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общество

Эффективное управление

Doctorow G. The Financial Crisis of 2008-2013: Starkly Different Economic, Social 
and Political Scenarios in the USA and Europe. Why? And what lessons can be drawn? .......................4
Харламов А.В. Развитие теории о хозяйстве и глобальные проблемы экономики ...................11
Лукин М.В. К проблеме оценки эффективности управления 
административно-территориальными единицами ...............................................................................15
Волович В.Н. Пути и формы рационального использования природных ресурсов в
 условиях интенсификации общественного производства .................................................................20

Рыночная среда

Дашимолонов Ч.В. Формирование и развитие кластерных образований 
на территории региона (на примере автомобильного кластера Санкт-Петербурга) .................25
Тахтаева Р.Ш. Состояние, проблемы и перспективы развития инфраструктуры 
туризма в Республике Казахстан ................................................................................................................ 29
Петров И.С. Базовые функции информационного узла «Строительный объект» 
в рамках развития регионального инвестиционно-строительного комплекса. ..........................35
Преображенская Е.Г. Развитие рынка управления жилой недвижимостью 
в крупном городе ...............................................................................................................................................38

История и современность

Полынов М.Ф. Внешняя политика М.С. Горбачева на заключительном 
этапе Перестройки. Осень 1990 – декабрь 1991 гг. ............................................................................... 44
Дельвиг В.С. К вопросу о строительстве дворцово-паркового ансамбля «Анненгоф» – 
единственной в Москве императорской резиденции европейского типа  
(тридцатые годы XVIII в.). .............................................................................................................................49
Кондаков Ю.Е. Функции шотландских лож в архитектурах дополнительных 
степеней в России конца XVIII – начала XIX веков ............................................................................. 54
Петрова А.А. Крестьянская реформа 1861 г. в России в восприятии испанцев ....................... 60
Бондина С.И. Санкт-Петербургский вдовий дом в XIX – начале XX веков ............................... 65
Bonicelli F. Towards the Question of Szekely and count Teleki Pal  .......................................................71

Стратегия дискурса

Исупов К.Г. Перспективы развития методов научной эстетики 
в свете аксиологии М.М. Бахтина ................................................................................................................75
Никифорова А.А. Цена и ценность: взаимосвязь и различие смыслов ......................................... 84
Султанов К.В., Воскресенский А.А. Стратегии понимания модернизации: 
инструментальная рациональность и альтернативные подходы .................................................... 88
Верихов И.Д. А. Бергсон и М. Мерло-Понти в контексте проблемы восприятия .................... 93

Феномены социального развития

Росенко С.И. Средний класс в контексте социальной дифференциации 
cовременного российского общества ......................................................................................................... 97

Terra Humana

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Антонов Г.В.,  Лактюхина Е.Г. Анализ факторов формирования 
демографических установок в возрастах 13–20 лет .............................................................................101
Полозов С.И. Оптимизация деятельности общественных организаций 
в решении проблем жизнеустройства сирот в липецкой области ..................................................106
Петров А.В. Социальный диалог и динамика человеческого 
капитала современных компаний .............................................................................................................113
Карасева К.С. Корпоративная культура труда и проблемы адаптации молодежи 
в крупных российских компаниях ............................................................................................................118
Виноградов Д.А. Особенности становления корпоративной социальной 
ответственности во Франции .....................................................................................................................123
Бороноев А.О. М.М. Ковалевский как социолог политики ...............................................................128

Правовое общество

Алешина А.В., Косовская В.А. Браки с иностранцами: 
современное состояние правового регулирования .............................................................................133
Громцев О.В. Некоторые аспекты правового регулирования 
международной трудовой миграции в России  .....................................................................................137

Языки культуры

Бедирханов С.А. Коллективное начало в репрезентации лезгинской 
поэтической культуры периода начала Великой Отечественной войны .....................................141
Тезич М.Дж. Национальный язык как ресурс конструирования этнической 
идентичности в молодёжной среде на примере в Республики Бурятия ......................................145
Назин А.С. Особенности художественного восприятия джаз- и рок-музыки 
в историческом аспекте .................................................................................................................................150

