-19 which caused many countries to introduce lockdown measures, had an effect on the interviews as well. Many of the organizations - when contacted - have suspended their work for the time of the lockdown. Other have been heavily occupied by adjusting their services to the limitations and restrictions put in place by the authorities. Finally, the interview timeline corresponded to the lifting of the lockdown in Greece, which seemed to have an influence on the availability of organizations to partake in the study. Some of the contacted organizations have replied by saying that they’re too busy due to the lift of the lockdown and restarting of services with new requirements from an epidemiological approach. Furthermore, due to the fact that the interviewees were only from the NGO sector, most notably the GRO’s, there is a chance of bias in the answers. However, in order to minimalize this risk, the researcher did as much fact checking as possible considering the sources of the information and their respective expertise in the field.
20
Ethical constraints
Even though the researcher has done his best to protect the anonymity of the speakers, there still is a minimal chance that someone might identify the interviewed organizations, based on the specifics of their work or the situations described.
Theoretical Framework
Theory
In order to explain the current situation in Greece in reliance to the new government’s stance towards the refugee crisis, as well as the NGO’s helping in controlling the situation, the author will use the theory of authoritarian neoliberalism.
The author has chosen these theories for two reasons. Firstly, there seems to be a correlation between the actions of the Greek governments and the theory of authoritarian neoliberalism. Secondly, the current actions of the Greek government carry resemblance to the Power Shift theory. In this particular case, from the government entities towards various sized NGO’s (including Grassroots organizations).
Authoritarian Neoliberalism
In order to explain how the rise of authoritarian neoliberalism is affecting Greece, one must first grasp the ideology behind this theoretical approach. One of the main characteristics of authoritarian neoliberalism according to Bruff is the state’s approach to solving “economic issues” by frequent changes in the constitution and policies, which in fact change the purpose of the state and its bodies (Bruff, 2014). This reshaping - according to Bruff – has three results. For the purpose of this thesis the researcher will only present the third one, as it seems most in common with the situation in Greece. The third concept as presented by Bruff is that due to the changes coming out of the claimed “economic necessity” in fact cause the state to decrease it’s democratic position, leading to an opposite – by gaining point’s on the
nondemocratic scale (Bruff, 2014). Another characteristic of authoritarian neoliberalism is that the dominant group does not seek compromise with the minorities, instead it favors the marginalization and exclusion of their opposition, through cleverly constructed laws (Bruff, 2014). As such, they use state institutions that once stood at the forefront of protecting democracy and equality, by introducing laws which undermine their fundamental duties towards the society as a whole.
21 According to Bruff, especially in the light of the 2007 economic crisis which had a big toll on Greece and its society, especially combined with the later ‘refugee crisis’, the rise of authoritarian neoliberalism can lead to a even deeper crisis and pushing the whole country to a “less open and democratic entity” (Bruff, 2014). Examples of such de-democratization
include for instance the pacification by state authorities of civil movements protesting against the governments approach in countries such as Spain, Brazil, Turkey and USA (Bruff, 2014). Thus, showing the catch 22 situation in which the government claims to stand on the forefront of democracy whilst at the same time denying a groups constitutional right to protest.
At the same time, research shows that countries that witness the rise of authoritarian neoliberalism, but at the same time preserve freedom of media activity, access to free elections and political debate in the parliament gain a higher level of societal satisfaction (Bonn, 2018). Therefore, it seems reasonable to claim that if the façade is democratic then the masses are satisfied. Especially since the authoritarian neoliberalism seeks populistic rhetoric, as it also adds to the accumulation of social legitimacy (Bonn, 2018). Finally, even though a regime might emerge with a strong ideological approach, when push comes to shove, it will be the regimes interest that will win over, whether it’s ideology or economics (Bonn, 2018).
Power Shift
What connects the rise of authoritarian neoliberalism with the current approach of Greece towards NGO’s is the fear of the occurring shift of power. According to Mathews, the current geo-political situation is leading to the shift of power from the state authorities towards businesses, international organizations and NGO’s (Mathews, 1997). She claims that this is possible due to the global development of information technologies such as the internet, which allows quick and cheap sharing of information on a global scale (Mathews, 1997). Since the effects of globalizations are borderless as all states partake in some shape or form in the global market, it is natural that the shaping of these is influenced by the international public opinion (Mathews, 1997), What this means in reality is that states authorities have to at times put aside their political beliefs and follow the course set out by other countries which play a dominant role in the global marketplace (Mathews, 1997).
