Please Tell Me That Europe Isn't Morphing Into Capitalism

[Mr. Ected]

I overheard Sean Hannity say it just a few moments ago. I suspect it has something to do with more conservative politicians winning seats in the recent elections there.

He said "As Europe moves towards capitalism, America continues to become more socialist".

If Hannity says it, it must be full of shit.

But not fully understanding the impact of conservative politicians on EU governance, I don't know how to respond.

Can anybody help me with European politics 101?

[Oregone]

1. Even in healthy mixed markets, there is always a pendulum that swings through some range

Making calls on recent trends does little to understand the overall structure or movement of the countries' economy

[magellan]

2. Overall, Europe is moving more to the right just like we are.

On edit: I didn't write my subject line very well, lol. My meaning was it's BS that we're moving toward socialism. Both Europe and the US are creeping ever rightward towards more free market capitalism.

[tocqueville]

7. on the contrary there is a convergence

between Obama's policies and European ones. But the US is still light years from European conservative regulated capitalism, what we call here social-liberalism (liberalism in the sense of free market oriented)or social-democracy (more state interventionist). All this has nothing to do with socialism, which is collective ownership of means of production by the state. This latest model has failed everywhere except in North Korea and Cuba.

[paulsby]

24. it HAS certainly failed in korea

the country hasn't imploded yet, but they are about as disfunctional and non-productive as you can get.

[tocqueville]

3. see my answers in this thread

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=5803852&mesg_id=5806583

Europe has always been capitalistic and Hannity is full of it. The difference is that Europe has a more regulated capitalism, and it's because conservatives have been good at it lately that they win votes.

[muriel_volestrangler]

4. The results of national elections are more significant than the European Parliament ones

And, in those terms, the drift to the right happened started some time ago. The centre-right under Merkel is the senior partner in the governing coalition; Sarkozy, like Chirac, is centre-right, but probably further right, economically, than Chirac was; Berlusconi, who is robber capitalism incarnate (let's remember a lawyer has just been convicted of taking bribes from Berlusconi, but Berlusconi has immunity from giving the bribe, because he's PM at the moment); the British government is nominally Labour, but by far the most pro-unregulated capitalism 'left wing' party any country has ever seen - and they are certain to lose an election within a year to the centre-right Conservatives; and the Polish government is centre-right too. The only truly centre-left government in the big European countries is in Spain.

Capitalism was defined in Europe. Modern banking, stock markets, national banks, the industrial revolution, all originated here. It's a bit late to say Europe is morphing into it.

[Joe Chi Minh]

8. I don't think the Tories have a dog's chance. People know they'll crucify

them if they get in, making savage cuts into the social welfare.

Brown, for all his faults, has at least pledged, perhaps already initiated, programmes to protect those who do not belong to the "monied" classes. These election results have hardly suggested massive Tory support among the electorate.

[muriel_volestrangler]

11. The county and European elections don't give you a bit of a pause for thought?

Even if you don't believe all the opinion polls, which have agreed for ages that the Tories will get an absolute majority, how about Labour nearly wiped out in county councils? No longer the largest party in their 'strongholds' of Wales and Scotland? Labour getting fewer votes than the Greens in South West and South East England? Fewer than the Cornish nationalists in Cornwall?

Labour now control no English county councils at all. At the end of the 2008 local elections, they controlled just 18 of the 159 councils contested. All they have left is Westminster. And they're massively unpopular there too.

[Selatius]

13. I think Labor shifted too far to the right and alienated its loyal voters.

Might explain why they only control 18 out of 159 councils. Honestly, the party appears to be adrift.

[Joe Chi Minh]

29. I might agree with you, but for the fact that Brown has set out his stall

regarding maintaining public services, rather than cutting them. Cameron could not but proclaim the opposite.

I wouldn't pay to much attention to non-general elections. It's customary to express extreme disapproval with the Government of the day - particularly NuLab, who have been so crass self-serving and just vile. Cameron has already promised to crucify the public (who have already experienced their Via Dolorosa and scourging by NuLab) by cutting public services, the very hallmark of the Tories, in any case.

Personally, I doubt very much that the public are naive enough to vote for the small parties in the next general election. When PR comes, a different matter all together, of course.

[Joe Chi Minh]

30. We'll see. I'm totally unimpressed by the results of the local elections orthe European ones.

Tories didn't exactly star.

I didn't vote for NuLab in them, either. Nor will I, in the general election, because of their attack on the Catholic Church re adoption.

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

25. People are sick of New Labour.

A lot of disaffected New Labour supporters will probably jump ship to the Lib Dems or smaller parties in the next election, but plenty of them will go over to the Conservatives, and I doubt that the Lib Dems and Labour together will be able to pull together a coalition, even if they wanted to (which they don't) and even if it was possible (which it probably won't be.) It's a bad situation on all fronts.

[Bigmack]

5. They'll be SORRY...

Just look at how Capitalism worked for us lately.

[asteroid2003QQ47]

6. Capitalism doesn't "morph" it metastasizes! n/t

[cali]

9. seriously? most countries in Europe are more capitalist in nature than

socialist. I'm flabberghasted that anyone here doesn't know that.

[Mr. Ected]

12. Flabbergasted? As if comparative international economics is DU 101 remedial material?

I know that Europeans have a social-market economy. I know that they boast universal health care, a system of free education and generous social security. I know that the European brand of capitalism is more highly regulated than our own.

The problem is equating a social-market economy with socialism. That's the misnomer, one that many of us make.