Мир художественной культуры

Ляшенко С.В. Стилистические особенности графических иллюстраций Н.С. Самокиша 
на рубеже веков ...............................................................................................................................................154
Куракова Н.В. О Елагиноостровской выставке гобеленов Бориса Мигаля  ..............................159
Горобец С.В. Концерты А. Зилоти в культуре Санкт-Петербурга .................................................164
Васильева А.А. Скульптура в современных архитектурных проектах 
(по следам биеналле «Архитектура Петербурга 2013») .......................................................................168
Аплечеева М.В. «Здравица» Сергея Прокофьева как художественный феномен 
эпохи построения социализма ...................................................................................................................172

Культурное наследие

Заборовская В.А. Восприятие памятника культуры до и после реставрации ...........................177
Ткачева Е.А. Режиссеры немецкого экспрессионизма. От театра к кино ..................................183
Слуцкая Е.А., Махрова Э.В. «Купеческий театр» в русской культуре 
XVIII – начала ХХ веков ..............................................................................................................................188
Ярмош А.Я. Фаянсовые и фарфоровые мануфактуры Дании и Швеции 
в XVIII веке: 1720–1780 годы ......................................................................................................................193
Калугина Е.О. Луис де Моралес (1509/1511–1586) и Хуан де Рибера (1532–1611). 
Живопись в контексте духовной культуры Испании XVI века .......................................................198
Беляева Н.А. Преемственность наследия итальянских мастеров Алессандро Маньяско 
и Антонио Визентини в творчестве Гюбера Робера ........................................................................... 203
У Ген-Ир. История танцевального искусства Кореи 
как хореографическая летопись корейского общества ..................................................................... 207

Педагогический опыт

Золотухин В.А. Управление качеством образования на уровне «шесть сигм» ..........................212
Пашковская И.Н., Шемякина Е.Ю. Субъектные механизмы формирования 
социально-профессиональной активности менеджера сферы сервиса .........................................216
Мясников С.В.  «Лесная» педагогика и детско-юношеская рекреация 
как фактор государственной лесной политики России ......................................................................221

© ЦНИТ «Астерион», 2013
© Авторы, статьи, 2013

Научный поиск

Лукьянов И.С. Объективное и субъективное в политической идеологии государства ........ 226
Горбунов А.А., Горбунов Ал.А. Принципиально новый подход к формированию 
инвестиционных активов малых социально-предпринимательских групп  
в современных условиях ноосферной экономики ................................................................................232

среда обитания

Осмысление ноосферы

Румянцев В.А. Еще раз об участии России в мировом рынке воды .............................................237
Чистобаев А.И., Семенова З.А. Эволюция научных представлений 
о качестве жизни населения ........................................................................................................................247

Глобальный экологический кризис: мифы и реальность

Малинин В.Н., Гурьянов Д.А. К оценке продолжительности сезонов года 
в Санкт-Петербурге ........................................................................................................................................252
Дроздов В.В., Косенко А.В., Задевалова М.И. Экспериментальное обоснование применения 
ультрафиолетового обезвреживания воды для снижения риска трансграничного  
биологического загрязнения морских акваторий ................................................................................257

Природная среда

Ивлев Л.С., Резников В.А. Структурные и энергетические характеристики воды, 
их роль в экологии окружающей среды ................................................................................................. 265
Греков И.М., Сырых Л.С., Кошелева Е.А., Субетто Д.А. Палеоландшафты 
раннего голоцена Кольского полуострова и геоархеология .............................................................275

новости

Kruglikova Ia. Imagined Interregnum: Disintegration and Re-Establishment 
of Russian Academic Networks in 1917–1924 (5–6 of August 2013 in Helsinki, Finland) ...................283
Никифоров В.В. Неаполь живописный и туристический 
(6 сентября 2013 г., Санкт-Петербург)  .................................................................................................... 285
Кривич Н.А. 2-я Международная научно-практическая конференция «Научное издание 
международного уровня: проблемы, решения, подготовка и включение в индексы  
цитирования и реферативные базы данных» (Москва, 24–26 сентября 2013 г.) ....................... 286
Новикова-Китаева Е.А. Юбилейные события в Музее семьи Бенуа (ГМЗ «Петергоф»)
(сентябрь 2013, Санкт-Петербург)  ............................................................................................................287
Дробышева М.Н. Вечера Бриттена в Петербурге .............................................................................. 289
Мельникова А.А. Основания культуры в языке: подходы к анализу ........................................... 290
Summary  .........................................................................................................................................292
Сведения об авторах  ...................................................................................................................300
Условия подачи материалов  .......................................................................................................303
Редакционный совет ................................................................................................................................304

