I. CAPITALIST CRISIS

1- At the gates of a new recession. All the indicators point to a second recession. The economy of the United States, Germany and France stops. A new wave of defaults questions the financial system, and governments are preparing to deliver another astronomical amount of money to the banks. This second recession comes while states’ cashboxes are choked by a runaway public debt, resulting from the first massive payment of money to the banks in the previous "rescue plan". Lenin said in "Imperialism, the Highest Stage of Capitalism" that the imperialist epoch is characterized by the dominance of finance capital over all other components of capital (industrial and commercial). In this crisis that dominance is revealed in all its magnitude. Everything is to please the great master of the world: the banks! Meanwhile that happens, unemployment and misery spread over the working majority.

2. - The nature of the crisis. We are facing a crisis of capitalist overproduction. The downward trend of the rate of benefits of capitalism, pushed towards concentration of production (globalization), as well as a tremendous downward pressure on wages (neoliberalism). The rate of corporate profits recovered while the imbalance between increased production and consumption capacity of the majority of the people was increasing. The first symptoms of the current crisis came for a long time, already in the summer of 2000 the growth cycle of the profit rate was running out, which had started in the 80’s by the policies of Reagan and Thatcher. The Bush administration started to escape forward. It was launched to conquer sources of easy and profitable resources with the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, to maintain the flow of capital that the Yankee economy needed not to sink. While they were waiting to reach those petrodollars, the Republican administration skyrocketed the state’s military expenditure and launched a massive borrowing process of the population based on consumption (particularly housing and car) to revive a blocked economy. At first the economy revived somewhat with this injection of fresh money, but the plan ran aground in Iraq and Afghanistan, with the people’s resistance to the occupation. Rather than a source of income, the war became a huge expenditure. In 2007, the situation precipitated a new crisis, deeper than that of 2000 and amplified by the massive indebtedness.

3. - The cycle of the crisis proceeds spiraling and with feedbacks. This crisis has similarities with that of 30’s, with the stock market crash of 29 and the Great Depression. With the credit policy, the crisis of overproduction turns to be a financial crisis that dragged consumer’s power to a fast drop and to massive closures of companies. Many companies are closed, or reduced their workforce, as a preventive measure of the capitalist, or taking advantage to impose cuts to workers, and inevitably comes the recession. States turn to deliver astronomical amounts to banks to support them. Private debt accumulated in the banks is transferred to the public. The states apply a huge cut of the expenses, dismissal of public employees, closure of public enterprises and privatization, to be the workers who pay the bill. This causes a further drop in the consumption capacity of the majority, what returns to stop the economic growth and create new recession looms, this time with the public coffers empty.

4. – The non imperialist countries: are they free of the crisis? The growth of some countries during these years of crisis can give the impression that they are not affected. However, it isn’t true, although the rhythms and situations are different.

On the one hand there is the case of China, whose great development is due to the relocation of low value-added production towards this country, to make use of its almost slave labor. This is especially so in the Yankee case: over 17% of North American manufacturing output has gone to Chinese soil, but in turn, that creates a dependent economy that must export most of its production back to the imperialist countries. Relying exclusively on exports, – 70% by foreign capital companies, largely American–, at a time of global crisis, Chinese government was obliged to reduce the value of the yuan to be more competitive. It was the "war of currencies" in mid-2010s that led the leftist currents to much confusion on USA-China discords. The USA and China relation on one hand is of interdependence, but on the other is clearly hierarchical, so that at the end of the "currency war" the Chinese capital ended being forced for the purchase of Yankee debt to the tune of 1,160 million dollars USA Treasury bonds, leaving China still more attached to the American future. China is the scapegoat of the USA’s crisis through the purchase of debt, meanwhile its economy already warns a slowdown 2012.

Another situation is the Latin American economies that had been growing in the recent years circumstantially, with significant tailwinds generated by Chinese and Asian expansion, high prices of strong demand to raw materials –soybeans, copper, oil ... – and low international interest rates.

In a third group there are the broad areas of the planet, which according to Chesnais, which are falling out of the globalized system –South Asia and Saharan Africa especially. In this zone, food speculation, especially with the reversal of speculative capital to the future markets of food in 2010-2011 –with a consequent increase in prices of commodities– has pushed crowds to famine: the most extreme case being Somalia in 2011-2012.

So, capitalism is global, as is the nature of this crisis, although with special effects in different regions.

5. - The way out of the crisis is a political problem that will be resolved only with class struggle: Capitalism requires a brutal destruction of capital in all its forms (factories, products, currencies, stocks and shares, workers) to recover the profit rate and return to the path of growth. The way out in the 30’s came only with the II World War : Europe destroyed, 60 million dead ... Shall the workers and peoples withstand the destruction to which leads the capitalist crisis? And for how long? That means, the first way out of crisis for imperialism is to wage new wars, meanwhile with plans to launch a massive destruction on wages, employment and public services. But it’s precisely this process that is bogged down in Iraq and Afghanistan, while on the second front the reaction starts working to stop the plans, especially in Europe, with Greece at the head. As a combination of the consequences of the crisis and the old oppression of dictatorships, revolutions broke out in North Africa and in the Middle East, destabilizing the imperialist’s control of this strategic area.

So, because the only way out of crisis is the class struggle, on the political scene the defense of the workers and peoples needs a policy of transitional slogans with the objective of ending this system, which needs to destruction of the productive forces, and replace it by its opposite, in which the man and the nature have the priority, i.e. socialism.

6. - The stage: we entered in the crisis of overproduction of 2008 with the initiative in the hands of the bourgeoisie. We are in the stage opened by the defeat of the workers’ movement in the political revolution in Poland, which was the key for the imperialist counteroffensive with the so-called globalization and the "neoliberal" policies launched in 81-82 by Reagan and Thatcher (the so-called 4th Stage). Neoliberal policies began with the dismantling of the welfare state and workers’ conquests in Western countries. At the same time, with the so-called globalization, imperialism began a brutal extraction of resources from the rest of the planet. But to understand the recovery period of the rate of benefit of the proceeding 30 years nearly, it must be added the immeasurable contribution of capitalist restoration in Russia and China, and that especially in China the state apparatus was kept intact, which allowed her to impose the whole restoration plan in a controlled manner. There is no doubt that the movements of Eastern Europe, (with the fall of the Berlin Wall) and Russia, the revolutionary processes in Latin America in the decade of 2000-2010 and the Afghan resistance and especially the Iraqi one, had been highlights of decisive battles that marked a revolutionary situation in those areas. And in some cases, the situation went beyond it. But there hadn’t been a victory or a defeat that could change the balance of forces in class struggle, that would oblige the definition of a new stage.

