Post-crisis Context Research Articles

New democracy and centre-right dominance in Greece: a new normal?

ABSTRACT In the parliamentary elections of 2023, the ruling New Democracy (ND) party of prime minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis was re-elected triumphantly. ND’s victory marks an unprecedented moment of centre-right dominance in Greece since 1974 and goes against the trend of the so-called ‘crisis of the centre-right’ elsewhere in Europe. This article claims that ND’s strategy under Mitsotakis has been typical of the winning formula of other centre-right parties in Europe in previous decades. Yet, that this formula is now so successful in Greece owes much to the country’s post-crisis context, out of which the Mitsotakis leadership emerged. Given the geopolitical position of Greece and the historical intertwining of the question of its international orientation with major cleavages of domestic politics, the article argues that the success of Mitsotakis draws particularly on a certain form of posturing in foreign and European policy that allows him to reconcile contradictions inside ND’s electoral coalition.

Exploring Shared Challenges of Empowered Patients and Entrepreneurs: Towards Diversity, Innovation, and Entrepreneurship in Post-Crisis Contexts

This practical study explores the shared challenges faced by individuals managing chronic health conditions and entrepreneurs within the context of post-crisis periods, focusing on diversity, innovation, and individual empowerment. The aim is to develop a theoretical framework elucidating the mechanisms behind these challenges and their implications for fostering diversity, social innovation, and sustainability. Methodologically, an integrative approach was employed, drawing upon insights from psychology, sociology, health management, and entrepreneurship literature to conduct a comprehensive analysis. The research utilized mixed methods, including scoping reviews and qualitative analysis of virtual communities, to uncover the dynamic mechanisms that drive empowerment. This approach not only validated the theoretical framework but also proposed practical strategies to harness diversity, innovation, and entrepreneurship in post-crisis contexts. Drawing upon Dubin’s methodology, the study structured the theoretical framework to highlight the interconnectedness of empowerment experiences within communities. The findings underscore the interconnectedness of empowerment experiences within communities and highlight the vital role of collaborative environments and support networks in promoting diversity, innovation, and entrepreneurship. Ultimately, this research contributes to the development of strategies that capitalize on cultural diversities and reap the benefits of different nationalities, knowledge areas, and cultures, particularly in the aftermath of crises.

Beyond fear and safety: revenge travel and international tourists’ intentions in the post-crisis era

Purpose This study aims to investigate the evolving travel intentions of tourists in the aftermath of the relaxation of international mobility restrictions in 2022. It aims to understand how the concept of “revenge travel” – travelling with the intent to make up for lost time during crisis periods – impacts tourists' travel intentions in the post-crisis era. Design/methodology/approach Employing a quantitative approach, the study uses Structural Equation Modelling (SEM). Data were collected through a survey of 320 respondents in 2022. This methodology enables a comprehensive understanding of travel intentions, including motivations, perceptions of destination safety and the influence of revenge travel. Findings The findings reveal that revenge travel is a significant predictor of travel intentions post-crisis. The results indicate that tourists are less concerned with health and safety and are more driven by the desire to compensate for lost travel opportunities. This shift suggests that travel intentions in the post-crisis era are not predominantly fear-induced. The study also offers insights into how these intentions can inform the recovery and sustainable planning of the tourism industry. Originality/value This paper recognises the impact of revenge travel on travel intentions following the lifting of crisis-related mobility restrictions. It provides novel insights into tourists' post-crisis travel behaviour, extending the understanding of travel motivations in extraordinary circumstances. The findings are valuable for tourism practitioners and researchers, offering guidance for future tourism development and marketing strategies within a post-crisis context.

Revising the Justification for an EU Tax in a Post-Crisis Context

Revising the Justification for an EU Tax in a Post-Crisis Context

Post-crisis Emergency Legislation Consolidation: Regulatory Quality Principles for Good Times Only?