Terra Humana

4

ЭФФеКтИвНОе УПРавлеНИе

общество

УДК 338.22.021.4
ББК 65.05

G. Doctorow

The Financial crisis oF 2008–2013: sTarkly DiFFerenT 
economic, social anD PoliTical scenarios in The Usa  
anD eUroPe. Why? anD WhaT lessons can be DraWn?

Рассматриваются экономические, социальные и политические последствия глобального финансового кризиса 2008–2013 гг. в США и Европейском Союзе. Анализируется 
влияние глобального экономического кризиса на стабильность и жизнеспособность хозяйственной системы ЕС. Рассматривается разница в восприятии этих последствий 
политической элитой США и ЕС и в сценариях осуществления экономической политики 
выхода из кризиса. 

Ключевые слова:
европейский федерализм, неолиберализм, политика остерити (финансовый аскетизм), 
секвестрация, экономическая реструктуризация.

The financial shock wave which came out 
of Wall Street in September 2008 following the 
bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers and the seizing up of credit markets moved like the «perfect storm» across the world, setting off economic, social and political crises that, at least 
in the case of the European Union, have not 
significantly abated five years later. The continued viability of the Eurozone, indeed of the 
entire European experiment of supranational 
integration, has been called into question.
Meanwhile in the USA itself, following a 
couple of years of steep recession with high unemployment and comparatively high social unrest, the ship of state righted itself. There have 
been two years of modest but significant growth 
in GDP. Social unrest succumbed rather easily 
to police methods of control after making little 
traction in the media. The public mood may be 
described as cautiously optimistic.
In this interpretive essay, I will make the argument that despite commonality of prevailing 
neoliberal ideology on both continents, the different political structures, and the difference in 
perception of the gravity of the crisis coming 
from financial markets to the real economy at 
its onset explain the very different scenarios 
that played out on both sides of the Atlantic.

I will present first an overview of the situation in the EU and in the USA today. Next we 
will go back to 2008 and follow how the crisis 
was perceived and what responses were made 
by the state authorities in the EU and in the 
USA over the course of the five years to today. 
And we will conclude with thoughts on possible lessons to draw from these sharply differentiated scenarios.

Usa today 

The official U.S. State Department message disseminated by ambassadors abroad is 
that the country recovered from the recession 
and began enjoying strong GDP growth (now 
moderated to 2,4%, Q1 2013) nearly three 
years ago, with steadily falling unemployment 
(currently 7,5%) [7; 12]. Because of the weighting of house ownership in family net equity, 
attention is directed in particular to the rise 
in real estate values from the depths to which 
they sank in the midst of the sub-prime mortgage crisis that preceded the crash of 2008.
The official account of the present day 
U.S. economy highlights the increased competitiveness of U.S. manufacturing industry 
arising from the restructuring of whole indus

Общество

5
trial sectors, first and foremost, automobile 
production, early in the recession under state 
direction. The second leg of the recovery and 
the factor deemed most promising for repatriation of manufacturing industry from foreign 
shores is the commercial scale arrival of shale 
gas onto the domestic market at prices well 
below world levels. The boom in production 
of nontraditional gas provides not only cheap 
energy, but cheap feedstock for petrochemicals used across industries [10]. Moreover, in 
2012 there was a shift from import substitution, itself a major contribution to improving 
the U.S. commercial balance of payments, towards prospective export of LNG to Europe 
and other welcoming markets.
Politically, the 2012 elections confirmed 
stability and stasis at the national level arising from a Republican dominated House 
of Representatives and a Senate where the 
Democrats hold a narrow majority. And 
while Americans as a whole today express 
very unfavorable views of Congress, radical populism represented by the Tea Party 
suffered significant setbacks in the election, 
which reconfirmed mainstream politicians 
of both parties. Meanwhile radical protest 
embodied by the Occupy Wall Street movement is now a distant memory.

