I do not think that we disagree much on this issue, albeit I think you overestimate the power of business in EU. Yes, they are making inroads, because globalization gavet them upper hand over labor. But follow the money trail. In most EU countries, social welfare expenditure are still 25 - 30 percent of the GDP (in Scandinavia even more), while in the US - it is only about 16%. So let's talk about neo-liberal taking over EU when this percentage does down to the US level.
> I don't understand why you like to insult straw men so often. Do you
> think that anyone on lbo-talk fits this model of having no concept of
> the collective and the public good, being incapable of seeing the
> forest among the trees, and thus fancying himself or herself with
> illusions of individualism?
I think some people do - they are individualists and they hate big institutions, albeit they believe that individuals can create "just" order ex nihilo by sheer power of their will as soon as the current institutions are smashed into pieces. I think that most Americans believe in that tripe, and ideological differences are merely different seat arrangements on the deck of the Titanic. Normally, I find it silly and do not pay much attention to it, but from time I find it mildly irritating and depressing. Hence the straw men insulting.
>
> The whole issue of the "public good" is problematic. Who determines
> what it is?
Oh, I think neoclassicals worked that out pretty well. It is the goods whose consumption is non-excludable and non-rival i.e. ones that are available to everyone regardless of his ability or willingness to pay (say, unpolluted environment) and ones whose consumption by one person does not diminish the utility of another. So far, so good. Where the neo-classcials lost their way is their belief that non-excludability and non-rivalry is the function of the property of the good itself or technological limits of its distribution system, rather than conscious political choices. Stated differently, they believe that goods are public because they are non-excludable and non-rival (by nature), whereas I would argue that the opposite is true. Goods are non-excludable and non-rival because they were made public by the authority that oversees their distribution. This, I believe is also consistent with the Marxist position, no?
Wojtek