[Enrique]

10. that morphing was completed c. 1991 n/t

[mwooldri]

14. The recent EU elections as far as the UK are concerned are more protest vote.

The extreme far right racist British National Party got two MEPs elected. The UK Independence Party maintained their strong showing, despite their non-existence at Westminster.

From what I know about EU politics, more power seems to reside with the Commissioners than the Parliament, because the Commissioners get to decide what gets brought before Parliament to debate. They got to pass it and then in some cases the member states themselves.

[anonymous171]

15. lol Europe is socialist?

:rofl:

[and-justice-for-all]

18. Well, they are in some respects...

not 100% socialized, but the have a broader socialized system. From their Education system to their Health Care.

Most people have no idea what they are talking about when they say Socialism; EU is not really socialized, it still has plenty of capitalism. The EU balances the two very well and not one EU citizen would trade their UHC for our shitty health care.

[Selatius]

20. Tell that to the Dutch. They actually privatized their health care system.

Europe is slowly shifting to the right, but opposition on the left is heavy, but the thing is, no amount of opposition replaces the power to legislate a law. Left leaning parties really need to control enough seats to write and pass the legislation. Otherwise, they will always be on the defensive.

[and-justice-for-all]

22. The privatizing of health care is national suicide IMO..

I cant believe they did that, that's terrible. Why did they do it?

Private Health Care is a death sentence for a majority of a population.

[Selatius]

23. They elected a right wing government into power.

At the time, the Dutch government was having trouble keeping costs down, but when the right wingers came into power, their proposition was that people were riding the system too heavily. They built in a series of disincentives to seek care. Mainly, they shifted people over into the private sector because they knew for-profit corporations would be punitive to people who were, in their eyes, "abusing" the system. As part of the reform, they included a mandate that everybody must have health insurance except for people who are poor. Then, the government will still cover you. Everybody is required to get at least the basic package, but anything beyond that is at the discretion of your insurer. If they deem you too high of a risk, you probably will not get anything more than the basic package.

[Joe Chi Minh]

33. The atheists who took over the left at an early juncture in the UK, are

totally lacking in common sense, so that while people are denied expensive drugs for cancer, money is being spent on cosmetic surgery, "in vitro" fertilisation, etc. Life-style enhancements, for crying out loud.

Of course, people who are disfigured should, indeed, be treated under the NHS, but our NHS seems to look at our legal system as sme kind of role model. Not only common sense, but justice go out of the window, so that millionnaires can get legal aid. Murderers and rapists are allowed to sue the government on all sorts of unbelievable grounds. While the European Parliament, also strongly atheist, has been responsible for checking some of the excesses of our predatory right, they are also responsible for that sort of nonsense. Of course, prisons should be humanely run, and offending staff severely punished, but the pendulum has swung to absurd extremes not only in the penal system.

This cretinous misuse of the funds appropriated for medical purposes just gives right-wingers fuel for attacks on a civilised tax-payer-funded health service. The bulk of taxes comes from the rich and the better off, even though the poorer folk, so ruthlessly exploited by business and industry, can ill-afford to pay ANY tax.

[Hannah Bell]

26. so are the swedes....

http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=2443216

[Cessna Invesco Palin]

16. Most of the conservatives who won in Europe did so on an anti-immigration platform...

...not an economic platform.

[tocqueville]

35. it's simply not true

even if they say that the question of Turkey is not "actual" it hasn't been a major part of the debate with exceptions in small countries.

[and-justice-for-all]

17. Their citizens are not going to allow for much deveation from what works..

they simply will not tolerate it.

[Greyhound]

19. Don't worry too much, in addition to the points already listed, it is largely

a matter of definitions.

Our conservatives and their conservatives have little in common beyond the label, just as our conservatives bear little resemblance to our conservatives of 40 years ago.

People there are really pissed, more so than here, and it seems to be a result of the "just get rid of them all" vote.

[Hannah Bell]

27. "get rid of them all" = the number one political sentiment among my

acquaintances who aren't political junkies.

[Unvanguard]

21. The thing is, while the conservative parties gained seats

the conservative parties in places like France are actually much less bent upon neoliberal economic reform than they were pre-crisis.

The shift has more to do with the long-standing policy and ideological weakness of the European moderate left, which does not quite know where it stands--never a good impression to give in the midst of severe economic trouble.

[Heidi]

28. "Socialist" is the worst thing that asshat can think of? Is "capitalist" the best thing he can say?

I've lived in Central Europe for a decade; it's decidedly capitalist. However, capitalism does necessarily not preclude social responsibility.

[Ganja Ninja]

31. I suspect that Europe's turn to the right has a lot more to do with racism

than any great love for capitalism. Hannity is a clueless shill selling GOP talking points. GOP talking points = bald faced lies.

[tocqueville]

34. xenophobic populist parties

are not the main factor in the increase of the "right". They are a local phenomenon and a lot of their support is often not the xenophobic part, but protest votes. When commentators talk about an increase of the right (and they mean the classic non-xenophobic conservatives), it's because "socialist" voters have either reported their votes to social-conservatives or the green, thus making socialists lose seats. Besides the vote has never been a choice between "capitalism" and "socialism". People vote primarily on a national basis et they'll support the lists that represent best their national affinities. In countries where the sitting government like the conservatives in Greece have screwed up big, they will vote primarily socialist, but if it's the contrary in another country they will vote conservative.

[MellowDem]

32. Europe is a mixed economy

just like the US. It's not all one or the other, but I doubt Hannity has the mental capacity to realize that.

[New Dawn]

36. Europe already is capitalist.

Socialism is public ownership of the means of production and distribution. About all that is owned publicly in Western Europe is their healthcare system. Europe just has a regulated (Keynesian) capitalist system.