Since the creation of NGO’s they provide a wide range of expertise focusing amongst others on advocating, mobilizing public support, protesting, providing various services, serving as watchdogs for a number of international policies and standards (such as the aforementioned Declaration of Human Rights) amongst others. This, according to Mathews,
22 causes that NGO’s have an increasing influence on even the biggest governments (Mathews, 1997). Furthermore, since NGO’s are gaining an expert role on many of the areas of their operations, they have become partners in shaping international laws and standards (Mathews, 1997). As mentioned in the literature review, NGO’s helped to shape various UN
declarations.
Thus, the growth of power amongst NGO’s and civil society, can cause a threat to the sovereignty of the state (Mathews, 1997). Identifying NGO’s as partners rather than enemies lowers this potential, however adjusting laws in order to limit NGO’s operational abilities within a country, under false pretenses can lead to a potential backfire, especially on the international stage.
Results
The findings cast an important light on the current situation of Grassroots organizations in Greece, especially regarding the policies of the newly elected Greek government. When analyzing this information, in the actions of the current Greek government one can find many similarities to implemented laws and policies aimed at NGO’s of such countries as Egypt or Russia. This is an interesting finding especially due to the difference in the political systems in these countries. One could imagine that Greek would not want to be compared to such countries, especially on the level of political matureness and responsibility. Yet the findings are pointing without doubt in that way. This will be further shown in the respective chapter.
Analytical Framework
Based on the interviews with the 6 organizations, main topics have been identified. The identification was based on the recurrence of the interview answers. The main topics are those that relate directly to the 3 research questions. As there was a consistency in the themes throughout the interviews, the main areas of interest in respect to this research were easy to identify. Due to the thesis size limitations, only the most important subjects will be
thoroughly described. The rest will be briefly summarized in short paragraphs at the end of the results section.
The Need for Grassroots Organizations and their Advantages
One of the first question the organizations were asked, was whether Grassroots
organizations are needed, and why so. From this opening question an interesting picture of Grassroots has been made by the people working in them. They were able to reflect on their
23 situation and the field they work in, within the country. All these organizations operate in Greece, therefore, their answers are relevant to the current situation in the country. When talking about their organizations or the organizations which are under their
umbrella, the interviewees often pointed to the advantages of Grassroots Organizations. The researcher believes that pointing out these characteristics can help to paint the picture of these small organizations, and help the reader see what sets these organizations apart from other actors.
Amongst the most commonly named characteristics of Grassroots organizations are flexibility, agility, less bureaucracy (compared with INGO’s or governmental organizations), more innovative, adaptability. And above all – as pointed out by all the interviewees – the ability to identify and fill in gaps.
“Another reason why I think they’re [Grassroots Organizations] necessary is that they can
operate quite quickly and smoothly compared with big, more established NGO’s, which have a lot of bureaucracy. So for example for a Grassroots organization it’s really easy to provide quick support within camps with food or NFI’s [Non-Food Items], while a big organization it might take weeks or months to get approval to distribute in those camps” (Interview 6, 2020) Identifying and filling gaps
As shown in the introduction, somewhat by definition, Grassroots organizations tend to be gap fillers. When interviewing the participants, the research question was whether Grassroots organizations are needed and if so, then why (for the whole list of questions please check Appendix 1). All of the interviewees have stated that in their opinions such organizations are needed. Furthermore, each and every one of them, has stated that Grassroots are gap fillers. All of the participants were asked to provide a few examples of gaps that are filled either by their organization or by other Grassroots that they know of. Thanks to their testimony, we can see what a diverse number of areas Grassroots Organizations can cover. A few examples will be described in this paragraph, however, it is only the tip of the iceberg in the needs that are being covered by these small organizations.
An interesting example of covering basic needs of the refugees comes from one of the organizations working on mainland Greece. An organization that was primarily focused on providing non-formal education to preschool aged children, and English and Greek classes to adults, which was running a side project aimed at providing non-emergency medical
24 fact that Red Cross was operating in the camp providing basic medical care. However, when scheduling more specialized doctors’ appointments, the INGO was not providing any means of transportation to the hospitals. And due to the fact that the camp is located in a remote location with no access to public transport, meant that there was nearly no way for the beneficiary to reach his or her appointment.
