EU: Keeping Up With What's Happening

["John Gelles" <jjgelles@xxxxxxxx>]

Bernard Girard writes from France:

"...[R]ead what the Commission is now writing on social security.
The neo-liberal model is everywhere. In fact, I come to think that
post Maastricht Europe will do to our social model what the post
Traité de Rome's Europe did to the protectionism : it will destroy it.

"Just two instances : - every one in Bruxelles talks about a "revenu
social minimum", a kind of salary that everyone above 18 would
receive. The idea, not far for some of Friedman's, would pave
the way to the privatization of most of what we call social security
(health, rents for old persons...) and the introduction of pension funds;
- every one in Bruxelles uses the word "employabilité" and wants the
unemployement insurance to be linked with this "employabilité" which
would mean that those who are not "employables" would not get any
insurance when unemployed. Some of these ideas might be good
(pension funds, for instance), the trouble is that nobody in Europe,
but those who work for Bruxelles or with Bruxelles, know what's
happening. And one day one of our governments will come and tell
us, la queue entre les jambes : "sorry, but we have to change all that
because of Bruxelles." "

        o  So called "transparency" in government (and foreign
	investment) is what global trade advocates claim we
	need.  Surely, the business and better press in Europe
	must be reading all the material the EU offers and
	digging out through its sources the stories behind the
	official publications.

        o  We here in discussion are counting on our European
	PKT'rs to reveal the facts -- even if there are more
	than one set of them (from pro and con EU points
	of view).

        o  Bernard offers an impression neo-liberal moles are
	underground at various EU institutions planning radical
	reductions in worker protections (from the vagaries and
	failures of unregulated markets).  And that against the
	damage these moles will do stand street demonstrations,
	because there is too little informed debate in the parlors
	and parliaments of Europe.

        o  Perhaps I exaggerate, but let us hear more.  The Europa
	site, with endless long documents offered, gives an
	opposite impression.  Those who support the EU must
	think there is reasonable current transparency and that
	they know what is presently sought by competing voices
	in and around the EU in the areas discussed by Bernard.

        o  Is it the case that populist unrest is being fed by a lack
	of transparency -- a lack of following who is fighting for
	the rights of workers and those in need, who, in the quest
	for European prosperity and unity, has plans to prevent
	deflation and unemployment from bringing Europe to a
	chaotic condition, and who has none?
	
		John Gelles