Abstract This article analyses how emergency legislation has affected law-making and regulatory quality principles (RQPs) before, during and after the COVID-19 pandemic (2019–2021) from stakeholders’ perspectives. It takes Slovakia as a case study, as this country was considered a high performer in the adoption of RQPs before the crisis, while empirical findings suggest a subsequent decline in their use. We argue that formal RQPs are not deeply embedded and are vulnerable to crises. In doing so, we conceptually distinguish between standard (fully following the RQPs), emergency (modified to accommodate crisis) and non-standard law-making (violating formal rules and the RQPs). In the transition from a crisis to a post-crisis context, the deployment of both emergency and non-standard law-making has become relatively permanent without proper justification having been provided. This reinforces the notion that RQPs and governance legitimacy became less important for the executive than in the pre-crisis period and emergency and non-standard regulatory law-making became institutionalised as new norms of swift law-making. All of these factors prevent stakeholders from being informed and from engaging in deliberation, which jeopardises the legitimacy of post-crisis law-making governance.

Facing post-crisis livelihood challenges? Insights from young farmers in Kenema city, Eastern Province, Sierra Leone

Globally, urban and peri-urban agriculture (UPA) research has focused mainly on capital cities, has avoided conflict-affected locations and rarely considered the challenges faced by young cultivators. The latter are particularly important because of the vulnerability of unemployed young people to being drawn into violent, criminal or antisocial behaviour in conflict or fragile states. This paper examines the post-crisis livelihood challenges of youth farmers in Kenema, Sierra Leone’s third largest city. The research on which this paper is based comprised multiple methods, including GIS mapping, in-depth interviews and group discussions with youth cultivators and key informants in several sites in Kenema city. Research participants gave first-hand accounts of their experiences of the Civil War and the subsequent Ebola epidemic crisis, and the paper explores their transformation from dangerous living to productive agriculturalists within Kenema. The research uses an exploratory approach to critically examine the engagement of youth in urban and peri-urban agriculture, as a strategy for encouraging young people to become responsible citizens who support city and national development. The paper challenges the pessimistic view that contemporary urban youth in developing countries are characterised by disaffection leading to crime. The study reveals how urban youth in post-crisis contexts can play a vital role in national development when a proactive and pro-youth public platform is evident locally. Appropriate resource mobilisation can unlock the latent potentials of youth for both self and community development.

Vulnerable customers' perception of corporate social responsibility in the banking sector in a post-crisis context

PurposeThis research aims to determine to what extent corporate social responsibility (CSR) actions developed by bank entities in Spain improve the vulnerable customers' emotions and quality perception of the banking service. Consequently, this increases the quality of their relationship regarding satisfaction, trust and engagement.Design/methodology/approachData from 734 vulnerable banking customers were analyzed through structural equations modeling (EQS 6.2) to test the relationships of the proposed variables.FindingsVulnerable customers' emotional disposition exerts a strong influence on their perceived service quality. The antecedent effect is concentrated primarily on the CSR towards the client, with a residual secondary weight on the CSR towards society. These positive service emotions are determinants of the outcome quality perceived by vulnerable customers, directly in terms of higher satisfaction and trust and indirectly through engagement.Practical implicationsThis research contributes to understanding how financial service providers should adapt to the specific characteristics and needs of vulnerable clients by adopting a strategy of approach, personalization and humanization of the service that seems to move away from the actions implemented by the banking industry in recent years.Originality/valueThis study has adopted a theoretical and empirical perspective on the impact of CSR on service emotions and outcome quality of vulnerable banking customers. Moreover, banks can adopt a dual conception of CSR: a macro and external scope toward society and a micro and internal scope toward customers.

Reflections on the Preservation of Tunisian Cultural Heritage in a Post-crisis Context: Between Digitalization and Innovative Promotional Techniques

Abstract The revival of the value of cultural heritage is imperative for the conservation of this asset. An anchoring between past and present is essential for any nation concerned with preserving this rich heritage, and protecting it from deperdition. A new conceptualization of the preservation of Tunisian cultural heritage in a post-crisis context integrates the role of the state as well as the private sector/NGOs and international institutions to conserve and subsequently promote this heritage. This approach tends to revive certain components of cultural heritage and to revitalize the economic sphere that revolves around it. This research focuses on the integration of digitalization and innovative techniques in order to preserve or even promote Tunisia’s cultural heritage. Qualitative research, through the combination of in-depth interviews and focus groups, was carried out with the governmental sector, private/NGOs, and foreign institutions whose aim is to promote this heritage. The combination of the results of these sectors tends to provide a pragmatic picture of the current post-crisis situation in addition to important managerial contributions. An analysis of the qualitative corpus via T-LAB Plus 2022 made it possible to identify the technologies most mentioned by the respondents.

