Greece

Greece's 2009-2018 debt crisis remains the most severe sovereign financial collapse in developed-world history: GDP contracted by 25%, unemployment exceeded 27%, and the country received €289 billion in bailout loans conditional on austerity measures that deepened the recession. The Troika (EU Commission, ECB, IMF) effectively governed Greek fiscal policy during the crisis, with memoranda of understanding replacing domestic budget sovereignty — a loss of metabolic autonomy that biologists would recognise as parasitic governance, where the host organism's resource allocation is redirected to serve the parasite's priorities (debt repayment). Greece's structural challenge is a clientelist political system where public sector employment serves as patronage, creating a state workforce that represents roughly 20% of total employment. Tourism generates roughly 20% of GDP, creating seasonal economic rhythms that concentrate employment and revenue into six months of the year. The recovery since 2018 has been genuine but fragile, with debt-to-GDP still exceeding 160%.