Domestic and international economic changes. Embarrassing correspondences

The breakdown of the socialist regimes of the east European countries has been incredibly fast. The subsequent changes in the international setting may imply much slower processes. Unified Germany is building up a vast area of influence ranging from the Baltic to the Adriatic sea. The former Moslem republics of the Soviet Union may fall instead under the influence of Turkey, supported by the USA. The presence of the USA in the Middle East and the American influence over Israel, Saudi Arabia, and possibly Iran, might help to build up a huge Moslem area controlled by the USA. This implies questioning the pre-existing national borderlines, a problem in which ethnic conflicts seem to be playing a role. The three great economic areas of the world exhibit a common tendency to become three strongly protected commercial areas. In the domestic structures of the main capitalist countries very similar changes are taking place: a general fall in the ideals of social justice, replaced by the ideology of individual effort and efficiency; a decline in the belief that any individual should be protected from the cradle to the grave, a belief replaced by the ideal of a scoiety made up of self-made men; a decline in the supply of schooling services, health care, old-age pensions and collective action in general, in favour of individual initiative and privatization. A consequence of such changes will be a sharp increase in personal and regional inequalities.