Onward migration and onward precarity of Latin American labour migrants in postcrisis contexts in Europe

ABSTRACT The main aim of this paper is to shed light on the link between ‘onward migration’ and ‘onward precarity’ as an experience of continuous precariousness by paying attention to crisis/post-crisis contexts and how these contexts have led to precarity becoming structurally embedded in migrant labour markets in Europe. Onward migration studies have centrally focused on crisis contexts, but very little attention has been paid to post-crisis contexts. Thus, this article contributes to complementing the previous research on onward migration and onward precarity. The paper follows a qualitative and multi-sited approach based on in-depth interviews and discussion groups with Latin American migrants living in Madrid, Lisbon, and London. Our empirical analysis elucidates that labour mobility and onward migration are embedded in intersectional dynamics of exclusion which entail a continuous experience of multifaceted precarity.

What do we know about small and medium enterprises’ survival in a post-global economic crisis context?

Considering the impacts of the most recent global economic crisis in 2008/2009, this paper explores how firm size, type of business activity and approach to internationalisation influence SMEs’ survival. Based on the literature in the field, we developed three hypotheses regarding determinants of Small and Medium Enterprises (SME) survival. We tested these hypotheses in a 7-year quantitative study and a survey of 344 SMEs in Poland – the seventh largest market in the European Union. Our findings reveal that, in the context of crisis, internationalisation acts as a stimulus for SMEs and influences their long-term sustainability, with businesses operating in foreign markets being more likely to survive after a global crisis. However, neither business size nor the type of business activity appears to have an impact on SMEs’ survival in a post-global economic crisis environment. Our paper extends knowledge about factors influencing a firm’s post-crisis survival and proposes a new framework for understanding characteristics of SMEs and their propensity to survive in a post-crisis context. In our conclusions, we discuss implications for SME entrepreneurs showing that, in order to enhance chances of survival, even small and medium enterprises should consider expanding business activities beyond their national markets.

A New European Philosophy on Recovery and Resilience. The Recovery and Resilience Facility and the Impact over Member States.

Abstract The EU offers different funds to member states for investments and development in infrastructure, governance, economy, and society. They are targeted towards the EU priorities and national necessities, offering the chance for member states and partner states to adapt to the new challenges. The COVID 19 pandemic tested states, societies and economies, and pinpointed towards needs which previously occupied a less important role in EU funding. Moreover, European states needed tailor made solutions for the post-crisis context, which will help them recover fast from the domino effect of the pandemic. All these were gathered in the Recovery and Resilience Facility, which, based on national plans, offer funds for a rapid recovery and investments in key sectors. The mechanism revealed an entire philosophy in approaching resilience and recovery, as, even if states followed the same rules in developing the plan, they oriented funds for different investments, reforms or activities. The present article overviews the manner in which states channeled their resilience and recovery plans, as they offer different philosophies in approaching recovery and resilience.

Condensing Vestiges of Past Futures in the Post-Peripheries: Artistic Engagement with Post-Colonial and Post-Authoritarian Contexts

This article analyses the archival and historiographic turn in contemporary art that arose in response to post-authoritarian, post-communist, and post-crisis contexts. It references German philosopher Reinhart Koselleck's concept of Vergangene Zukunft (the past future), his idea of the multiplicity of historical times; Cameroonian philosopher Achille Mbembe's notion of the time of entanglement; and Argentine-Mexican sociologist Néstor García Canclini's concept of multitemporal heterogeneity. Through an examination of recent hybridised artworks by Clemente Padín (Uruguay), Marek Sobczyk (Poland), Tamás Kaszás (Hungary), Kiluanji Kia Henda (Angola), and Michael Rakowitz (Iraq/United States), the article focuses on how these artists construct metahistorical narratives about domination and resistance from several images taken from high and popular cultures. These works respond to post-authoritarian trauma, socio-political crisis, and a general state of ideological confusion characteristic of world regions placed between major centres of power. Rather than referencing historical facts, the artists refer to popular culture, personal experiences, memories, expectations, and (unfulfilled) hopes or (uncompleted) past projects. Yet their aim in creating these artworks, mockuments, and artist's books is to construct not fictional narratives, but historical ones.

