07.05.1998

Fight for revolutionary internationalism

As Europe unites from above, so must those below

Amidst a flurry of last-minute horse trading over who is to head the European Central Bank, the euro was born last weekend at a European Union summit in Brussels. The new currency will become legal tender in 11 member countries on January 1 next year. In a deal between Germany, France and the Netherlands, the new head of the ECB, Wim Duisenberg, will voluntarily stand down about halfway through his eight-year term. Duisenberg will probably remain until mid-2002, the final date for the switch from national currencies to euro notes and coins. The summit made an undertaking that the next ECB president will be a French national. This will be the current head of the French central bank, Jean-Claude Trichet.

On the surface, the birth of a new currency may seem a rather technical matter, impacting on the world of capital, but hardly one to grab the attention of partisans of the working class. Yet this would be to miss the fundamentals. European economic and monetary union (Emu) is, above all, a political endeavour. In bourgeois circles many see the outcome of this summit as the most important event in Europe since the fall of the Berlin wall. And they could well be right.

While everyone (apart from the odd rogue state) is meant to be friends post-1991, the New World Order is forcing realignment and the consolidation of economic blocs. This brings with it political change. Neo-liberalism may be breaking down old barriers, but it is slowly, at times imperceptibly, creating them elsewhere.

At the heart of the ‘European project’, as currently framed by the European capitalists and their politicians, is their recognised need to create a large home market in order to compete on the world stage against North American and Asian-based capital. If the euro is successful, they will have gone some way in achieving this. ‘Euroland’ - the combined economies of Austria, Belgium, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Portugal and Spain - is huge. This zone accounts for 19.4% of global GDP (compared with 19.6% for the US and 7.7% for Japan) and 18.6% of external world trade (16.6% for the US, 8.2% for Japan). Add to that the likely entry of the UK, Denmark and Sweden in the ‘second wave’ and the stage is set for the 21st century to comprise three big economic zones, dominated by two currencies: the greenback and the euro.

But not everyone is happy. The enemy class exposed divisions at the summit, in what was regarded as an undignified squabble over the presidency of the ECB. Most supported Dutchman Wim Duisenberg, head of the ECB’s forerunner, the European Monetary Institute. In a move which caused outrage, particularly with chancellor Kohl, last November president Chirac nominated Trichet for the job.

Under the Maastricht treaty, the ECB is meant to be politically independent to encourage that most intangible of capitalist necessities: confidence in the financial system. The independence of the ECB is not only intended to signal prudent management of monetary supply and interest rates, but secondarily it is also meant to signpost and underpin political union.

From now on, even if the individual countries of the euro 11 wanted to take an independent economic course, it would be impossible. President Chirac’s display of national intransigence on an occasion which was meant to celebrate closer European unity seems a final flourish of Gaullist brinkmanship. Markets this week reacted favourably to the Brussels summit.

There are other clear indicators of the political nature of Emu. In order to qualify for monetary union, EU members were expected to maintain budget deficits below three percent of GDP and public debt below 60%. It is arguable that most of the euro 11 nations only fell within these limits due to a degree of creative accountancy. Others were clearly outside. Belgium, for instance, has a public debt of 122.2% of GDP, while Italy’s is 121.6%.

France’s intransigence over the ECB president point to longer-term difficulties. How will sovereign nations exist within a single economic zone? While economic union does not automatically signal political fusion (Belgium and Luxembourg have shared a currency for some time now), it will be increasingly difficult to avoid.

Alongside the fiercely monetarist ECB is the euro-11 club - an informal grouping of the finance ministers of the euro zone - which many hope will act as a counterbalance. In what was seen as Gordon Brown’s first major setback, Britain was excluded from this committee after deciding not to join in the ‘first wave’. The more federalist politicians such as chancellor Kohl hope that this group will be strengthened, alongside an increasing role for the European parliament.

Whatever the fears of Eurosceptics pressures outside Europe may force the pace. The Economist (May 2 1998) notes that “it is hard to believe that America will not soon seek a European interlocutor who can speak with more authority that the current president of the European Union”. Either way the direction is unmistakable.

