ABSTRACT
This chapter identifies the particular codifications of legitimation in the Greek crisis during 2010-2014. It explores the ways in which the state attempts to justify its authority and governance strategy; consequently, it asks how modalities of legitimation have been redefined and articulated in the context of a wider neoliberal economic and political restructuring. The chapter suggests that past events of public contestation have shaped discourses, practices and imaginations of state delegitimation in times of crisis. It focuses on how notions and discourses of uncertainty have been employed by the state. The chapter argues, that the discourse 'to get out of the crisis' has mobilised the implementation of 'law and order' by the state to discipline the 'social body'. The political objective is not simply to criminalize the social groups, but to delegitimise them. Nevertheless, this is an essential part of state reengineering.