7. - The revolutions in North Africa and the Middle East can change the stage. An obvious characteristic of the process, which born in central Tunisia, has been its international expansion. It is one of the centers of the class struggle today. After Libya, the center of the revolutionary wave in North Africa and the Middle East is Syria.

At the head of the revolutionary movement is the youth, punished by unemployment and insecurity, but also because of the oppression and humiliation of the dictatorship and the budding democracy. These revolutionary processes have essentially a democratic content, and have destabilized the mechanisms of imperialist control of this area. We characterize the process as political revolutions which have overthrown dictators, but have not completed with destroying the old regimes. Also we don’t share the positions of those who characterize the process by stages, sustaining that for the time being the revolution must be a democratic one and later it may address the social and class aspects, nor of those who want to see in them already socialist aspects. The key of the progress of these revolutions lies in the link between social and democratic demands, regarding the need to create jobs and to end the misery. If there is no solution to the lack of jobs for youth, the democratic revolution will not be transformed into a social revolution, but will be more likely to have an involution to preserving essential parts of the old regime. Either the political revolution connects with social tasks or it’s in danger. This is the dilemma and our understanding of the process as part of the permanent revolution. The great problem of the revolutions in North Africa is that workers are struggling for democracy but are not fighting for socialism as their flag. And this limitation, together with the lack of revolutionary organizations (or their weakness), is threatening the revolutionary process in all these countries.

8. - Imperialism is relocated in the new scenario. Imperialism has supported dictatorships in North Africa and in the Middle East until the end. The UN decision to intervene in Libya was not to help the people, but to regain the political initiative in the area and create a firewall against the revolution (see Chapter V). In Syria the Syrian National Council (SNC) responds to the policy of imperialism. We reject the imperialist intervention in all its variants. Not all intervention of imperialism is armed as was in Libya. In Tunisia and Egypt the imperialism tries to stop the revolutionary process with elections that are giving the victory to Islamist parties, which are not going to break up the old regime totally. The plan of imperialism is the same in all countries: to prevent the deepening of the revolutionary process. And, when it is inevitable, it tries to control the regime’s changes with the objective of not changing the system

On the other hand, the peoples all through the zone have expressed their solidarity with the Palestinian struggle; the deepening of the revolutionary processes allows the revival of the Palestinian struggle against Israel. The strategic imperialist plan is to consolidate Israel, the true imperialist aircraft carrier in the area, as the only military power, for exercising direct control over ther regimes. That is why the Zionist government constantly calls for attacking against regimes like of Iraq or now of Iran. The struggle of the revolutionaries must be closing the ranks with the Palestinian people, for the dissolution of the Israeli Zionist state, for a unified, secular and democratic Palestine.

II. EUROPE IN THE CENTER OF THE STORM

9. – Europe vs. USA. It is not a coincidence that the global crisis that began in the United States is installed in Europe with particular virulence. United States has the military and financial hegemony. The dollar remains the currency of international exchange by force of marines, and this privileged position allows it to export part of its crisis. Given the need to resort to imperialist military intervention, the European imperialism still has a long way to go compared to Yankee gendarme capacity. Bretton Woods –1944– was the expression of that power at the end of II World War and establishing the dollar as currency, continued its dominance. It went bankrupt in 1971, when following the Vietnam War, USA declared the inconvertibility of the dollar into gold, although it reflected the blow received by Yankee imperialism, did not change its hegemonic character, and its currency remained the basis of world trade. Other countries continued buying dollars to their reserves, and therefore the value of the dollar was not only of American wealth but also of others. However, the only one that finds its value by issuing more bills, or devaluing is the Federal Reserve, thus each inflationist measure in USA is exported to other countries. Attempts to escape from this dependence were the attempts to shift the reserves into (like Venezuela), or create an oil market with that currency driven by Iran, but all these attempts failed and came the crisis with 2/3 of the world trade made in dollar. Only the sum of the dollar reserves of Germany, Italy and France jointly (603 trillion in 2011), would place them as the 3rd dollar holder, after China and Japan. So when the crisis began in USA, this quickly exported it to the other countries, devaluing their reserves. The effect was devastating in Japan, also joined the tsunami and the Fukushima nuclear accident, and in Europe was multiplied by the characteristics imposed by the financial capital to the European Union (EU).

10. Dollar and Euro. The other great weakness of the EU in its competition with USA for the world market is in the construction of a single market and a currency, without a state behind to protect it and impose it. The imposition of the Euro was of the Mark, we might say a "deuchmarkization", or by a comparison with the process in some Latin American countries, a dollarization in European style. But, in the absence of a state to protect the currency –by devaluation or revaluation as convenience– the Euro is a giant with clayish feet, a conglomerate of unequal, hierarchical and unstable economic and political relations that exploded under the effects of the capitalist crisis and speculative movements which gambled with these differences to get high returns.

II.a. The dominant role of Germany

11. - The fall of the Berlin Wall and the German reunification. The fall of the Berlin Wall in 89 put end to the post-war Europe, based in Potsdam and Yalta, in other words the division of Europe between the imperialism and the Stalinist bureaucracy, whose keystone and its nexus was the division of Germany and, with it, of the more numerous and powerful proletariat of Europe. The reunification of Germany, propelled by mass-movement, which was a step forward and coincides with the collapse of the Stalinist regimes in Eastern Europe, drew a new European reality. This, on the one hand, strengthened Germany as the central power, leaving France in the second place, and on the other, reunified the German working class once more. But this contradiction between a demand imposed by the masses but concretized by the bourgeoisie, marked the bourgeois character of the reunification.