”Yeah, I would say the project that we had of providing transportation to and from the Greek
National Healthcare system, with a translator. That took the Red Cross a year to copy. We have been doing it for a year, and we still did it better than them” (Interview 1, 2020)
The above words show clearly that for a year this organization has been filling the gap, that the Red Cross seemed to be unable to fill for one reason or another. Of course, the
transportation was done in cooperation with the Red Cross, as to information protecting and sharing. The reason that seems most reasonable to believe in terms of why this gap existed, was probably the lack of funds from the Red Cross, and lack of incentive from the local authorities which will be discussed further in the following chapters.
A similar story, relates to a situation years ago when every resident in the camp needed to receive a Greek healthcare card, called AMKA. Without it one was not eligible to free healthcare withing the Greek system. However, again due to the location of the camp, the residents needed to travel quite a distance to the closest AMKA issuing office. Yet again one of the Grassroots Organizations had to step in.
“(…) in some point everyone who was a refugee in Greece had to get a Greek social security
number and health number called AMKA (…) so we organized buses, we contacted the bus company and the bus company man came and he provided a price to the residents and they self-organized. But we were able to connect them with the Greek community and go
backwards and forwards.
Was there no incentive from the International Organization for Migration (IOM) or UNHCR to bridge that gap?
They couldn’t. There was incentive, they needed to solve the problem, but they couldn’t solve it.
Because of lack of ideas or because of their mandate or because of something else? No funds.” (Interview 1, 2020)
This shows yet again that INGO’s have limited funds and can’t always cover all the gaps that exist even though that they’re aware of them. It seems that without the support of the
25 authorities, it’s the help from the Grassroots organizations that makes the difference by
solving the issues at hand.
It seems that many of the gaps that are existing are created by pure circumstance and mistakes in the planning process. However, the current situation in Greece shows that this is not always the case. It seems that sometimes gaps are created with premeditation in order to achieve a certain goal. An especially disturbing example of a deliberately created gap comes from the North of Greece. This will be best described in the words of a key informant: “A really recent example now is in the North, recognized refugees are staying in the camps
even though they need to leave – but they have nowhere else to go. So, the Government ordered IOM to not provide any food to them anymore. So, what IOM has done is they are reaching out to Volunteer organizations, GRO’s and private donors in order to provide food packages for these people. So that their food supply is secured. But this is a gap that NGO’s should not cover at all, it’s a duty of the state to provide these people with food
So IOM is looking for a loophole, because they’re asking other organizations to do – what they would want to do, but they can’t because their hands are tied by the government, right?
Yes.” (Interview 6, 2020).
The approach that the Greek government is adopting in order to achieve their political gain seems below any humanitarian standards. Not to mention that it is a possible violation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UN General Assembly, 1948), and especially Article 25 which states that “Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, (…).”. Therefore, by depriving these people of food and accommodation without proposing an alternative, the Greek government seems to be depriving them of access to their basic rights. Korey’s (1998) research has also its appliance here, as in accordance to it, the Grassroots representative not only speak out about the situation but also stands on defense of the Declaration of Human Rights. The interviewee added that he would share this information because the interview was anonymous. This shows potential fear from the organization, that it could cause retaliation if they spoke openly about it. Afterall in Jenkin’s research we can find example of countries which have found reasons to expel advocating NGO’s (2012).
Other examples of gaps in the Greek humanitarian aid system are: education (especially of adults), Water and Sanitation (WASH), laundry, waste collection, legal support, food for
26 unregistered asylum seekers, accommodation, transportation, community centers. All of these were mentioned by the interviewees as typical examples of gaps.
Advocacy
Since the creation of the Declaration of Human Rights, NGO’s of various size have been seen as the watchdogs of people’s rights (Korey, 1998). Therefore, it was natural for the researcher to have a question concerning Grassroots involvement in advocacy. Interestingly, not all of the interviewed organizations actively advocate, and furthermore not all
organizations are able to do so according to a spokesperson from an umbrella organization. Whilst some of them have reasons that don’t cause concern, other reasoning - that will be described in more detail - is worrisome.
