Greece avoided an imminent default by taking a brave vote for more austerity. Europe and the International Monetary Fund will now release financing to enable it to service its debts through the summer. Yet there can be no doubt this second bail-out must be the last of its kind. Either Greece and its eurozone partners will agree to a long-term solution, or the rioters in the streets will prevail next time that Greece is pushed to the brink.

Many of my colleagues in academia have blithely called on Greece to default, and so force a debt restructuring. I find such advice to be naive. No one can guarantee a managed default in today's global financial system. Bank runs, a contagion to other countries, the triggering of credit default swaps and heated political recriminations within Europe are but some of the consequences that could follow.

A default may indeed occur, but should never be a first or early resort. I myself have helped to negotiate many sovereign debt restructurings, from Bolivia to Poland to Nigeria, but Greece is different. It is a developed economy. It over-borrowed and overspent, then got caught in accounting shenanigans and the global financial meltdown. Now it needs to adjust, if that adjustment is within reason.

Many who argue for the inevitability of default claim Greece can never repay its debt. This claim of inevitability is that with public debt owed to foreign creditors around 120 per cent of national income, Greece's servicing will break the economy and prove to be politically unsustainable as well.

With average interest rates on Greek bonds expected to stay above 6 per cent per year (on the business-as-usual scenario put forward by the IMF and EU) interest servicing would also remain higher than 6 per cent of gross domestic product in the coming years. That indeed would be an impossible load to bear, both economically and politically.

Fortunately these dire forecasts are not necessarily right. Greece need not pay anything near to that level. Here is how to do it. The IMF-EU estimates are based on the idea that Greece will have to pay high interest rates that include a premium for default risk.

The problem is a self-fulfilling prophecy: high interest rates will lead to an intolerable debt-service burden and the inevitability of default. The prospect of default, in turn, will lead inexorably to high interest rates. A better policy is to get Greece's interest rates lower.

Suppose Greece can service its debts on Germany's borrowing terms. With eurozone inflation of 1.5 per cent, its real interest rates would be around 2 per cent. If Greece can grow at around 3 per cent, it will then be able to service its debts, make modest net transfers abroad of around 2 per cent of GDP and reduce the ratio of debt to gross domestic product from around 120 per cent to 70 per cent over a 20-year period.

This is the main point: Greece can probably service its debts in the long term, without default, if a low interest rate is locked in place and repayments are stretched over 20 years. Such low interest rates could be put in place through Europe-wide guarantees on Greece's debt service. Angela Merkel, German chancellor, is afraid to be tarred with a taxpayer-financed bail-out. But this concern is exaggerated, at least relative to greater concerns regarding a disorderly default.

There is also a way to address the political and financial burdens of a European guarantee. The EU has been moving towards new taxes on the financial sector. These could be used to back the guarantees on Greek debt, drawn upon only in event of a default.

Let's face it: the pessimists are guessing. A gradual repayment at low interest rates is worth a try. In the worst case, Greece defaults without a banking panic or a breakdown of the single currency.

Of course my concept assumes that Greece will resume growth in the eurozone through new exports of renewable energy, IT, transport services, and of course the country's remarkable tourism. Greece is one of the world's glorious destinations for exploring and ruminating on the human condition.

With some luck, Greece will someday ruminate about how it stuck to a narrow path in the early 21st century, and found honour and vindication.

The writer is director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University