12. The German "miracle". The German bourgeoisie led the reunification process and to proceeded to destroy the entire productive apparatus of the East: in 1994, of the 8500 public companies controlled by the Treuhand, there remained only 400 and 60% of its workers of which about 2.5 million were pushed into unemployment. This huge reserve army was used as internal pressure to push down the wages and working conditions, multiplying the profitability of the capital. Between 1997 and 2010 real wages fell 10% and hourly productivity grew by about 8%, resulting in an overall reduction of 25% in unit labor cost, with greater "flexibility of labor". In 2004, the SPD Government introduced Schröder’s "Hartz IV" laws, which limited the unemployment subsidy with one year and conditioning the social aid with the obligation to accept any employment with worst pays (down to 1 €/h), without regarding any qualification, the distance from house, ... In the deepest phase of the crisis (–4.7% of GDP in 2009) industrial firms didn’t reduce the number of employees, but the working hours, subsidized by the Public Employment Agency: it was a spur to increased partial contracts. So in 2011, while the number of permanent contracts felled, there was more than a million of temporary and partial day workers (dismissal without cost), the so-called the "jobs of 400 Euros." The temporary workers in 2012 were already 2.7 million. In the same year, the wage gap between men and women increased, reaching 23% less for women (in the Spanish state 16%, as the European average).

The situation of the poor is desperate. Seven million Germans, including three million unemployed, live with some form of subsidy. In late 2010 Merkel fixed it at 364 Euros. Those seven million are the new "reserve army" that keeps on pushing down the labor conditions.

That scenario, which was reached with the silent complicity of trade union leaders, is serving as a model for the current labor reforms in all countries. In some of them, with very high levels of unemployment –over 20% in the Spanish state– and in all of them with preferred victims: the immigrants –for example in the Spanish state immigrant unemployment is 30.4%– and the young people –21% European average and twice of this in the Spanish state.

13. - The strength of German’s banks: capital exportations based on the plus value created by the workers. After the reunification, Germany assumed a big economic cost with the Mark shift of 1x1 and it took almost ten years for her to digest it, during which it was a recipient of funds and credits. However, the brutal working conditions, described in the previous section, produced between 2000 and 2007 added benefits of 99,000 million Euros, and business and property income rose 7.7% annual compared to 1.1% increase in average wage. This accumulation of capital since 2001, became an export of capital of 270,000 million Euros in annual average directed to purely speculative destinations such as housing bubbles, and to promote evasion and unproductive investment; but also took the form of credits for the peripheral countries which allowed them to buy German products in an endless circle, and generate huge private debts –of the banks largely– that later nationalized by governments. The consequence is that German banks are now on the brink of the abyss and, to try to recover the capital they lent out, they impose criminal looting of the nations of which it had gained in recent years untold benefits.

14. Germany-France in the new UE. This process prompted a drastic change in the balance of power between France and Germany, with a direct impact on French political stability. A central element of the EU foundation agreement is the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), which came to absorb over 80% of the EU budget, and is funded by the money of industrial Germany militarily defeated in the war against the French agricultural bourgeoisie. After the reunification of Germany, that resized its potential and the huge costs that derivated, Germany demanded and start cutting of subsidies through the CAP. The consequences of the impoverishment of the petty bourgeoisie have a direct relationship with the construction process of the extreme right, but also have an impact on other classes. Another key element of the new correlation of forces was the German determination to proceed with a rapid expansion of the EU to Eastern Europe.

15.- The Merkel-Sarkozy binomial. For now France and Germany are the two decisive powers of the EU, within a new hierarchy in which Germany imposes its law. That led to so-called Merkozy. Today, European countries account for more than half of Germany’s foreign trade turnover and are the source of most imports, with France as the leading trading partner in both directions. But also, and primarily, Germany is the first creditor of the peripheral countries (568,600 millions Euros), followed by France (440,000 millions), Italy (96,400 millions), and in turn Spain being creditor of 127,600 millions (Portugal owes 99,800 millions to Spain). So what is "rescued" is the fictitious capital of the big European banks, mostly German and French second. This is the material basis of the binomial Merkel-Sarkozy. And it also reflects not only the hierarchy in the EU in terms of GDP, but also the correlation of class forces in each of the two countries –in recent years French working class being more militant, who didn’t permit the application of the plans as brutally as in Germany.

16. - Eastern Europe: From the German expansionism to the crisis and the entrance of the IMF. The EU enlargement to the East was a requirement of German multinationals which, starting from the privileged position of a reunified Germany with close relations with Eastern Europe, sought to take advantage of deals at bargain prices from mass privatizations and to choose the best sectors to relocate their industries, using the skilled and cheap workforce and proceeding to lower production costs for their companies. This was coupled with the German policy of capital exportation, and after a strong growth based on household debt, Eastern countries began to suffer the worst recession in Europe in late 2008 and 2009. Poland and the Czech Republic managed to get out of it and reached positive GDPs in 2010 and 2011, but the rest couldn’t. Some, with a variant of the housing crisis from massive loans granted to families at initially reduced interests in foreign currencies. In Hungary, the mortgage crisis combined with a huge increase in the deficit, public debt –72.9% of GDP– and a strong social resistance against privatization, particularly of health services.

The European Central Bank (UCB) cannot help the Euro zone states, but can do it beyond of its frontiers. So, UCB injects aid to the Eastern states so that they could pay their debts to Western banks, but although it increases the amount it isn’t enough. It imposes the "solution" of the IMF: G-20 tripled its resources to refloat under the guise of aid to the East. The counterpart of aid in 2008 and 2009 of the IMF, the EU and various banks in Hungary, Latvia, and then to Romania, was brutal. Hungary: privatizations, 2.5 percent decrease of GDP of public spending, 30% decrease of the salaries of public workers and freezing all other wages. Latvia: 20% decrease of the minimum wage, 10% of retirement, and 50% of teachers’ salaries and a third of health spending. Romania: commitment to 30% decrease in the wages in five years, firing off 100,000 employees, lower pensions and subsidies. Between March 2009 and March 2010, unemployment in Latvia increased from 14.3 to 22.3%, and GDP falled more than 20% in two years. In March 2012, the EU suspended the cohesion funds to Hungary for running excessive deficits and required new adjustment plans.

