Europe´s crises

Abstract

After the fall of the Berlin wall in 1989, a well-orchestrated chorus proclaimed the end of history and capitalist eternity. History, as if offended by such silly predictions, quickened pace and today nobody will seriously contend that everything is for the best in the best of possible capitalist worlds. On the contrary, we are obviously living a time of deep crisis. The rapid capitalist invasion of eastern Europe, nicknamed shock therapy, is meeting serious resistance, illustrated for instance by the need to bomb Parliament in Moscow, and is provoking popular discontent, expressed most recently in the Polish election. The making, or re-making, of a capitalist class within years, and not decades and centuries, proves a more difficult exercise than was assumed.