As far as the prospects of a pan-European revolt, or rather lack thereof, is concerned, I think it has less to do with the nature of the European state, but more to do with "civil society" or a wide array of intermediary institutions that link collective interests. They offer a much better prospect of bringing political change desired by a particular group of actors and at a much lower cost than a revolt. That is why revolts occurred only in countries that lacked these mediating structures, as aptly observed by Trotsky and Gramsci.
Wojtek
On Sun, May 16, 2010 at 4:54 PM, Somebody Somebody <philos_case at yahoo.com>wrote:
> James: Nothing short of a European-wide revolt will overthrow this
> malignant
> dictatorship (which, for reasons I can't fathom, the 'Weekly Worker'
> seems to view with too much affection).
>
> Somebody: Has there ever been a European-wide revolt in history? Not in
> 1789 nor during the French Revolutionary War, nor in the Napoleonic Wars, or
> in 1830, 1848, or 1871. The Russian Revolution sparked failed revolts in
> Hungary and parts of Germany. The end of the Second World War produced
> similarly patchy left-wing upsurges, that in Greece, France, and Italy were
> put down with Soviet compliance.
>
> Considering how ill-suited the Westphalian system of nation-states has been
> to spreading revolutions, why not support an even stronger European Union?
> It amuses me that as soon as the capitalists become better internationalists
> than Marxists ever were, the progressive content of international union
> suddenly dissolves. The EU is what the Soviet Union *should* have done, if
> it really had any progressive claim whatsoever.
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