17. Between the control of the debt and the growth. This debate has been installed among the bourgeois sectors. It responds to the inter-bourgeois tensions about the distribution of resources –for productive sectors also requests of public funds as "stimulus to growth"– as well as a small relaxation in the pressure of debt that allows for some recovery in consumption. But it also implies a certain truce to avoid a direct clash of classes, in response to the mass resistance to restrictive policies. Regarding this social policy is the social democracy, with Hollande at the head, followed by the German Social Democracy (recent winner of partial elections) and industrial sectors. These sectors raise the flag of Obama and they are not limited by the social democracy, for some sectors of the bourgeoisies, like the Spanish one, try to release of the control objectives of the deficit. But let’s not be cheated: both policies are the two sides of the same coin with which imperialism tries to make workers pay for the crisis. Does anybody doubt who will pay the bills for the stimulus to production? In the name of development we are facing new projects of labor reform that further deteriorate the living conditions of workers.

II.b. The public debt crisis and bailouts

18. - The ECB, guarantor of the financial benefits. Most of the financing of the debt of states is done in a lucrative process. The European Central Bank lends money to the big banks with an interest rate of nearly 1% while speculative movements allow to place that money in loans to states to an interest of around 6% (in November it was as high as 14% for ten years and 20% for 3 years, for the Greek bonds). To obtain those big bank profits, the economies of the countries are drowned receiving loans up to the point that makes unpayable the debt terms. It is in this situation in which Germany, and with it the big German banks, followed at some distance by the French, require their governments’ guarantees in the collection of those juicy benefits. The so-called Fiscal Pact intended to give such guarantees, demanding constitutional reforms to force all governments to pay first the debt bill, imposing drastic restrictions on state spending and an attacking by law to wages, pensions and social expenditures.

19. - Greece, the weak link in the chain in the Euro zone. Bailouts. The chain of over-debting was broken at the weakest link and after a full-scale offensive of international finance capital. After austerity plans, came the threat of bankruptcy and the first "bailout". Its primary objective was not to help Greece to get out of this situation, but to prevent the bankruptcy of the big German and French banks that let credit to Greece. Debt is bleeding the country at a rate of 1 billion a week. One year after, the first bailout debt became higher, and the possibilities of paying dramatically got worse, unemployment soared, evictions increased, wages and pensions dropped.... The debt became even more unpayable. The troika (ECB, EU and IMF) provides strict control over Hellenic economic policy, in the IMF-WB mode in Latin America during the 90s. On 20 October 2010, the EU –according to the IMF– dictated the conditions for a second bailout. In January 2012, new conditions for another term with more adjustments and layoffs in exchange for a new refinancing plan...

20. - More money for banks: second bailout.
The 4,2 trillion Euro recognized by Barroso that the states surrendered to banks in the first bailout are indigestible for states. But not even that amount resolve the financial situation, which continues worsening. The bankruptcy of the Franco-Belgian bank Daxia announces the precarious state of banks’ health. At the October 27 summit of EU, 1 trillion Euros are put directly or indirectly to serve the recapitalization of the banks. The mechanisms are the usual ones: payments to third party bank debtors, increased capitalization requirements to be met by the fund ... and the debt crisis is approaching to the heart of Europe –the recent rise in the France risk premium is an alert. Plans after plans they try to contain the infection, while each of it proves insufficient. How that new trillion is going to be paid? With a new turn on the screw for the popular classes of Europe.

21. The bailout of Spanish banks. On June 9, the EU together with the ECB and the IMF approved a bailout for Spanish banks for 100 billon Euros. This is the direct target of the plan, that is, the funds are not going to be used to pay wages or pensions; however this is done with a credit to the state with a requirement of measures to ensure its return (reduction of public expenditures, salary reduction to public employees, VAT increase...). A new selective "bailout", i.e. more money for the banks, which the popular classes will have to return.

22. - The End of Euro? The offensive of the capital against the workers is not free from a strong internal conflict. Discussions are manifold: between France and Germany on the policy to be followed and the payment of the bill; between German banks and the ECB, with the resignation of the two German EU directors in protest for the intervention of the bank buying sovereign debt; between the German bourgeoisie and the peripheral bourgeoisies. In this context, some German banks sectors directly pose that it’s no longer possible to sustain the Euro, or that it would be preferable to leave the Euro, or to create a ‘secondary’ Euro for the peripheral economies hit by the debt crisis. They debate if the cost shared by the central states involved in purchasing debt from the ECB offsets the weakening of the Euro. There is no solution in the framework of "capitalist economy", the solution moves to the arena of class struggle: either the capital imposes the destruction of the working class and other popular classes, or these end with capitalism: that is the dilemma. There are fissures among the bourgeois sectors of the intervened countries, in response to the piece of the pie, but there is a class agreement to boost the whole package of measures against workers, that unify them above their differences.

II.c. Assault on labor and social conquests.

23. - An unprecedented offensive against the working class. Under the dictates of the banks and European institutions all European governments and employers have launched an unprecedented offensive to charge the crisis on workers. Companies engage cuts in staffs and salaries, with the complicity of governments and the passivity of the union leaderships. Governments cut wages of public workers, pensions, education and public health. Conquests of decades of struggle are melted in an instant. The living conditions of the working class regress. Evictions and poverty soar in Europe (in some countries already with 26%). Poverty, on the other hand, preys on women (62 million of the 110 Europeans who suffer it in 2012).

24. - Criminalization of immigration, Schengen ... and when that’s not enough, restoration of borders. The ‘Europe-Fortress’ guaranteed by Shengen has been the base for several European immigration laws, and their subsequent reforms, but their application made a big jumped with both the exacerbation of the crisis and migratory pressure as a result of the revolutions in North Africa and the fall of their old dictators who were serving EU as coastguards.

The immigration laws were the best labor reforms the states could implement without choking with labor aristocracy sectors represented by the trade unions. The huge workforce bags of illegal immigrants were the cannon fodder of the production sectors that could not be delocalized, –construction, agriculture, hotel industry…–, while representing an important reserve army that, jointly with legal immigrants who always try to keep their jobs in order not to loose their "legality", set the stage to worsen the working conditions and above all to divide the class, and even to inject racism and xenophobia in it. British strikes of early 2009 demanding "British jobs for British workers” were one of the clearest reflections.

Criminalizing the lacking of papers in 2008, Berlusconi accelerated the spiral of widespread persecution throughout the EU. Sarkozy further tightened the immigration law in 2010, after the illegal expulsion of Roman immigrants without criminal charge. In its reform he included extraditions and withdrawal of citizenship for those who, being non-French origin, commit crimes against authority: the deportations totaled to 28.000 that year and 33.000 the next. Each turn of the screw pushes to underground those who remain in the country, increasing exponentially their slavery and marginality, while they were among the first workers that suffered unemployment since the early years of the crisis –for example, in countries like Spain in construction, and among women, especially young women, enslaving and trafficking in prostitution for the sex industries increase.