europe today

Europe is presently at the crescendo of a 
succession of separate but interrelated crises 
which find expression firstly in the ongoing 
financial bail-out of southern and peripheral 
states of the Union — Ireland, Spain, Portugal and Greece. The evening television news 
brings reports every few days on the resistance 
in the streets, at the ballot box and in national 
legislatures to the severe austerity programs 
instituted in these countries at the order of 
the so-called troika of European Commission, 
IMF and European Central Bank in exchange 
forhundreds of billions of euros in assistance 
packages which these countries’ diminished 
tax receipts and inability to tap bond funding 
without ECB intervention forces upon them. 
The austerity medicine prescribed by Dr. 
Europe has a number of dimensions with great 
social impact. The governments affected are 
being downsized through curtailment of social 
services including healthcare and education. In 
parallel, cash benefits are reduced and beneficiary participation in costs of services is raised. 
Then there is the implementation of economic restructuring, the complementary 
recommendation to austerity on the short 
list of troika prescriptions. In simple English 
this entails changes to labor legislation in the 
target countries, in particular, raising the re
tirement age, making it less cumbersome and 
costly for employers to lay off workers and 
removing restrictions on entry into a variety 
of professions. In a word, the crisis is being 
used as cover for readjusting the social compact of the welfare state, with a lot of new pain 
dealt to the majority of the population otherwise deeply affected by the current high tide 
of unemployment in both private and public 
sectors simultaneously.
It is no exaggeration to say that the level of 
unemployment being experienced across the 
European Union today, at roughly 12%, is unprecedented [6]. In several of the aforementioned weakest states, the overall level is in excess 
of 25% and, most alarming, the level of youth 
unemployment (those under 25) is above 50%. 
Euronews, the BBC and print media provide a 
stream of depressing coverage of the plight of 
university graduates who are leaving their home 
countries, migrating to Germany if not overseas 
to destinations in Latin America (for the Spanish 
speaking) or still further afield in the expectation of finding relevant employment after years 
of discouragement at home. The brain drain is a 
much-debated issue [11; 13; 16].
Mass demonstrations in Athens, Madrid 
and other European capitals over cutbacks in 
public services, over forced pay and benefit reductions appear on television weekly [9]. The 
Indignados and related protest movements 
similar in social demands to Occupy are still 
gathering substantial followings. In the domain of electoral politics, populist parties, 
some embodying xenophobic and other extremist views, have claimed significant shares 
of the electorate in Italy and Greece during 
2012 local balloting as the electorate expresses 
its non-confidence in the mainstream parties 
to defend its interests.
Public opinion polls in many European 
Union member states show remarkable negativity towards the Union and its central organs 
in Brussels, which are deemed to have abandoned the principle of solidarity that was a pillar of the integration principle from the beginning in the 1950s [14]. The idea of raising all 
of Europe gradually to the standard of living 
of the most advanced has, in the view of the 
broad European public, been replaced by focus 
on balancing budgets, fiscal conservatism and 
reducing exposure to the perceived extravagances and folly of the weakest members. 
The public is treated to the spectacle of 
never-ending consultations between the 
member states in the European Council at ad 
hoc summits that have a fire-fighting character. The Union seems to be constantly too late 
with too little to stay ahead of the market and 
put in place the instruments of coordination 
needed to protect its currency against mas

