In 1915 Lenin said that a capitalist United States of Europe was neither attainable nor desirable. After the October Revolution of 1917 communists generally believed that the modern nation-states in the European heartlands of imperialism represented the highest form of capitalist society in Europe and that socialism would inevitably follow. Now, following the counter-revolutions in the Soviet Union and the people’s democracies of eastern Europe, we can see that a European Union is plainly attainable though it is clearly as undesirable for working people as it was in Lenin’s day.

The question of “attainability” merits serious study. The problems in building a single state in a continent long divided into nation-states and lacking a common language, religion or culture are immense. But the building of a new European state, like the Roman Empire that was built on the destruction of older nations and tribes, has proceeded since the Treaty of Rome was signed in 1957.

If a “United States of Europe” is, indeed, feasible and attainable, given the support of Franco-German imperialism and the dominant trends within the rest of the European bourgeoisie, then the defence of the nation-state and national bourgeois parliaments by some left social-democratic anti-EU forces is futile and ultimately counter-productive.

Despite the establishment of a common currency and a customs union the question of the “super-state” is regularly ignored by British Europhile labour leaders and bourgeois politicians who never publicly talk about the real purpose of the Treaty of Rome, which is to build a new European super-state.

Communists, therefore, have a crucial role to play by raising the principled objections of the working class to the European Union and raising the demand for people’s democracy and working class power.

The development of the EU was the choice of European imperialism and western European monopoly capital. It promotes neo-liberal measures favouring the monopolies and the concentration and accumulation of capital. It cannot represent a genuine counterweight to the United States in favour of the people. With the Lisbon Treaty, new steps are being taken towards the configuration of the EU as an imperialist, economic, political and military bloc, contrary to the interests of the workers and the people.

The majority of the leaders of our unions have elevated the EU as an instrument for social progress and economic advance. They say that the EU is becoming more representative through the authority of the European Parliament and establishment of regional autonomy. The social-democrats claim that the anti-working class “directives” and “rulings” can be reversed. The revisionist and left social-democratic circles that still pose as communists in some parts of Europe argue that the EU can be reformed to serve the interests of working people.

The bitter campaign over the EU during the British referendum in June
reflected the deep divisions within the British ruling class. Both sides appealed to the working class for support on the day. But the level of debate barely rose above the gutter, with the “Remain” camp resorting to “Project Fear” scare stories of mass unemployment, high taxes and even world war if Britain left; whilst the “Brexiteers” relied on anti-immigrant hysteria and the supposed threat to national security posed by continued EU membership. The principled working class opposition to the EU was barely been heard above the roar of the bourgeois media that sought to limit the discussion to the confines set by the bourgeoisie themselves.

The New Communist Party of Britain opposed the European Union and the Treaty of Rome from the very beginning when our Party was founded in 1977. Since then we have seen the labour movement as a whole succumb to the baleful influence of EU propaganda throughout the whole spectrum of social-democracy within the Labour Party and the Trotskyist sects beyond it. The anti-EU campaign has consequently been dominated by the arguments of far right and racist movements, which concentrate solely on immigration and the defence of the bogus sovereignty of the Westminster parliament.

The ruling classes of Europe are determined to put the entire burden of the slump on the backs of working people. They have already slashed state welfare, pensions and social provision while driving down wages through social dumping. Major issues that concern the working class like the artificially high price of food, arbitrary taxation, anti-union laws and the total lack of transparency, democratic control and accountability are all ignored by the social-democrats of all persuasions.

For years the British Labour Party and the majority of the leaders of our unions have elevated the EU as an instrument for social progress and economic advance. They say that the EU is becoming more representative through the authority of the European Parliament and establishment of regional autonomy. The social-democrats claim that the anti-working class “directives” and “rulings” can be reversed. The revisionist and left social-democratic circles that still pose as communists in some parts of Europe argue that the EU can be reformed to serve the interests of working people.

But the European Union is designed solely for the benefit of the oppressors and exploiters. What few benefits the EU has brought, such as increased trade and open borders, could all have been achieved through separate agreements and treaties.

The new Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn, and most of his supporters still talk about a future “Social Europe” and that “Another Europe is possible” — the line of most of the left social-democrats, Trotskyists and revisionists inside the EU. Another Europe is indeed possible — but not within the EU.

The European Union is neither genuinely federal nor democratic and every stage of European integration has been financed by working people through higher indirect taxes, lost jobs and lost benefits. The European Union cannot be reformed. It must be dissolved and the Treaty of Rome, which established the Common Market in the first place, and all addenda repealed.

Andy Brooks, General Secretary
New Communist Party of Britain
PO Box 73
London SW11 2PQ
Britain

Tel: 020.7223.4052
Email: party@ncp.clara.net