ABSTRACT
The origin of the term ‘crisis’ has its roots in ancient Greece, where the word ‘κρίνω’ was mainly used to indicate the act of separating, discerning or, in a figurative sense, the overall process of deciding. Quite ironically, and perhaps unintentionally, the use we make today of the word ‘crisis’ has much more in common with its Greek original meanings than one might expect. Crises are often understood as turning points, even watersheds, produced by important transformations in politics, economics and society, and thus marking a profound shift, or separation, from one era to another. At the same time, crises are generally only overcome by means of important decisions concerning what is the best strategy to adopt in a given critical circumstance.