Terra Humana

6 sive speculative attacks that globalization has 
empowered. Alone among the world’s reserve 
currencies, the euro is not backed by a nationstate and, as has become painfully clear in the 
5 year long crisis, lacks common fiscal policy, 
lacks a banking union, to protect its interests. 
Meanwhile the perception has emerged of a 
leadership crisis, a lack of vision, and a deficit 
of democracy in Brussels [8].
The EU institutions have for many decades been the whipping boy of national leaderships of the Member States which have 
jealously guarded their prerogatives against 
what is described as a bureaucratic Commission and a weak-tea legislature in the European Parliament which lacks the right of initiative and, most importantly, has no power to 
raise taxes. Indeed, at its present state of evolution the European ‘government’ has almost 
no direct tie-in with the peoples of Europe 
and no balance of powers internally. This is 
not a new development but only now are all of 
these defects in the public view daily because 
of the wrangling over how best to address the 
crises facing the continent for which the EU 
institutions lack the proper instruments to 
take charge. Moreover, the perception that 
Brussels represents mandarins responsible to 
no one rather than representative democracy 
has assumed a new dimension as EU officials 
took a hand in the replacement of popularly 
elected prime ministers in Greece and in Italy by technocrats chosen for their likely good 
relations with the markets, as guarantors of 
the faithful implementation of the austerity 
and restructuring programs.
The issue of the EU’s viability today has 
become so acute that the minority of federalist minded politicians with continent-wide 
ambitions has mounted a campaign to use 
the crisis and force the pace of integration 
so as to reach a federal union following the 
2014 elections. In a recently published book 
entitled Forward Europe, Liberal bloc chairman in the European Parliament Guy Verhofstadt and Greens leader Daniel BenditCohn are promoting federalism as the only 
answer to the crisis [15]. Germany’s most 
powerful think tank and patron of right-ofcenter causes, the Bertelsmann Stiftung, is 
supporting this effort.
As of this writing, in July 2013, Europe is 
mired in a ‘second dip’ recession. Meanwhile 
there are the first signs of a crack in the predominance of austeritythinking within the 
European Council, with the latest EU summit in the final days of June having approved 
a 6 billion euro appropriation of assistance to 
alleviate youth unemployment. This marks 
the success of an initiative introduced by the 
French Socialist government following its 

electoral victory a year ago to balance austerity with measures to encourage economic 
growth. At the same time, a growing assault 
on the stewardship of the European Commission under Jose Manuel Barroso has become public. While Barroso’s lack of leadership generally over the past 6 years is easy 
to document, the fact that his post had been 
reduced to one of public relations was the 
conscious choice of those who installed him 
and reappointed him two years ago, the better to protect the prerogatives of the Member 
States. Thus, what is essentially a structural 
failure of the EU to face up to the systemic 
crisis which began in 2008 is trivialized as an 
issue of personalities.

Usa, crisis scenario from 2008

The previous major worldwide crisis in 
1997-98, dubbed the «Asian Flu», had its origins at the periphery of international financial system. Its outstanding feature was to 
demonstrate the potency of globalization and 
open capital markets in sweeping the world 
and wreaking devastation along weak links as 
funds were swiftly drawn out of speculative 
developing nations in a flight to safety in the 
money centers. Russia’s financial default in 
1998 was a case in point. The 2008 crisis, by 
contrast was Made in America, spreading out 
from the world’s financial center, Wall Street. 
And it was the direct consequence of the 
exuberant application of the Anglo-Saxon financial and political model of minimal government regulation of markets which had 
become the mantra in New York and London since the 1980s, and had spawned trading in fiendishly complex derivatives. This 
was a model taken up with enthusiasm by 
New Europein the 1990s and grudgingly by 
Old Europe in the new millennium, where 
it replaced dirigisme as the consensus view. 
Attenuation of risk through its distribution among many market participants has 
been at the core of modern banking since its 
invention in Renaissance Italy. However, as 
quickly became apparent during 2008, there 
were novel problems in the new age, as the 
supposed self-regulating nature of markets 
failed to occur. First there was dereliction of 
duty by credit rating agencies with respect to 
fixed income securities representing bundled 
mortgage loansthat were nominally «subprime» and de facto uncollectible. Second, 
it developed that the sophistication of new 
instruments such as credit default swapsnot 
onlyevaded regulators but also escaped the 
comprehension of most bankers trading in 
them. The discovery after nearly a year of denial that major U.S. banks were carrying on 

