I think that the root of problem is basically this globalized economic model and , at the bottom line , the whole capitalist system (at least its ultra liberal version were living today).
Of course austerity isnt working for the countries economies , but its working fine for the imf and all the market sharks that own part of the countries bonds.
Let me tell you how things hapened in greece , where i live.
In the 80's , not many years after the dictatorship the "socialist" goverment built a huge dysfunctional state mechanism and started giving away money and public servant jobs at the people. Greeks were convinced that they would live milking the state cow and left the corrupt goverments party.
The 90's came and economic scandals were emerging but we were surely witnessing just the tip of the iceberg since the corruption was really deep into the media too.For example buisnessmen owning the big tv stations and newspapers , were the same that took the biggest construction jobs for the state. so it was (and still is) all pretty much concieled.
Of course modern Greeks (having pretty much nothing in common with their far ancestors) would only get into politics or syndicalism when they would have some personal profit.
Things went on like that and then came the euro. And the whole consumer culture wich came along with the banks giving away credit cards and loans like they were beans.
Thats one part of the problem and i gave this brief , and highly superficial retrospective so that you can understand what happened when Greece started its great journey with the eu bank and the imf...
Because as these were happening greeks were forced (or convinced) to practically quit producing.The agricultural production was destroyed , Greeks would import oranges when the greek oranges were rotting unsold because they were not cheap enough. Of course the liberal capitalist goverment let this happen.Thats a liberal ecomony.Alongside they let the dealers cartels control the prices of the goods. I dont know how you call that.... At the same time retail prices were going up as hell....
Of course stupid Greeks didnt care. The eu fund for the agriculture would make up for their losses and allow them to live the "euro dream" , with nice cars and bouzouki entertainment and the easy money from the banks gave them time to focus on real national issues like the eurovision song contest , the euro football cup and the olympic games.....
The olympic games were practically the beggining of the end. Huge amounts of money spent on useless infrastructure , but even more taken "beneath the table" as bribes.
The rich industrial countries of the north and their industries were making huge amounts of money (call me siemens....) Money that they couldnt be making if there was a true economic , and not only monetary union. But who would want that?
The bedt crisis came and everything burst like a bubble. Except corruption which kept strong on the (not so) underground.Greece went into the imf. They help us , with high intrest rates , so that we have the money we need to pay back the interests. Nice deal huh?
So now all europe is debating on austerity or development. Thats no debate for me. Because in this globally corrupt system , development is going to happen with the exact same way. Giving away whats best in a really cheap price , offering cheap labour to multinational sharks , destroying whats left of the enviroment.....
Its time for the people to start building their own.Creating structures with no help from anyone. Collective working and (re)building society on a different basis. Now is the time for us to do it , but dont fool yourselves ,this is coming to a country near you , maybe you own...
We have to educate ourselves ,and act locally but think globally....
p.s im no political or economics specialist (as you propably understood from my post) and my whole analysis was highly superficial. I could write a lot more but i already feel bad for the lenght of my post (and its partial irrelevance to the topic). I consider this to be an intro.I'm really into discussing the situation. Share your thoughts and ill be back.