But, in acute situations –and although Schengen itself provides its suspension, limiting the free movement within the EU– neither the laws turn to be sufficient and the borders strongly reborn. Facing the avalanche of Tunisian and Libyan immigrants to Lampedusa (Italy) during the revolutions in their countries, France demanded the suspension and revision of Schengen –thing that Sarkozy in his election campaign of March 2012 specified for the following year. Denmark went further and restored border controls.

25. - Dismantling of the "welfare state". The reconstruction of the bourgeois states after World War II needed dismantling of the armed mass movement that had faced the Nazi occupation in different countries. To do this it was essential the betrayal of the Communist Parties under orders of Stalin. He was responsible of the Yalta and Potsdam agreements that divided Europe, and especially Germany, and carried the Greek revolution to crush; and in the West, the CPs took charge of the disarmament. The bourgeoisie could reborn from its ashes but had to yield significant amounts of power to the parties and trade unions led by the Social Democrats and CPs. The weakness of the bourgeoisie and the rise of the postwar struggles –reinforced by the independence struggle of the colonies– were the basis of the so-called "welfare state". It was the postwar workers struggles that imposed a model by which two parts of the wages –the indirect and differed– were dedicated to the consolidation of a universal social system, to guarantee basic needs of the whole society: pensions, education, health, and social services. These conditions –drawn out from the bourgeoisie– by imposing high levels of welfare, made the next overproduction crisis to delay 20 years, until the 70s, and even to overcome it without falling into a crack spiral. But the profit rate continued dropping, and financial capital imposed neoliberal policies to governments from the early 80s on, which were intended to take off those two parts of the salary out of the hands of workers to increase the surplus value extracted from them. These were the attacks to privatize the pensions, health, education... searching for profits in those services.

With present crisis the attack goes beyond. The dismantling is now imperative for that money can go to cover foreign debts. So, to take away our indirect salary, they extend from the closure of services to the repayment of what we already paid –deepening privatization of health care with co-payment forms, increasing university and education fees... And to tear off our differed salary, unemployment subsidies and pensions are reduced, the retirement age is lengthened... By the deletion or privatization of the services, the bourgeoisie also carries on with the firing off public workers and reducing their wages, which also come from our indirect salary or, in some areas from our tax contributions –both direct [income tax] and indirect [VAT] taxes– that are increased also to pay brutal interests on the debt. And specific victims of these cuts are women, who assume unavoidably what is no longer offered by social services –soaring prices of kindergartens, lack of social services for dependents (that had never been complete), etc. In varying degrees and at different rates, these are the constants of the current cutting measures.

III. THE EUROPE OF THE CAPITAL AND THE DEMOCRATIC RIGHTS

III.a. Towards police states

26. - The EU, the Europe of the capital. The character of the EU as a tool of financial capital has been clearly demonstrated. The other problems of the economy, such as growth or unemployment, are relegated and are simply a bargaining chip to guarantee the benefits of big financial bosses. The differences in the construction of the European market between a periphery increasingly dependent and indebted to a center (Germany) that absorbed production and built a powerful financial system which acted as a lender to the periphery, lead to the breakup of Euro. In the light of the development of this crisis it’s seen that a European imperialism as such doesn’t exist, and it became obvious the existence, however, of an unquestionably hierarchy in which German imperialism imposes on the rest of the European imperialisms. Multinationals continue having a homeland, faced to the need to use political power to open markets or defend themselves from competitors: it is the Europe of the capital, in a no-quarter war against workers.

27. - The cession of sovereignty doesn’t weaken the essence of the states, but reinforces it. The Stability and Growth Agreement, the Agreement of Structural Reforms and the Euro Pact, with the willingness of the Commission and the Council of EU to impose them through their states to European citizenship, have once again put on the table the discussion of the cession of sovereignty. Some say that the so-called European Economic Governance (the realization of the three pacts) is "a real silent coup d’état" against national sovereignties, that stands in opposition "to the true democratic government of Economics, indispensable in re-conducting European construction". A seemingly opposite reasoning was Negri’s when he called affirmative vote in the French referendum on the European Constitution, valuing it as "positive to reduce the weight of the nation-states and increase the weight of Europe". Both positions are based on the assumption that cessions of sovereignty to the EU have a qualitative character weakening nation states. Not at all; all that cessions bind the states with the orders of the major multinationals that rid them off as much as possible from the vagaries of the class struggle of their country –even limiting them to put social palliative-, but are not qualitative changes in the role of the state. They not only allow the maintenance of the essence of the nation-state (“the battalion of armed men who maintain class domination”, said Engels), but also reinforce that essence in its most repressive and undemocratic features to crush the workers in each country. More EU is not less states, but more Bonapartist features in the states, and more brutality against their people to play their essential role as guarantors of the capital.

The EU is a front of states against the working class. And that front is not reformable, but it is essential to defeat it, in every state, and as the EU, as a totality – to build a Europe of workers and peoples.

28. - The EU has never had a democratic character, as demonstrated from its foundation with the role assigned to the European Parliament, in which only few things are treated. The center of the decisions, as a front of states that it is, is the European Council, which collects together the representatives of the member states. But even that structure needed to be strengthened to ensure the control of multinationals and financial capital. They proposed to impose the European Constitution, which was abandoned after the defeat in the referendums, particularly in France in 2005. The failure did stagger the EU itself. The makeup Constitution was presented without much pomp as the Lisbon Treaty. No government ventured to put it to a referendum, except where there was no choice as Ireland. Multinationals demanded its functionality to secure their interests in countries that may become unstable. Ireland, under a deep crisis in 2010, voted in favor, after repeating a referendum that rejected the text of Nice. When something does not go as they wish, they repeat it until it is imposed.

