Ancient Greece is where Western civilisation began, and modern Greece is where it ends

Is the Greek debt crisis simply an isolated case or could similar debt problems develop in other countries across Europe and the rest of the world? Michael Ben-Gad writes that while it is easy to find examples of mismanagement and clientelistic behaviour in Greek society, it would be dangerous to regard the crisis as unique to Greece. He argues that with rapid aging and an unwillingness to adjust levels of spending to match new demographic realities, there is the clear potential for debt crises to emerge in other Western societies in the coming decades.