union official or a works council? In the past few decades, the wage differential in Europe has grown enormously. One working hour in Scandinavia, Germany, Britain and France costs between €25 and €30; in Poland, €5; in the Baltic States and Slovakia, €4; and in Bulgaria, which entered the EU at the beginning of 2007, just €1.40.

This wage differential is to be found across a small geographical region. From the German capital of Berlin it is only 100 km to the Polish border and slightly more than 1,000 km to the Latvian capital of Riga. There exists a wage differential of over 90 percent over a distance of 1,000 km.

The widespread social decline has created conditions in which rightist political tendencies seek to stir up racism and wininfluence. In Italy, Spain and Germany, but particularly in Eastern Europe, there is a growing wave of violence directed against foreign workers and socially disadvantaged layers.

In the new Eastern European, members of the EU, former Stalinist bureaucrats, have cooperated with major Western companies to expropriate all former socialised property and accumulated outrageous fortunes, while the population sinks into mass poverty and increasing misery. Further attacks on democratic rights and pervasive corruption create conditions in which openly fascist forces are able to gain influence.

Socialist perspectives

The resistance against mass redundancies, plant closures and social pauperisation is increasing in all European countries. In Lithuania, Iceland and Belgium the economic crisis has already led to the fall of national governments.

The rebellion against the European Union and national governments requires, however, an international