Grassroots have a variety of tools through which they can advocate. Out of the interviewed organizations the most commonly used channels were social media. Others forms of advocacy include letter writing
“(…) we started writing letters to MEP’s [Member of the European Parliament] and we asked
all our followers and former volunteers to write letter to their MEP’s” (Interview 2, 2020)
signing open letters/petitions, advocating for camp residents to be able to partake in camp coordination meetings
“we advocate the residents should be in the meetings (…) we shouldn’t talk about them as if
they weren’t there” (Interview 1, 2020).
The main problem with social media advocacy is best pointed out by one of the interviewees “(…) people are really good at raising awareness, it’s just the problem of preaching to the
converted, people who like your Facebook page are already going to be a bit more
knowledgeable and less racist. So, it’s how you advocate to the audience you need to reach – that’s the tough question” (Interview 4, 2020)
According to a spokesperson from an umbrella organization a number of organizations which they cooperate with don’t have the manpower that they could redirect towards advocating “I think most of the organizations that we support don’t really have the capacity for it. I think
most organizations are constrained by funding and the gaps they need to fill” (Interview 6,
27 Luckily, umbrella organizations exist, and part of their mandate is advocacy, giving the voice to the organizations which otherwise would remain voiceless. They also tend to have contacts on ‘higher’ levels (Interview 6, 2020).
Finally, some of the organizations choose not to advocate for other reasons than lack of manpower or time. They decide not to advocate due to the fear that being vocal could cause trouble for them
“(…) we made a conscious decision not to (…) because we work inside one of the official
camps, we feel that we can be more beneficial continuing to have access. And one of the reasons we have access is because we haven’t been targeted as a trouble making group”
(Interview 4, 2020).
This is worrisome due to the fact that Grassroots fear retaliation from the Government (or their appointees) if they openly speak up about the situation of the people they work for. An example from Egypt shows that a governments involvement in interfering with the freedom of speech can lead to state control over the organization, thus influencing its activity (Jenkins, 2012). If need be, the state can use controlled media to scapegoat any given organization which stands against the authorities. In the worst-case scenario, a state could go as far as to deny an organization from working in the country (Korey, 1998, Jenkins 2012).
And the fear is real
“We think that our access to the camp would be limited if we were more vocal” (Interview 4, 2020).
New NGO registration process
When asked about the requirements put in place by the Greek authorities for the operations of Grassroots in Greece, the main problem unanimously named by the interviewees was the new NGO registration system. Firstly, it’s worth mentioning that there is an understanding for a proper registration system, as one of the organizations says
“(…) all organizations have to register – I completely understand, because a lot of people
came to Greece to help out, and you need to be careful who you let in (…) but they make it very, very, very difficult… almost impossible” (Interview 2, 2020)
The new government introduced the new registration process for NGO’s operating in Greece dealing with ‘international protection, migration and social integration issues’ (Ministry of Migration & Asylum, 2020). The reasoning for the new registration laws, is to
28 first and foremost centralize the registry system, which beforehand was dispersed amongst different ministries (Expert Council on NGO Law, 2020). Secondly, it is the continuation of the previous plan, which in theory was introduced years ago as an anti-money laundering safeguard (ibid, 2020).
According to one of the interviewees from an umbrella organization, which amongst others provides legal support to NGO’s these are the requirements that the new NGO registry expects from the Grassroots in order to be registered:
”They prohibit the founders (…) to receive any salary or stipend from the organization.
Which is especially hard in some organizations because the founders are also the people working on the ground” (Interview 6, 2020)
“They require an incredible amount of paperwork to register, for example: tax declarations
which have been audited, financial data, data on property etc. Which is not in line with the guidelines on registration from the European Council.” (Interview 6, 2020)
“They also require for organizations that want to work inside camps or want to receive EU funding – to get [ISO] Certified. (…) You have to understand, that ISO Certification is really expensive, costs at least 1000 Euro. And besides that, they require a financial audit which costs around a few thousand Euro.” (Interview 6, 2020).
The previous legislation – introduced in 2019 – states that only organizations that are certified by the Greek Ministry of Citizen Protection are to be allowed to work in: reception and detention centers, transit zones and border crossings (Expert Council on NGO Law, 2020). Additional legislation from early 2020 states that organizations which have been successfully registered in Greece under prior laws, loose their status, and have to register under the new requirements (ibid, 2020). What is most disturbing is that according to the Expert Council on NGO Law recently published opinion on the legislature in Greece concerning NGO
registration, the new Greek laws give the Ministry the power to deny registration “on grounds
which are vague, arbitrary and with the potential to be abused” (2020). This is confirmed by
one of the interviewees who’s a specialist on the registration topic:
“(…) the legislation gives a really big amount of freedom to the Ministry of Migration to
decide who gets certification and who does not. There are not really any guidelines in the legislation. (…) which basically is going to exclude a lot of small NGO’s and Grassroots movements. Because for them it’s really difficult to comply with all the requirements (…)”
29 “I think the main consequence will be first of all lack of service provision in the camps. So,
people will not have legal support from NGO’s, they will not have access to any kind of recreational activities or education” (Interview 6, 2020).