Social solidarity economy and urban commoning in post-crisis contexts: Madrid and Athens in a comparative perspective

ABSTRACT The social solidarity economy (SSE), as an alternative paradigm to crisis-prone market-driven capitalism, gained significant momentum during the last decade in cities such as Madrid and Athens that experienced the harsh impact of neoliberal austerity. This article consolidates a debate between divergent accounts of social economy and the commons, in order to bring forward the urban dimension of SSE and the contested spatiality of commoning in crisis-ridden contexts. This gesture lays the ground for unearthing various analytical dimensions of commoning, from urban-based socioeconomic practice, to re-instituting forms of urban commons via governance and policy channels. Through an empirically informed, comparative account of the SSE in Madrid and Athens, the article critically assesses the possibilities and limitations encountered in the process of expanding resistance to and experimentation beyond dominant socioeconomic practice and given institutional arrangements. The article is based on extensive original empirical research conducted in Madrid and Athens between 2017 and 2019.

Homeownership, mobility, and home: A relational housing study of Argentine Ludar and Romanian Rudari

This article examines the community-led housing practices of two related Boyash-Roma communities in Argentina and Romania. The Argentinean case introduces the story of the Ludar in the Greater Buenos Aires Region, a Romanian-speaking sub-group of the Roma, who likely arrived here between 1880 and 1900. Throughout Argentina, most of the Ludar are involved in street vending. The second case concerns the Roma communities of the Rudari from Vâlcea County in Romania, who travel to Sweden primarily to beg. Although the cases seem unrelated, they demonstrate how close engagement with Roma and their socioeconomic mobility allows experimental comparisons of informality and urban development in various parts of world. While their mobile earning strategies are contested by authorities, they enable many to secure a feeling of belonging in a post-crisis context, characterised by rampant racism, greatly restricted welfare provision and increasingly constrained mobility. The newly emerging homes are understood as spaces of hope and dignity and the coping strategies as processes meant to unmake precarity. In this way, the article contributes to an emerging scholarship of Roma resistance, while informing broader contestations of urban marginality.

Precarious Education-to-Work Transitions: Entering Welfare Professions under a Workfarist Regime

This article looks at the process of education-to-work transitions in female-dominated welfare professions within the Slovenian post-crisis context marked by a workfarist agenda. It departs from a scholarship that conceptualises precarity as a transitional vulnerability and disaffiliation exacerbated by workfarist policies to explore the contemporary experience of those trying to achieve professional integration under a volatile workfarist regime. The findings reveal a mismatch between established regulations for early career recruitment and professional licensing and actual chances in the labour market to meet these requirements through available workfarist non-standard, entry-level jobs/schemes designed for particular status and/or socio-demographic groups. It gives new evidence that European workfare regimes exacerbate precarity and a novel understanding of state-manufactured precarisation as an intersectional process of marginalisation and discrimination that not only hinders integration into welfare professions, but also downloads the costs of social reproduction on the next generation, causes precarious ageing and widens intersectional differences.

Food Networks As Urban Commons: Case Study of a Portuguese “Prosumers” Group

In many parts of the world, people are coming together to experiment with ways to collectively take care of their livelihoods and create practical solutions to their needs. Guided by principles of solidarity, these grassroots initiatives represent rich contexts for research on the urban commons: what qualifies them as commons, and how do they emerge, develop, sustain and dissolve – or transform over time? This research dissects the commons character of a food network which emerged from Porto's solidarity economy movement in a post-crisis context. Following an action-research approach and methodological triangulation, we develop a qualitative analysis of a “prosumers” group, where both production and distribution were performed weekly by consumers themselves. We first analyze how the initiative emerged and then look at how its principles and democratic qualities relate to commons theories and frameworks. We then delve into the main dilemmas of its commoning practices and reflect about its transformative character and liminal role as a temporary urban commons. Despite ceasing its activities, there was a lived-experience and a knowledge commons which allowed it to be appropriated in new terms, and thus food networks as urban commons persist.

