From: 17428-AT-HHSS.SE
Subject: M-I: RE: Amsterdam Treaty
Date: Wed, 4 Feb 1998 18:23:01 +0100


> As for the single currency the main argument is that it reduces the
> power of the local bourgeoisie to manipulate with devaluations (Which
> benefit the multi-nationals who thus reduce their labour costs.)
> I would like to see some arguments on the issue. I, though an Irish
> Socialist Republican, see that the era of independent nation states is
> over, but believe that national self determination of the oppressed
> nations from the Ukraine to Ireland is a prerequisite for a democratic
> establishment socialist union of the peoples of Europe.
> 
> 
	The single currency at the same time reduces the possibilty for
a country to adapt to large external disturbances by letting the
currency devaluate. The result arising from this is that disturbances
are met by putting downward pressure on the wages and forcing people
into unemployment.

	Among the monolithic neo-liberal economists, the issue debated
is if the work force, in terms of wage-rates and mobility, is "flexible"
enough to avoid the shock waves of unprecedented mass-unemployment. As
far as I can see, those who merely use their simplistic theories to
guess what could happen, warn for possible unemployment shocks in
different parts of Europe. Those who are slightly more clever understand
that EMU can and will be used by organized capital to destroy whatever
labor market regulations left in Europe, and are thus pro-EMU.

	Obviousely, there is no reason for socialists not to fight a
project that so severely threatens the advancements of the working
class.

	The national question is very interesting indeed. There are no
legitimate democratic institutions on a European level today and a
prerequisite for building such institutions is that the working class
uses its existing institutions as a power base. Those institutions are
generally nation-based, and attacked by contemporary capital

	Ali Esbati
	/Stockholm. 



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