Interestingly enough, a similar policy was introduced in Egypt (pre-Arab Spring), which granted the government “power and discretion to grant or deny registration to an NGO, [to]
interfere in the operations and fundraising of an [NGO], and to order [an involuntary] dissolution” (Jenkins, 2012). 8 years later, Greece seems to be heading down the same road as
Egypt - which at the time was scoring very low in terms of freedom according to Freedom House International’s ranking (Jenkins, 2012). Furthermore, the creation of such bureaucratic barriers is an often tool of authoritarian regimes and is reflected in the rules of NGO
registration in Putin’s Russia (Jenkins, 2012).
This seems to resonate with the authoritarian neoliberalism theory, where the state presents little to none concern in terms of the civil societies’ rights to freedom of association (Bruff, 2014; Bonn, 2018).
Grassroots perspective on the reasoning for the new registration process
While receiving information about the requirements of the registration process, the researcher asked the Grassroots about their opinions as to what could be the reasoning behind such strict registration policy. The informants were unanimously pointing towards one direction.
“Well as long as it’s impossible or really difficult for us to get access into the camp, we also
officially don’t see what’s going on there” (Interview 1, 2020)
“I think it’s because the NGO’s advocate on behalf of the refugees and try to bring attention
to the situation and to the poor job that’s being done. They’re [NGO’s] trying to shine a light on the corruption, the substandard inhumane conditions. And I think the Greek government wants them gone so that they can carry on without witnesses” (Interview 4, 2020)
“(…) it’s combined with trying to push out these smaller organizations out of the camps with
also trying to restrict movement from these camps. Because this has been one of the main focuses of this government – to find a system to restrict entry and exit from camps
For residents and organizations? Yes, both” (Interview 6, 2020)
When asked about what impact this could have on the future the answer the researcher got was:
30 “I think this is sort of a turning point, (…) which could really restrict the operations of civil
society within Greece. And which is going to have a really big effect as well on the asylum seeking and refugee population” (Interview 6, 2020).
As Korey stated, NGO’s serve as watchdogs of human rights (1998). The need to tighten the control over NGO’s could be a result of the fear of the potential power shift (Mathews, 1997). Making the registration process so hard, with many limitations seems to be a tool to exclude the advocating positions of these organizations, and therefore silencing them before the wider public opinion. A resolution which could keep the market power at the governments side, without fear of other market controllers intervening (Mathews, 1997).
Critique of the Greek authorities
Although there was no direct question in the interview, regarding the Greek authorities, the interviewees would often refer to the Greek state in their answers. Therefore, the researcher believes it’s vital to share the thoughts in order to help the understanding of the mood
amongst Grassroots towards those who rule. Before diving into the Grassroots responses, the researcher believes it’s important to briefly sketch the political change that happened with the 2019 Government elections, especially in context of the “migration crisis”.
After the 2019 government elections in Greece, New Democracy took control of the country, by obtaining more than 50% of the seats in the parliament (BBC, 2019). Elected amongst others on the notion that they will deal with the immigration problems in Greece (BBC, 2019). During their campaign they have been targeting NGO’s as one of the main reasons as to why immigrants arrive on the shores of Greece
“The current government campaigned against NGO’s and talked very badly about them” (Interview 1, 2020).
“This government really made NGO’s into a scapegoat. By calling them ‘leeches’,
‘cockroaches’ and stating that some of them have been working with human trafficking networks” (Interview 6, 2020)
One of the members of the ruling party, Giorgos Koumoutsakos said in an interview that “NGO’s are leeches” which were “set up overnight in order to get EU funding” (Keep Talking Greece, 2020). This scapegoating and populistic rhetoric caused a further falling out between the Greek community and Grassroots. Populistic rhetoric is common in regimes which follow the path of authoritarian neoliberalism (Bonn, 2017).
