Ukraine’s Sickness and Europe’s Cure: Neo-Liberalism and Neo-Fascism Join Hands
The situation in Ukraine is evolving by the
hour. Right wing ultranationalists and their “liberal” collaborators
have taken control of the Rada (Ukrainian parliament) and deposed the
democratically elected, though utterly corrupt and incompetent,
President Yanukovich.
Former Prime Minister, and convicted criminal,
Yulia Tymoshenko has been freed, and is now making common cause with
Noe-Nazi Right Sector, Svoboda, and other fascist elements, while the
opposition’s nominal leaders such as Arseny Yatsenyuk and Vitali
Klitschko begin to fade into the background.
In Moscow, Russian President Vladimir Putin
undoubtedly watches with anxiousness. In Washington, Victoria Nuland
and the Obama administration rejoice. However, perhaps the most
critical development of all is soon to emerge in Europe, as the forces
of Western finance capital prepare to welcome Ukraine into the fold.
They will come bearing the usual neoliberal gifts: austerity and
“economic liberalization.”
With the overthrow of the Yanukovich government,
the $15 billion of promised Russian financial assistance to Ukraine is
in doubt. According to Moody’s
rating agency, “Ukraine will require $24 billion to cover a budget
deficit, debt repayments, natural gas bills and pension support just in
2014.” Without Moscow’s continued bond purchasing and other forms of
financial aid, and with pro-EU forces taking control of the country’s
economic and foreign policy, the outcome is not hard to predict: a
rescue package from Europe and the IMF with all the usual austerity
conditions attached.
In exchange for European “aid”, Ukraine will be
forced to accept the driving down of wages, significant cuts to the
public sector and social services, in addition to a rise in taxes on the
working class and slashing of pensions. Moreover, the country will be
compelled to accede to a liberalization program that will allow Europe
to dump goods into the Ukrainian market, deregulation and the further
opening up the country’s financial sector to predatory speculation and
privatization.
It doesn’t take psychic powers to predict these
developments. One merely has to look at the wave of austerity in
European countries such as Greece and Cyprus. Furthermore, Eastern
European countries with similar economic and historical conditions to
Ukraine – Latvia and Slovenia specifically – provide a roadmap for what
Ukraine should expect.