Общество

7
their books illiquid, ‘toxic assets’ led to a succession of near bank failures among some of 
America’s largest institutions in 2008. In traditional fashion these pending insolvencies of 
institutions deemed ‘too big to fail’ without 
engendering a systemic failure threatening 
the real economy were resolved through U.S. 
Treasury directed takeovers by strong banks. 
The step too far in an already fragile market environment was the decision of Secretary of the Treasury Hank Paulson, himself 
a former CEO of the competitor investment 
bank Goldman Sachs, to allow one of the 
oldest and best known institutions, Lehman 
Brothers, go under. In the years since, that 
decision has been examined from many angles, but one thing is clear: such a decision was 
totally in line with the highest principle of the 
American model of capitalism: to reinforce 
‘moral hazard’ and ensure that those responsible for bad management and/or bad financial decisions paid the price of their errors. 
Indeed it responded well to the criticism that 
Paulson and the Bush Administration had received for saving the scoundrels running other banks ‘too big to fail’ in the preceding year.
The impact of the Lehman bankruptcy 
was a devastating shock to the U.S. financial 
community and its foreign counterparties. 
Interbank credit shut down. Banks refused 
the traditional overnight lending to one another, not to mention to the public. Between 
15 and 19 September, the US stock markets 
were in free fall. The Dow Jones index lost 
30% of its value. 
In short, the decision immediately revealed 
itself to be a blunder of colossal proportions 
that threatened to set off a new Great Depression. This was understood both by Paulson 
and his team at the Treasury and by Ben Bernanke, the head of the Federal Reserve, who 
just happened to be an academic scholar on 
the Depression. What followed in a matter of 
weeks was a set of programs of massive proportions intended to prop up the American 
banking system and its partners abroad. 
Paulson rushed legislation through Congress providing the Treasury with $700 billion to stabilize the financial system. The first 
step of an evolving process already became 
law on 3 October 2008. The Troubled Assets 
Relief Program, or TARP, was aimed primarily at relieving banks of their subprime mortgage papers and other illiquid holdings. For 
the recipients, it came at the price of a federal stake in their equity and a detailed set of 
requirements on executive pay, reopening of 
credits to other banks and to the public.
The programs amounted to nothing 
short of a public recanting by a Republican 
administration of the entire economic and 

political philosophy it wore on its sleeve. Big 
government was stepping in to save Wall 
Streetand the banking system in a manner 
totally incompatible with ‘moral hazard.’ A 
white flag was being raised by the authors 
and defenders of neoliberal ideology.
All that was left for the incoming Obama 
administration to do upon coming to power 
in January 2009 was to move on to saving 
elements of the real economy and to practice the Keynesian solution of pump priming to combat the unfolding recession and 
prevent its further descent into depression. 
This passed Congress swiftly in the form of 
the American Recovery and Reinvestment 
Act of 2009 which took effect already on 17 
February. The overall value of the stimulus 
package was a huge $787 billion. Among the 
points covered were spending on infrastructure, education, health and energy; federal 
tax incentives, and expanded unemployment 
benefits and social welfare provisions (for a 
brief overview of the various federal programs put in place see [4]).
A noteworthy follow-on intervention of 
the federal government to combat the recession was Quantitative Easing, the purchase of 
debt instruments by the Federal Reserve to 
influence interest rates and encourage business investment. This began in 2008 with 
the Fed’s purchase of mortgage backed securities, nominally QE1. However, it became 
a new and important lever on the economy 
in 2010, which is spoken of as QE2, and yet 
another follow-on beginning in 2012, called 
QE3. The effect of these novel measures was 
to keep credit cheap, encourage inflation, 
prevent deflation and rouse the economy. 
The value was roughly $600 billion per year.
Without going into details, the obvious 
point is that the US federal government, led 
by the Treasury Secretary and Federal Reserve Chairman, was able to react with blinding speed to the crisis which began in September 2008 and continued to apply heavy state 
intervention in the economy and Keynesian 
methods to reflate and stimulate the economy.
In parallel, it bears mention that from the 
very start of his presidency Barack Obama 
made his personal cause the expansion of 
America’s threadbare social protection network in a major domain that would touch 
the entire population: his proposal to extend 
health insurance to the millions of citizens 
without coverage. For more than two years 
this issue became a focus of public debate 
and political maneuvering. While the end 
result was passed by Congress only through 
the application of political stratagems not 
consensus and fell well short of the opening 
objectives, nonetheless, in the midst of one 