29. - Democracy is incompatible with capitalism in crisis. The mere mention of the word referendum in Greece trigger the alarm bells in the ECB, in governments and in all EU institutions. They rose accusations against Papandreou as unsupportive, irresponsible, incendiary ... all for the simple fact that a government put on the table the possibility that the people decide about an event most decisive in their lives: the response to the crisis. How come –roared European leaders– to ask the Greeks on whether they accept or not a second bailout? In the cradle of democracy it was a scandal giving the word to the people. Those who give lessons on democracy all over the world were terrified with the possibility that the people decide on whether the priority belongs to the markets or to the workers. What if that requirement was extended through the European Union? Papandreou was forced to retract the referendum and the Troika prepared an intervention to impose a "technocrat" government of Papademos with the condition of the support of the two major parties in the parliament. Capitalism and all its institutions fear from the voice of the people. We defend the right of people to decide their future!

30. - A new Bonapartism and the policy of "national unity". After Greece, Italy also came under the control and supervision of the Troika. The political crisis was isolating the Cavaglieri from its allies and was weakening the government, while rejection mobilizations were growing. This panorama was perfect to get juicy returns with speculative attacks on Italian public debt. Finally, after several interventions of the ECB buying Italian debt, Berlusconi was replaced by also "technocrat" Mario Monti. For the first time since Mussolini, not a single government minister was elected. However, after Monti, as after Papademos, the national unity endorsed in Parliament was imposed. The purpose of these two governments of former employees of Goldman Sachs, is to apply without delay the plans decided by the Troika. "Technocrat" governments try to rise itself above the political confrontation between the political parties and their electoral calculations, to serve the big capital, including Italian and Greek respectively. It’s a Bonapartism acting under pressure from the international financial capital and with the acceptance of the bourgeoisie. National sovereignty is questioned, as it was in Latin America under the foreign debt, but there is no questioning on the legal system on which the national state and its institutions base themselves, which would result in a more classic Bonapartism. A government that, in exacerbations of the class struggle, will strengthen its police content.

III.b. Reconstruction of the far right

31. - Far right reconstructs. That turn of the screw to impose capitalist decisions to workers is not the last resort. It rang in Greece, although very slightly, the possibility of a military intervention and during the days of the announcement of the referendum Papandreou reorganized the entire military high command. But where that possibility doesn’t exist or is not sufficient, the financial capital pushes and finances the recomposition of the far right in Europe. Fascism is the last bullet in the chamber of capitalism. During times of crisis, the polarization increases and the far right grows. In the 30s, Hitler achieved power in Germany after the Brüning government that applied drastic and unsuccessful austerity plans to take the country out of the Great Depression and which generated strong workers struggles. In the last election cycle in Europe, the far right has achieved its best results since the II World War, and in some countries (Austria, Hungary, Netherlands, Italy, Switzerland, Greece, Norway, Denmark) forms part of or conditions the government. With an anti-immigration, anti-Islamic, ultraliberal and ultranationalist discourse they attract the votes of petty bourgeoisie and working class sectors hit by the crisis.

32. - The fight against fascism. Last summer we have witnessed the most brutal fascist aggression that occurred in Europe in years. 84 young people participating in the Labour Party camp on the Utoya island, Oslo trade unions assets, were killed by a former militant of the far right Progress Party. The labor government treated him like a maniac and the courts are facing the process in the same direction, that even can save him from prison. Instead of calling to an antifascist front of trade unions and political leftwing organizations demanding, with a general strike, the investigation of the connections of the murderer with the state apparatus all remained in exhibitions of pain as if it were an unfortunate catastrophe. Much of the radical left has also attached any big importance to a fascist attack on organizations claiming of workers, therefore they magnify the indispensable confrontation with social democrat European leaderships, which leads to not having any policy to their rank and file that are still considered workers and with a strong influence in unions. We must deal the fight against fascism without sectarianism, but from an independent class policy in a wide front of political and labor organizations who claim of the working class and the people. It is a mistake to attempt to separate the democratic bourgeois parties from the far right, as happened in France when a part of the left called to vote for Chirac against Le Pen. They are not irreconcilable enemies, but complement each other, and, as happened in the 30s with the popular fronts, if necessary, democrats will finish up changing sides and preparing the way for fascism.

III.c. The national question

33. - The national question in Europe is at the root of many of the internal tensions of the present states and is an essential component of class struggle. We must return to the Marxist historical analysis to identify differences between remains of colonial enclaves, phenomena of segregation and non resolved problems involving national oppression, because the revolutionary policy depends on such characterizations.

Regarding the cases of legacies of colonial regime as Northern Ireland, the struggle for the reunification of Ireland excludes the right of self-determination (one of the main points of Good Friday Agreement), because in that case we would be recognizing the legality of the process of colonial occupation which it suffered. We stand for British retreat and Irish reunification. And just as we rose for the Falklands, or would do for Ceuta or Melilla (colonial enclaves of the Spanish state) or on the British Gibraltar, cases on which in no way self-determination can be accepted, we must demand their return to the country in which they are. Or, in the case of the French colonies overseas, what corresponds is the independence.

In relation to the policies of the bourgeoisie to provoke confrontation and division among workers as in the case of the Italian North League -bourgeois reactionary movement that seeks to deepen the differences with more impoverished southern Italy-, the denouncement must be permanent.

Another case is oppressed nations as in Euskadi, Catalonia, Scotland, Kurdistan... This is the national problem that Marxism deals with. As a democratic problem, unsolved under capitalism, surges the possibility of its transformation in transitional slogan against the existing state borders and therefore, objectively, questioning the regimes that support them. So, we are on the side of the oppressed nation against the oppressor and we stand for the right of self-determination. The leaderships of these movements, petty bourgeois or bourgeois, either don’t have that goal or will not defend accordingly the movement that they lead. Contrary to that, they will try to reconcile it with greater servility to growing Bonapartism, and will try to find a gap in the ”Europe of the Regions” without questioning current states. But we don’t define our position according to one or another leadership, but to the needs of the working class, that must lead the struggle and to drag behind itself the petty bourgeois sectors. So, our policy is to put the fight of the oppressed nation under the proletarian leadership and promote consequent struggle that combines self-determination right with confrontation with the states and their regimes. To carry the defense of the national problem to the workers and to their organizations (generally inclined to oppressor’s nationalism), defending the right of self-determination, while fighting non-classist positions and petty bourgeois and bourgeois nationalists leaderships –who are always inconsequent–, to join them in a single struggle against the state and the ruling regime, means rowing against the current. But on the other hand, to deny the national problem as current states do with their basis on oppressor nationalism, which is the dominant, is to let us to the current. That problem is central in the revolutionary programs for the countries in which it is present, as Trotsky said in 1936 referring to Spain. We are not for the position of the young Marx and Rosa Luxemburg who came to support annexations bringing down border posts in the name of internationalism. Our position is that of Lenin, which not only does not subordinates national question to class unity, but connects them dialectically, and not after the revolution but for here and now, even if it is a "peaceful" process of separation (position of Lenin before the secession of Norway from Sweden).

