Euro-ka!

[Chris Burford]

So the Euro has survived the first trading day stronger than it went in. A
perfect docking was achieved with the computers. No disasters occurred. The
French did not pull out on the grounds that Duisberg is staying in for a
full 8 years. The Euro crept up on modest trading from 1.17 to 1.18
dollars, and may go over 1.20 this year.  

Informed commentary emphasises how major central banks particularly those
of mainland and Taiwan China, plus major institutional investors will be
transferring funds over the coming months from the dollar to the euro. Plus
the successful transfer of European stocks to Euro quotations, coupled with
the link up between London and Frankfurt stock exchanges suggests further
gains to come. The strengthening of the Euro means a relative fall in the
exchange value of the pound such that sterling entry comes to look much
more realistic. 

The only criticism of my post of 1.1.98 was a typical one from Louis
Proyect. At first I found it very funny, but on reflection it would be
unwise to assume that LP has changed from his usual style, and to let him
get away with another arrogant and contemptuous dismissal of something he
does not understand. In my experience this only lays the ground for a worse
personal and sectarian attack later. Plus a small number of other
subscribers who orientate themselves around a sort of pecking order on
lists, rather than rigorous argument, who move in to attack later.

It also leads to others amplifying the diversion of the argument into
something more trivial, as Sam Pawlett did. 

So to punish LP, let us assume that he had made his criticism in a direct
and open manner: that I was unreasonable to see capitalism as a solution to
war.


At 09:54 01/01/99 -0500, Louis Proyect wrote:

>Chris Buford:
>>This is a tremendously progressive development, unprecedented in human
>>history. It is all the more important for putting an end to centuries,
>>millenia, of appalling tribal bloodshed in this corner of the Eurasian land
>>mass.
>
>A good point. We should recall that WWI started because the assassin of the
>Archduke of Herzegovena complained about how pissed off he was when he had
>to change zlotys into mjergs everytime he crossed borders to go to work. To
>really find out about this very important but neglected explanation for the
>cause of WWI, I recommend the article, "Currency conflicts: a heuristic to
>the first Imperialst War," contained in the Autumn, 1991 Journal of Marxist
>Studies on Eastern European Currency. The author, Hukkalaka Meshabob, was
>an important leader of the Trotskyist current in Bulgaria that was loyal to
>Juan Posadas, the Argentinian leader who believed that UFOs were proof that
>communism existed on other planets.


Now it is more generally argued by people in the marxist tradition that
capitalism leads to war, and in particular Lenin argued this of the highest
stage of capitalism, imperialism. LP on the face of it may have a much more
reasonable case than his snide and contemptuous criticism implies. 

LP suggests it is ridiculous to assume that the Serbian assassin of
Archduke Ferdinand of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, was irritated by having
to convert currency when crossing internal borders.

Not at all. While I am sure neither of us know the fine detail of what
coins were in circulation where in 1914, the broad picture remains clear,
and the marxist interpretation of the link between nationalism and the rise
of the bourgeois nation state is also clear.

I have an advantage in having visited both Cologne and Vienna last year.
While the relationship between economic base and superstructure has to be
interpreted carefully in marxist analysis, the broad picture is vivid.
Cologne is dominated by its Cathedral. But what is not known is that for
much of the modern era, it was without its famous spires. The prosperity of
the early half of the middle ages ran out. The newer, grander building,
started in 1248 was left still half finished in 1560. Who completed it? The
Prussians, drawing on the wealth of the capitalist revolution in the
Rhineland provinces it won at the Treaty of Vienna in 1815. And next to the
Cathedral is, (what could be more appropriate in its sublime ideological
message?) the railway, and the main station. And that magnificent railway
runs across the Rhine, to the flanks of the gothic cathedral over the
mighty Hohenzollern bridge coming from the east, from Berlin and Prussia,
and flanked at both ends by a pair of mighty statues of Prussian cavalry.
This celebration of Rhineland exuberance and Prussian dourness, was paid
for by rising German capital, the real heroes of the architecture. 

Vienna has nothing to compare in its central structures by way of such a
celebration of rising industrial capital. And with good reason. Prussia
defeated Austria in the decisive war of 1866 not so much for the soul of
the German speaking peoples, as for their capital. And the Prussian
unification of Germany was crucially dependent on the extension of the
Zollverein, the customs union, to the whole of Germany. 

This is what the dry marxist theory means about how the bourgeoisie in its
rising era, forges nations out of its quest to capture the national market. 

Where did that leave Austria? Austria needed to keep a large market but it
had no national basis for doing so. The later 19th century was one of
tortuous compromises in order to keep it together, most notably the
convention that it became the Austro-Hungarian Empire, with the monarch
Emperor of Austria but King of Hungary. The kitschly tragic royal family
was both k and k: kaiserlich und koeniglich and all the tradespeople who
were so profoundly grateful for their royal favours stamped k.u.k. on their
names. 

So when the Serbs wanten their own nation state that was disastrous for the
aspirations of capitalism for a large market. It was worth fighting over.
The assassin of Archduke Ferdinand was not objecting to border tariffs, he
was expressing a Serbian national identiry that objectively in economic
terms was for the development of Serbian capitalism, within its own tariff
area, separate if necessary from Austian capitalism 

The Irish rising achieved the same goal in the 26 counties of the Republic
under de Valera Republicanism.

What has happened now that makes it serious to argue that capitalism has
brought the prospect of peace to western Europe? It is that monopoly
capitalism has become transnational capitalism. It has gone far beyond the
bounds of a single national state. 

Schuman and Monet saw this economic basis in their plans for the precursor
of the European Union, the European Iron and Steel Confederation, between
France and Germany. It was specifically designed to make further war
between the historic foes impossible, or at least very unlikely. It has
succeeded. 

Now almost fifty years later, capitalism has so broken out of national
boundaries that 11 countries have come together on the same day to merge
their currencies. So much so that in the "British" Isles, the partially
aborted national liberation struggle of the Irish which has cost 3 1/2
thousand lives in the last 30 years, can be transcended by a framework
where both sides are in the European Union. And where Scotland can become
independent constitutionally from England with hardly a fist raised,
because it would not be constitutionally independent of transnational
capital. And where it is no problem if Czecho-slovakia has a velvet
divorce, because provided both parts play by the capitalist rules, they
will come together again in the super-national-market that was historically
premature in the last days of the Hapsburgs. Likewise, ETA is negotiating
in Spain. A "Europe of the Regions" is now a possibility because of the
development of capitalism. 

No doubt serious historians could take issue with some of the details, but
broadly this is a materialist historical analysis. If LP wants to make
contemptuous jokes about flying saucers, the laugh is on him.

Chris Burford

London.