Terra Humana

8 of the sharpest economic downturns in living memory and the threat of a new Great 
Depression, the American government was 
expanding rather than contracting its social 
protection for citizens.
The word austerity was absent from the 
American political lexicon during the whole 
of 5 years from the onset of the economic 
crisis. The stimulus programs were financed 
by record budgetary deficits and massive increases to the national debt. Political deadlock prevented any solution to the deficits 
which Democrats proposed to end by curtailing tax breaks dating from the Bush administration, meaning raising taxes for the 
wealthy; and Republicans insisted as determinedly on achieving by cutting ‘entitlement 
programs,’ meaning social security, healthcare and social benefits to the poor. In 2011, 
in one of the periodic standoffs over Congressional authorization of an increased level of national debt, it was decided to impose 
automatic spending cutbacks in the future 
should the sides fail to agree on the federal 
budget. And so, notwithstanding the threat 
of taking down GDP by 1% and harming 
the still unsteady recovery, in 2013 the long 
awaited… and feared «sequestration» took 
effect. Of course, against the background of 
a very real recovery and in the context of the 
vast stimulus programs that preceded it, the 
austerity effect of present sequestration has 
turned out to be minimal.
If one were to plot the level of organized 
social unrest in the USA with the cycle of the 
recession’s onset and development it would 
be clear that midway in the past 5 years, the 
bottom was hit, recovery began and the background propitious to unrest faded. In this 
way, beginning at around 2010 police actions 
to remove Occupy positions in public space 
became effective and the back of the movement was broken. 

crisis scenario, europe from 2008

The unfolding calamity facing the world 
financial community following the collapse 
of Lehman Brothers hit Europe immediately, 
but unevenly. The underlying issue of American ‘toxic assets’ from securities representing 
bundled subprime mortgages was a threat 
first and foremost to those countries which 
had traditionally been most heavily embedded in the American economy. Thus, Britain 
and the Netherlands were directly in harm’s 
way. In Britain, the crisis immediately endangered several major banks, starting with the 
Royal Bank of Scotland, which required UK 
government intervention amounting to nationalization within weeks of the start of the 

crisis. To its credit and in consideration that 
the City of London alone accounts for 10% of 
British GDP, the UK government was quick 
and resolute in tackling the problem with 
taxpayer money. In the Netherlands, the 
depth of the rot emerged in the midst of the 
world’s largest banking merger at the time, 
which in 2007 saw one of the country’s leading banks, ABN-Amro, acquired and divided 
up between Royal Bank of Scotland, Bank 
of Santander (Spain) and Fortis (Belgium). 
The financing package for the mammoth 
deal was undone by the worldwide credit 
freeze while the value of the acquisition was 
destroyed as the extent of toxic assets ABN 
had on its books gradually became apparent. 
The consequence was the shattering of Belgium’s largest bank, Fortis, which was saved 
from collapse only by state intervention and 
its takeover by BNP Paribas. 
Apart from these near disasters in a very 
few EU member states in which the American connection was readily evident, the rest 
of the European banking system did not 
seem under threat in the autumn of 2008 
and no heroic efforts were sought or undertaken. Indeed, the European response was 
directed mainly at the economic threat from 
the impending American recession. An EU 
wide stimulus package was passed in December 2008, but at a rather low level of 200 billion euros [3].
The second wave of problems which would 
hit Europe was a sovereign debt crisis which 
began rather inconspicuously at the very 
end of 2008 as Greece began to experience 
sharply rising market rates to refinance state 
debt. The issue assumed alarming proportions only after the October 2009 elections in 
Greece when revelations about the gravity of 
fiscal shortfall and budget deficits shook the 
markets [1]. It soon thereafter became apparent that Greece would require 100 billion 
euros or more (eventually several hundred 
billion) of EU assistance to bring its finances and refinancing under control. At this 
point bondholders of Greek sovereign debt, 
namely German and French and other major Member State banks,experienced sharp 
write-downs on their holdings, putting those 
banks in jeopardy. In this way, a small EU 
country accounting for no more than 2% of 
the GDP of the 27, initiated the loss of confidence in EU sovereign debt that has rumbled 
on across the Community seeking a systemic 
solution in terms of consolidation and mutualization across the Euro Zone that, till now, 
has not actually occurred [5].
Starting with Greece, the sovereign debt 
crisis moved out to ensnare Spain, Portugal 
and Italy. Whereas the prospect of Greece 

