“This morning, when I visualized Greece in the midst of anti-austerity protests, I saw the contested “Europe.” People in the streets, from all walks of life, from various generations, chanting, raising flags, rioting. I saw people organizing. I saw local assemblies, clinics run by volunteers. I saw the Acropolis, Exarchia, Syntagma Square. I saw olive trees. I saw the sun. I saw dēmokratia. The rule, the power, of the people. The very concept that has lost most of its meaning in today’s world. [...] As I write this, the hope that finds expression in the streets and homes all over Greece is a movement. A movement in the midst of a huge loss of material wealth for ordinary Greeks. But there’s a message there for everyone and it is that people can unite, that democracy from below can challenge oligarchy, that imprisoned migrants can be freed, that fascism can be overcome, and that equality is emancipatory. The powerful have sent us a message: obey, and if you seek collective liberation, then you will be collectively punished.

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Freedom is a Constant Struggle, Angela Davis 2015

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Greece has always been a place of inspiration for people around the world. It is the country Angela Davis wrote about beautifully in her book Freedom is a Constant Struggle, the land where democracy was supposedly born, a country known for its philosophers who wrote about the continuous pursuit of freedom, happiness, and well-being. Over the past few years, however, especially in a post-pandemic society, Greece is no example for the aforementioned notions of freedom. On a global level, there is an indisputable growing assertion of power and authority by political executives. Greece is no exception; its democratic norms have been weakened. This article will discuss different legislation passed by the government during COVID-19 and its permanent impact on the individual and collective rights of Greek citizens in the post-pandemic era. 

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On November 11 2021, the Greek government Nea Dimokratia (New Democracy) passed a penal code provision where the spread of alleged “fake news” has become a criminal offense. The government passed this law under the guise of public health concerns, claiming that there has been a proliferation of misinformation and conspiracy theories regarding COVID-19. According to the government, the publication of "fake news" will discourage people from conforming to the containment measures, including curfews, social distancing rules, as well as getting vaccinated. The growing disobedience will thus increase the population infected by COVID-19, exposing more people to unsafety. Hence, to limit any socially threatening behavior anyone who spreads misinformation will be punished with up to 5 years of imprisonment. In particular, a part of the article 36 of the criminal code suggests that:

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“Anyone who publicly or via the internet spreads or disseminates in any way false news that is capable of causing concern or fear to the public or shattering public confidence in the national economy, the country’s defense capacity or public health shall be punished by imprisonment for at least three months and a fine.”

“If the act was repeatedly committed through the press or via the internet, the perpetrator is punished with imprisonment of at least six months and a fine. The actual owner or issuer of the instrument with which the acts of the previous paragraphs were performed is punished with the same penalty."

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Even though the government is supposedly prosecuting anti-vaxxers who are attempting to misinform people through various social media platforms, the sentence “false news [...] capable of causing concern or fear to the public” is rather amorphous and can apply to many different categories, including but not limited to COVID-19. In fact, this penal code has significantly increased self-censorship, especially around the topics of migration, policing, and the critique of the government amid the pandemic. According to an annual report published by the Reporters Without Borders (RSF), Greece dropped 38 places in the ranking for freedom of speech –from 70th to 108th– in 2022 and is officially the lowest ranking country in the EU. The criminalization of “fake news” can result in the imprisonment of journalists for critical reporting, threatening Greece’s democratic ideas. By passing the misinformation penal code, Greece fails to meet the international and European legal standards regarding freedom of the press, limiting journalists’ right to critique and comment on current political issues. Hence, the Greek government effectively used the pandemic as a pretext to justify the increased control of media publications. 

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 In addition to the new penal code provision that restricts freedom of the press, the Greek  government also passed the Law 4703/2020 on 10 July 2020, which was followed by implementing legislation in September 2020. The Law 4703/2020 aims to regulate public assemblies through dispersal, prohibition, and the imposition of mandatory notification requirements to execute a peaceful assembly. In particular, Article 9 gives the police or coast guard the right to legally dissolve a public assembly and use “mild methods” to achieve that. These methods according to the guidelines can vary from warnings to chemical irritants in cases of protesters clashing with the police. The vagueness of this guideline will legitimize police violence against protesters as it is up to their judgment to choose the ‘appropriate’ method. According to Amnesty International this is an “unjustified interference with the right to freedom of peaceful assembly as it is guaranteed in international and regional treaties”, such as the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and European Convention on Human Rights.” Therefore, this law will hinder peoples’ right to organize peacefully, expanding the government's control over the field of public order.

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In addition to passing new legislation that limits the citizens’ ability to protest under the excuse of public safety during the pandemic, the government also used this time opportunistically to introduce police into universities. On February 11 2021, the Greek government passed a new law that allows for the stationing of police on university campuses. This is perturbing given Greece’s history of police presence in universities. In particular, the 1973 U.S. backed military junta caused a bloodshed after a tank entered the Polytechnic University of Athens. After this event, Greece passed the university asylum law in 1982, as a result of the lives lost during the dictatorship, and the police were not allowed to enter universities to create a safe environment and ensure academic freedom for the students. However, this safety is now threatened by the reintroduction of the police in universities. Academics and university students have warned the public that introducing police into university campuses will violate both the right to academic freedom as well as the ‘self governing’ legal status of Greek universities, granted by the Constitution. Although the COVID-19 pandemic was not used as a pretext to introduce police into universities, the law was passed at a time when public assemblies were limited. This in combination with the Law 4703/2020 has legitimized arbitrary arrests of university students and extreme police violence, limiting their right to protest safely. 

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We are living during an era where the increased intervention by the police in the public space is justified in the context of the implementation of pandemic measures. Since the beginning of 2020, there has been an increase of police surveillance, with the simultaneous imposition of various restrictions on movement, and an aggressive response against public gatherings, regardless of their nature and size. In light of this, a number of changes that emerged in the field of public order and policing during the beginning of COVID-19, have a more permanent character in the post-pandemic era. The intensive use of the police as well as the repression of freedom of the press were both a product of a political decision by the government, resulting in an urgent need to assess the new legislation passed.  

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