34. - The policy of imperialisms to channel national mobilizations is somewhat like "coffee for everybody" as happened during the ”Spanish Transition” that culminated in a multitude of autonomous communities dissolving the nations to maintain the state. Now, in the EU, its equivalent is the Europe of the Regions –in which also encourages competition to improve the advantages of multinationals and make labor force cheaper–, because bourgeoisie clearly needs to deal with this problem, but they do it, as they did it in Spain, with the aim of strengthening the states to hold the class struggle off. That is why the proposals from bourgeois and petty bourgeois nationalist parties are doomed to failure; they create expectations of solving the national problem under the”Europe of Regions” to avoid confronting the states. The only real solution is self-determination that invariably questions the states and this is the value this claim brings to the revolutionary struggle.

While they can, the policy of the states is to channel national claims, but when this is not sufficient, they pass to violence: Bosnia is still fresh in the memory, and the policy of the Spanish state, refusing to recognize Kosova, too. And since February 2008 till today the Turkish army is in a military campaign against the militias of the Workers Party of Kurdistan (PKK), suppressing peoples within Turkey’s borders as in northern Iraq, with the added goal of weakening the self-government of Iraqi Kurdistan.

III.d. The oppression of women

35. - The woman. The Church. Laicism. We have already noted the specific situation of working women in the economic context that working class is suffering. It is necessary to add gender violence, as a result of that context and of the patriarchal structure of society. In the EU, approximately 25% of women experience physical violence during adulthood, and between 700 and 900 die each year according to Eurostat in 2012 –and more than 10% are victims of sexual violence. However, the largest percentage figures of gender violence are not only the product of crisis –2007 data– nor of sexist educational models, and are given in Finland, Sweden and Germany, where between 40 and 50% of women have suffered it. So it is a phenomenon that has its roots in the dependence of women in a society based on patriarchal structure with a subordinate role to men.

Here we will delve into the cuts on women’s freedom that states are deepening when they increase undemocratic features and the far right influence grows over the governments. These regressions are based on ideological elements which usually settle in the reactionary and misogynist nature of the dominant religion. We had proof of this in the writing of the European Constitution, in which many Catholic countries defended that the "Christian heritage" of Europe was stated. Finally was written as "religious heritage", but the common goal was his utility as a source of segregation and marginalization of Islamism of the majority of immigrants. But whether one or the other, the woman is bargaining chip of religions founded on different degrees and variations of oppression. And our policy shall define in each case the defense of laicism from what, on its name, could be attacks on women of minorities –as the case of the decree against burkha in some municipalities of the Spanish state.

Among the European Christian religions, Catholic Church assunes a particular significance, with its Vatican state and the agreements and concordats with other states like Spain or Italy. Policies on abortion differ from state to state, but abortion is legal in most EU countries, with more restrictive policies in Catholic countries such as Ireland. In Portugal and Spain, it was legalized under some circumstances in recent years, but the return of the Popular Party government raises the possibility of cutting of rights that included a law, which in itself is insufficient because doesn’t guarantee attention of the public health system. Also from a Catholic perspective, abortion is illegal in Poland after 40 years of legality. In all cases it is obvious the denial of the right of women ton her own body and motherhood with the consequent control of procreation. But if there is one place where this fact is evident, even authorizing it in the name of laicism against Islam, is in Turkey, where abortion is legal from 1936 in case of risk to the mother or fetal malformation, and under circumstances similar to other European countries from 1983 –but with her husband’s consent if they are married. Defending the right of women on her body, the demand of breaking of ties between the state and religions –especially in Europe, the concordats like Spain has with the Holy See– and the struggle against patriarchy are constants of our policy.

IV. IMPERIALIST CHARACTER OF EU BOURGEOISIES

36. Military interventions according to accords and frictions with the world gendarme, the USA. Their incapacity to organize a common foreign policy made them to line up behind the USA both in their backyard –wars in Bosnia, Kosovo and bombardments of Belgrade- and at exterior –first war in the Persian Gulf, Afghanistan…-. The reality of the existing several bourgeoisies with their own states –and for that reason, competing imperialisms- which lies beneath their incapacity to unite interests, also made to appear differences with USA in a war like that of Iraq. What is at stake isn’t two distinct forms of power exercising –one belligerent and the other pacific-, but conflicting interests. Thus, Blair and Aznar aligned with Bush, with a common denominator around petroleum. The USA, in the service of petroleum companies Chevron-Texaco and Halliburton Corporation, was looking for Iraq oil reserves, also trying to desist OPEC –with its Algerian, Libyan, Iranian and Venezuelan components- to realize their transactions in Euro. For that end, she was ready to share the benefits with British Royal-Dutch Shell and give some crumb to Spanish Repsol. On the other hand France, whose Total-Fina-Elf company had treaties with Saddam for exploitations in northern Iraq, was distant to the invasion. However the German finance capital was more interested to give support to those who was betting for Euro in oil transactions, the currency with profound implications in her economy. This position was imposed to the industrial capital –especially of automotive- which worried for reductions in its exportations to the USA.

37. Imperialist accord before the North African revolutions. The old empires had left after them semi independent countries in which they were keeping on operating with plunders and massacres typical for each imperialism –while not at war between them. It wasn’t an easy road full of flowers for the predominance of the French Fruit Company, of the industrial holding Balloré –that owns from container terminals to plantations in 41 African countries-, of Bouygues group –public works, water, electricity-, of Total company in Nigeria; or of Areva -world leader in nuclear energy- with its uranium extractions in Niger. In defense of their interests they combined diplomacy with support to dictators, delivery of arms, mercenaries, etc… when not armies of several countries (French Turquoise Operation in the war between Tutsis and Hutus, or Perejil conflict on fishing treaties between Spain and Morocco).

