Euro-monster keert zich tegen z'n scheppers

[Dr. Marc-Alexander Fluks]

REPLY TO: D66 at nic.surfnet.nl

Bron:   The Guardian
Datum:  6 juni 2005
Auteur: Larry Elliott
URL:    http://politics.guardian.co.uk/eu/comment/0,9236,1500036,00.html
Opm:    Zie ook de twee scenario's in de Guardian van gisteren:
        http://politics.guardian.co.uk/columnist/story/0,9321,1499603,00.html


The week the monster turned on its creators
-------------------------------------------

(...)

Europe today is only socialist to the extent that the Soviet Union in the
last years of Brezhnev was socialist. This, lest it be forgotten, is what
the Keynesians, the greens and the anti-globalisers have long predicted.

The non-sensible left has always had its doubts about the "project". The
Keynesians said that the euro, far from leading to stronger growth, would
actually become a job-destruction machine. Setting up a central bank with
an inbuilt bias towards price stability in a world of low inflation would
be like the British guns at Singapore in 1942 - powerful weapons pointing
out to sea when the enemy was closing in from the opposite direction.

The greens said forcing the pace of integration from the top down was not
only economically daft but also anti-democratic. It would, they said, lead
to political disengagement. The argument of the anti-globalisers was that
despite all the talk of creating a social Europe, monetary union was actually
a Trojan horse that would be used as a means of spreading neo-liberal ideas
and big business values across the continent.

The events of the past four years, culminating in the no votes of the past
week, suggest that the Keynesians, the greens and the anti-globalisers
were right. Europe has not grown; it has stagnated. Unable to see the
damage wrought by the Frankenstein's monster they have created, Europe's
elite argues that the solution to the problem of mass unemployment is for
people to work longer hours and accept less generous benefits. Those on
the receiving end have hoarded their money and nurtured their resentment.

(...)

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(c) 2005 Guardian Newspapers Limited

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