The critical analysis of the Lula epoch is a complex task. The former workers' movement leader, who became a charismatic president, announced intense reforms and part of them were actually realised. Nevertheless, he could not break away from the past, or the history of Brazil, in many respects. The fact that Brazil now is probably the most influential country of the periphery does not mean at all that its internal conflicts were eased.

In the "debate" between Samir Amin and Michael Aglietta (see in the previous issue) the first is more realistic in detecting the dynamics of the interests and power structure of the EU. Amin sees well that the "Project Europe" can only be saved if capitalism could be forced to work in a way opposite to its own logic, and this task is hopeless. Nevertheless, at the present development stage of the production forces, leading transnational companies have an elementary interest in maintaining the common market, thus the scenario of the disintegration of the Union, the exit of the individual countries is an impossible scenario. The solution could be the expropriation of the international capital by the people, which is also suggested by Amin, by taking over the control of European institutions and changing them radically.