However, after all the post-colonial period based on support given to dictatorial governments of Northern Africa according to bilateral treaties, facing the North African revolutions the old European imperialisms acted in the front line –except Germany. In the case of Ben Ali, the very morning when the dictator was preparing his suitcase to fly out, the French foreign minister was offering him armament to suppress the revolt “with efficiency”. But later, it was Sarkozy who headed in the first instant, with the collaboration of Great Britain and Italy, the call for a NATO intervention in Libya to relocate the imperialism in the unstoppable revolutionary process. Also he was the first government leader who recognized the NTC, and with Cameron, they were the first to step to Tripoli after the fall of Kaddafi. It isn’t a causality that the 75% of the Libyan crude go to Italy (by Italian Eni), to Germany (by Austrian OMV), to France (by Total) and to Spain (by Repsol).

38. The role of Turkey and moderate Islam as firewall. Not being an imperialist country, Turkey is converted into a sub-metropolis, key for the EU imperialist countries. The Turkish bourgeoisie, waiting for its incorporation in EU since a long time, assumes a new importance in its role as a firewall before the North African and Middle East revolutions. With its neoliberal Islamist government in power, tries to convert Turkey into a sub-metropolis in the region as boarder gendarme station of the USA and EU. The Islamists in power are the best allies of Zionist Israel against the Palestinian resistance, although and with frictions because of the Mavi Marmara incident, maybe reinforced by them before the peoples of the region. In Iraq and Lebanon they help the illegitimate pro-imperialist governments, they keep their troops in Afghanistan to help the imperialist occupation against the Afghan people, and also offer its support to Washington for a possible attack against Iran. All these clearly demonstrate the reactionary and pro-imperialist character of the AKP (Justice and Development Party in its Turkish abbreviation, the governing Islamist party) and the capacity of the Islamist parties to adapt to the necessities of the bourgeoisie that they represent.

The revolutionary process in Northern Africa and Middle East has put in power in Tunis and Egypt Islamist parties (Nahda and Muslim Brothers respectively) with the help of the respective armies, and of Turkey as a new political potency in the area, of course to try to stop the process in collaboration with imperialism. Their role is to try to stop collisions with imperialism, even when this means collisions with the unemployed youth, with the workers that live in misery and with the associations that demand punishment for those culpable for the repression.

39. The CSDP (European Common Security and Defense Policy); continuation of the financial and commercial policies, only for the coincidence of the interests. After the incorporation of Germany into the plundering of Africa starting with the increase of the price of primary goods and its policy of exporting of capitals, which gave a leap in investments, the EU set out in 2007 to propose free trade zones with African countries (EPA, Economic Partnership Agreement). In exchange, the “millionaire help for development” would be increased, which include the financing of the African Union (AU) troops, the return-deportation of the immigrants, and even so a calculated return of 3 Euros of importation from EU for each Euro inverted. Despite of the proposals “to bear the losses for the commercial liberalization” the AU in 2011 refused to sign the treaty, basing itself on the financing that offered the Chinese penetration. Also a similar try failed in Latin America and the Caribbean. In fact, the free trade zones that dispose EU is itself in extension.

Thus, there had been few realization of the CSDP, because the competence between imperialisms is above all considerations. These considerations in fact has coincided in missions in Congo, headed by France, Germany and Belgium, that prolonged until today with military (EUSEC) and political (EUPOL) advisors, also with the major mission of UNO –since 2003- of 20 thousand Blue Berets. In the beginning, defending their interests against Yankee interference, but from 2009 joining their forces to hold back the Chinese contracts with DRC for the extraction industry in Great Lakes. All these have the only aim of securing the continuity of the mine extraction companies: being companies of diamond extraction as British Anglo-America, or French LVMH –partner of South African De Beers, implicated in the bloody diamonds of Sierra Leone-; or German, British and Belgium companies for extraction of coltan mine; or British oil companies SOCO and Dominion, that wait for green light from DRC to perforate in Virunga Natural Park.

We can also say the same for the still in effect Atlanta Operation –started after the kidnapping of the Bask tuna fishing ship, Playa de Bakio, in 2008- headed by France and Spain, due to the importance of the fishing fleets that spoil the Somali’s seas. But the aim was more than that, towards the control of the trade traffic –and especially oil traffic- in the Strait of Ormuz, headed by US Navy; but it was a failed try which clearly showed that for an initial hypothetical mission there was no need an operation with that magnitude, but only to arm the fishing boats, with mercenaries as in the Spanish case or authorizing the military as in the French and Italian cases. The withdrawal of the Greek effectives in March 2012 left only a unique military ship in the operation. However, the military ascent to recuperate Africa for the Occidental interests has provoked its prorogation until 2014 and a change in the operation that for the first time in the history of the CSDP it’s openly admitted that it was a war, because it not only increased the effectives, but also endorsed –in accordance with Federal Transition Government in Mogadishu- air attacks to the “pirates’” land bases at 2 km deep into the costal line.

40. Keeping on with the plundering of Latin America. Without the imperialist role of Spain in Latin America it’s difficult to understand why the majority of the 35 companies of IBEX (Spanish stock market) were able to resist the downpour of the crisis. Between 37 and 45% of the benefits of 2010 of Telefonica, BBVA or Santander came from there. The same year Santander took the control of its Mexican subsidiary; Telefonica did the same with Brazilian Vivo; and the oil company Repsol announced inversions in more projects of hydrocarbon explorations in Brazil. Also Gas Natural Fenosa started gas business in Mexico… This important power of the Spanish multinationals –in the majority of the cases, thanks to their Latin American subsidiaries- determined the policy of the PSOE (Socialist Party) and also PP (Popular Party) governments. Thus, social democrat Solchaga was executive adviser of the Argentinean minister of economy Carvallo, who was the driving force of the “corralito” (freezing of bank accounts and forbidding withdrawals from US dollar-denominated accounts) which provoked the so called “Argentinazo”; Felipe González –adviser of Gas Natural Fenosa- intervened directly in the very beginning of the 2001 crisis, then leaving the task to Aznar, both to ensure the benefits of the Spanish companies. The PP government was seen implicated in the coup d’etat against Chavez after his oil policy. And in March of 2012, the industry and energy minister of the PP would go to Buenos Aires –a