Many, from the left and right, insisted that European Union was impossible. Inter-imperialist rivalry and the political-economic interests of nation states would inevitably mean that Europe, as a capitalist enterprise, would collapse under the weight of its own contradictions. A united Europe was supposedly only possible under working class rule. In the bi-polar world before 1991 this seemed more plausible. Though it was wrong even then. In the uni-polar world of neo-liberal hegemony, it lacks any intellectual weight. Life itself is proving the point.

The bourgeois triumphalism born in 1991 emerged alongside global strategic defeats for our class which were fundamentally, though not exclusively, of an ideological nature. The current quiescence of the working class, as a political class, has allowed the European capitalists more room to manoeuvre. Just as Blair has so far been able to achieve constitutional reform from above in the complete absence of any working class alternative, Europe is being remade from above in the interests of capital.

Yet it has not been all smooth sailing. The election of Lionel Jospin’s Socialist Party in France, the referendum setback in Denmark and the sliding fortunes of chancellor Kohl, alongside a worrying rise in xenophobic parties in Germany and France, point to ongoing difficulties. So does the current strike by half a million Danish workers. While not sparked by direct resistance to Emu, its demands implicitly challenge the spending limits deemed necessary for convergence.

The upsurge of mass activity in France at the end of 1995 was an explicit rejection of the economic measures needed to reach the Maastricht criteria which the previous Gaullist government attempted to enforce. Its impact rippled through French society, culminating in Jospin’s election last year. In France at least, this signalled that the euro could not be bulldozed into place. Strategic battles in Europe lie ahead. However, workers’ actions have so far been defensive and restricted to economic issues. The political call for a fully democratic Europe shaped from below by the working class has so far failed to connect with any mass movement.

In fact, what is worrying about the nature of resistance to the impact of Emu up to now has been a tendency for the labour movements of European countries to politically trail their ‘own’ rulers. In Britain, John Monks and the TUC leadership are enthusiastic supporters of economic union. With no independent political programme, they fall into line behind the sector of capital they judge will provide ‘more jobs’.

On the other hand the Eurosceptic wing of the labour movement has tended to take a narrow nationalist line. In France, the chauvinist French Communist Party questions Emu out of concern for French sovereignty. However, in Britain ‘official communist’ relics, such as the so-called Communist Party of Britain, not only ‘say no to the euro’ but call for withdrawal from the EU. Arthur Scargill’s Socialist Labour Party shares almost exactly the same ‘little England’ approach.

Unable to break free from the national socialist straitjacket of the British road to socialism, these forces have no vision of a unified international movement against capital and its governmental form of domination. The more honest CPB types admit that Emu and any political union would wreck the BRS. However, rather than develop a programme able to deal with the real world, like King Canute they are trying to hold back the tide to make the world safe for their dogma.

Quite clearly, economic union is becoming a reality. The Economist is wrong in its assessment of Blair’s first year when it argues: “Labour is as confused as the Tories.” Despite overtures from US House of Representatives leader Newt Gingrich for the UK to join Nafta, the pound seems headed the way of all mortals. Blair is playing it cautious yet clever. While the euro does not become the coin of the land on new year’s day, neither will it be barred. The new currency will begin to circulate, people will get used to it and, alongside an increasing political culture of passively accepted referenda, a ‘yes’ vote for the UK to join Emu should become easier.

Unlike the TUC or the British roaders, the role of communists is not to advise this or that section of capital. We should not be advocating ‘liberation’ from Europe or championing the stability of the euro. On that level it matters not a jot who is ECB president. Yet to ignore such manoeuvring as irrelevant to our struggle would be inept. Any schisms, trip-ups or disunity must be used to our advantage. And their difficulties are not going to disappear, but more likely increase, as the contradiction between unity and national interest is exacerbated.

To the extent that European integration becomes a reality, our international political tasks becomes more solid: European-wide unions and a Communist Party of the EU. The example of the Renault strikers across Europe last year and the international impact of the Danish strikers at present point to the direction in which we need to organise. To act as cheerleaders for trade unionist resistance to the effects of Emu is no job for revolutionaries. We must generalise that resistance through a political programme for European revolution.

In this regard, the demonstration at the European summit in Cardiff on June 13 provides an opportunity to bring such an internationalist message to a wider audience.

Marcus Larsen