Общество

9
abandoning the euro may have been supportable, the departure of Spain, not to mention Italy, would be fatal to the currency and 
to the whole EU project.
From this point, the issue taking top of 
mind at European summits was financial 
rather than economic: how to stave off total 
disaster by putting in place, or at least agreeing to put in place within fixed deadlines, the 
banking union, the fiscal union and possibly 
the mutualization of debt that had not been 
done when the Euro was first agreed as an 
objective of the EU Member States in 1992 
and launched in 2000. The primary question 
was how much each state would have to put 
up to build the fire wall to protect the currency against speculative raids.
In this situation, the EU’s strongest economy and biggest likely contributor to all 
bailout funds, Germany, acquired a decisive 
say in all decisions. And Germany had some 
well-defined thoughts on the issues coming 
out of its financial orthodoxy and experience 
with austerity, which was put in place already 
by the predecessors to Merkel’s CDU, Helmut Schroeder and his socialist government 
(SPD) as the medicine to cure debt overhang 
from the post-reunification spending of the 
1990s. Austerity had proven its worth in 
Germany in the new millennium, creating a 
favorable credit environment for the Mittelstand, driving down labor costs in line with 
curbed inflation and generally improving 
the competitiveness of German industry, a 
very weighty consideration given the exportdriven character of the economy. 
 For these reasons, the Germans urged, 
nay insisted that their colleagues in the EU 
impose austerity on all applicant countries 
for EU bailouts. Unfortunately, in the midst 
of general subservience to the German prescriptions, EU Members ignored the fact that 
most of the weak nations struggling with 
steep recession had economies of an entirely 
different structure from Germany and were 
not major exporters, while the direct effect 
of austerity was to worsen and not improve 
their budgetary balances given that tax revenues were in decline and social benefits 
(unemployment compensation) had to be 
augmented. Indeed, it has been persuasively 
argued that austerity only aggravated the 
crisis in Europe while spreading negativity 
towards the EU as enforcer [2].
In the end, relatively little new money was 
actually put up by the Member States to assist 
the weaker states. Instead the main artillery 
in the battle to prop up the weaker states and 
bring interest on sovereign debt back down 
from ruinous levels has been the European 
Central Bank and its debt purchase program. 

With the approval of the States, and most critically, with German approval, a program of 
large scale intervention in the bond markets 
has been implemented to bring down the cost 
of borrowing to supportable levels for Spain, 
Italy and the other countries in most desperate situation, calming the financial markets. 
In this sense, the ECB acted in similar manner to the Federal Reserve but without a 
Treasury in tandem.

conclusion

Over the course of its half century evolution, the project now known as the European 
Union has passed through numerous economic cycles of prosperity and recession, often wearing the hair shirt of penitence in the 
down periods and resolving to make structural reforms necessary to remain relevant and 
competitive in the world. Muddling through 
was a way of life over decades. The objectives 
of forming a European consciousness and 
pride based on the legal and economic acquis 
and its implicit convergence proceeded in 
good times and bad.
However, the crisis which began in 2008 
in America and spread in a succession of 
waves across Europe found the continent 
unprepared intellectually and institutionally to cope. The simple solution of the past, 
namely to devalue currency to restore competitiveness and maintain tax revenues and 
employment, was no longer available under 
the conditions of the Single Currency. The 
rapid expansion of the EU from 13 to 27 
had stretched resources and the will of the 
wealthier nations to show solidarity towards 
the weaker. And the absence of a common 
fiscal and budgetary policy, the absence of 
a federal European government, made itself 
felt in the most painful way.
In one of his memorable quips, Henry 
Kissinger once complained about the EU that 
if he urgently needed to consult with them on 
foreign policy, he didn’t know whom to call. 
The crises of 2008 to 2013 have demonstrated 
that the same problem applies for the phone 
number of the European Treasurer manquant. 
It was precisely the concentration of power in the USA in the hands of several key 
managers in the Treasury and in the Federal 
Reserve which made it possible to formulate 
measures of unprecedented scope to deal 
with a threat at least as great as what precipitated the Great Depression. And it was 
precisely the absence of such persons and 
powers that has made the European pa ssage 
through 5 years of crisis so dramatic, uncertain and, ultimately, destructive.

Terra Humana

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