Towards a unified anti-Europe narrative on the right and left? The challenge of Euroscepticism in the 2019 European elections

In the aftermath of a decade of crisis, the 2019 European Parliament elections confirmed the results of the 2014 elections as voters turned away from the traditional political families to vote for parties with a strong message on Europe, including Eurosceptic parties. It further evidenced the normalization of Euroscepticism, which has become a stable component of European politics. But should one talk of Euroscepticism or rather of Euroscepticisms? This contribution focuses on 19 radical right and radical left parties, more specifically the parties from Western Europe belonging to the European United Left/Nordic Green Left (GUE/NGL) and the Identity and Democracy (I/D) groups. Through an analysis of the electoral manifestos, it analyses how the European Union has been framed by the parties and whether we can speak of a ‘unified Eurosceptic narrative’. More specifically, this article concentrates on three issues that have been at the heart of the recent crises: the European Union’s reform and how the regime itself is framed in a post-crisis context, the Economic and Monetary Union well as migration and free movement.

Doing Away with the Sovereign: Neoliberalism and the Promotion of Market Discipline in European Economic Governance

ABSTRACT This article proposes a critical reading of market discipline and its limitations as a mechanism in European economic governance. Consistent with neoliberal beliefs about market-based governance, the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) is premised on the functioning of the government bond market as a fiscal-policy discipliner. However, the operation of market discipline requires that neither governments nor their private creditors can rely on an authority to bail them out. It, therefore, precludes the kinds of intervention by Eurozone’s supranational institutions witnessed during the euro crisis. In the post-crisis context, efforts to strengthen market discipline continue to be frustrated by the growing reliance of financial institutions on government bond markets as well as the European Central Bank’s (ECB) active participation in those markets. Having undermined the credibility of the market as an autonomous and apolitical mechanism of discipline, European economic governance struggles to come to terms with the rise of a supranational ‘economic sovereign’ in the Eurozone.

Multiple property ownership in times of late homeownership: a new conceptual vocabulary

The number of individuals and households that own an additional property beyond their primary home is on the rise in several countries. However, recent studies have been inconsistent in describing such properties, referring, for instance, to the return of private small-scale landlordism, the proliferation of second homes, or the significance of dwellings that are held as investment properties. Rarely are these disparate issues considered together, either theoretically or empirically. This special issue mobilises the concept of multiple property ownership (MPO) to provide a more integrated analysis. In this introduction to the special issue we propose multiple property ownership as a conceptual banner that includes second homes, buy-to-let properties, holiday rentals, intergenerational support properties and safe deposit box properties. While these properties may differ considerably in terms of purpose and use, we argue that they are part of a broader proliferation of property wealth accumulation at the household level. Considering multiple properties together can motivate a deeper understanding of property wealth concentration and changing property relations in the post-crisis context. We introduce a typology of multiple property ownership, discuss the consumption and investment value of different property types, and outline some drivers of multiple property ownership, before considering implications for housing research. We end with a brief discussion of the five articles in this special issue and how they deepen current understanding of multiple property ownership.

Designated Spaces for Designated Imaginaries: The Cruel Optimism of Citizen Participation in Post-disaster State-citizen Dialogues

Environmental disturbances, pandemics, or social crises often lead to the emergence of ‘heterotopian’ spaces (Foucault 1998; Boano 2011), that give rise to emergent debates on alternative imaginations of the future, even utopianism (Solnit 2010). At the same time, modern governance increasingly emphasises the active participation of citizens in processes where these alternative imaginations are turned into actionable plans (Bherer et al. 2016). In particular, the intensity of development needs in post-crisis contexts (Olshansky et al. 2012) can see the prolific spread of participatory spaces designated to facilitate dialogue between authorities and citizens. From creative workshops to citizen committees, however, the results and experiences of citizen participation in these ‘designated spaces’ have remained consistently inconsistent (Davidson et al. 2007; Curato 2018; Cleaver 2001). Drawing on ethnographic research carried out in 2015 and 2016 among individuals who took part in spaces of state-citizen dialogue after the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and Tsunami, this paper contributes to critical debates on participatory governance by examining the non-critical acceptance of citizen participation as a universal social ‘good’. The paper focuses on the paradoxically high degrees of optimism and voicelessness reported by disaster victims in Tōhoku, arguing that this paradox reflects the wider patterning of dialogue and governance as a form of ‘cruel optimism’ (Berlant 2011), where the optimism represents just another form of voicelessness. The paper concludes that to overcome the ‘cruelty’, more focus needs to be paid on improving the process through which the content of dialogues is determined and shaped together with the citizens in the participatory spaces, rather than used as venues for promising a better future.