From France, Belgium, Italy, Albania and beyond the existing world system is disintegrating
By Abayomi Azikiwe
Editor, Pan-African News Wire
Wednesday October 21, 2026
Political Economy Review
From early October students have taken the lead in expressing their discontent with the economics of educational administration in France.
The walkouts, strikes and rebellions did not erupt in a political vacuum in France or in the broader European context.
Students in France are serving as a behavioral social barometer which is measuring the pulse of the people living within the capitalist states. The implications for events in France which have spread to several other European countries extends beyond their continent. Events over the last several months have aggravated underlying weaknesses and contradictions internationally.
When United States President Donald Trump took office in his second non-consecutive term, uncertainty became the order of the day regarding economic, political and foreign policies. The imposition of tariffs on countries across the globe defied the fundamental principles of capitalist thinking over the last century.
Severe economic stress was placed on other industrialized capitalist states through the hostility of the Trump administration. This was exemplified through the blatant threats to their neighbors and main trading partner to the north as well as the Kingdom of Norway over territorial claims over Greenland along with the reemergence of a secessionist movement in western Canada. Both of these states are members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) which was founded by the US in the aftermath of the conclusion of World War II in 1949.
Yet, the price for being members of NATO has risen immensely since January 2025 when Trump unilaterally mandated that other states raise the level of military expenditures up to 5% of their national budgets. Although the impact of US military policy towards Europe is rarely discussed in the corporate and government-controlled media outlets, it is quite obvious that the burgeoning economic problems in the United Kingdom and Western Europe are closely linked to the outdated strategic alliances such as NATO.
In following the US strategic trajectory since the 1990s, the fellow NATO states have faced repeated economic crises. The rising national debt inside the US has its parallels in other European countries including the UK and France. There are the problems of unemployment and underemployment, the deterioration of infrastructure and the rising levels of migration from the Global South which has aggravated racial tensions.
Since the advent of the unprovoked war against the Islamic Republic of Iran during June 2025 and the continuation of these attacks beginning of February 28, 2026, the prices for fuel, shipping, food, energy, education, insurance, fertilizer and other essential resources and commodities has had a devastating impact on various geopolitical regions of the world. Although a pause has been declared in the war against Iran, prices for essential goods and services have not declined.
Imperialist War and National Debt
Billions of dollars in US and Israeli military equipment have been destroyed by the Islamic Republic of Iran. Soldiers have lost their lives from the Pentagon and Israel while troops stationed in the Persian Gulf monarchies are posting photographs of the lost weapons, drones and barracks due to the damage inflicted by the Islamic Revolution Guard Corps (IRGC).
Fortune magazine drew an analogy between the debt crisis in France and the US, noting:
“Start with the debt. French public debt sits at a record 119% of GDP, while U.S. debt held by the public reached 100.2% of GDP at the end of March. Lecornu’s (French Prime Minister) budget, which would cut France’s deficit to 5% of GDP from 5.4%, faces its first critical vote in the National Assembly on Tuesday. Washington ran a $1.992 trillion deficit in fiscal 2026, about 6.2% of GDP based on CBO’s projections. Needless to say, that’s wider than the 5.4% deficit France is rioting over. Bond traders are treating the two countries alike. Bank of America economists Claudio Irigoyen and Antonio Gabriel recently found that the French and U.S. 10-year yields have been moving on nearly the same track, and they say the cause is the same. ‘When interest rates are low, governments have incentives to run bigger deficits financed with cheap debt,’ they wrote in a BofA Global Research report. ‘However, if that ‘cheap’ debt goes to finance a structural increase of the fiscal deficit, when interest rates increase it is politically difficult to implement the necessary fiscal consolidation to put the house in order.’” (https://fortune.com/2026/10/
Of course, the US president and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth have dismissed any connection between unprovoked warfare and the worsening economic situation. However, the costs of maintaining military bases around the world and a posture of consistent threats and destabilization have not benefited the residents of North America and Europe.
There are similar problems within the education sector in France, other EU member-states and the US. Education in the US is in crisis since it is no longer a priority among the ruling class and the capitalist state. The Trump administration dismantled the Department of Education while harassing colleges and universities over widespread notions of antisemitism and “wokeism.”
The youth in France have set the stage for the spreading of the unrest to other European states. According to a report published on October 19 by Radio France International it says:
“President Emmanuel Macron ordered a security review as the country’s interior minister admitted that the police ‘had lost control’ during the weekend’s unrest. Undeterred, the Yellow Vests movement which organized the weekend’s rallies called for a new round of protests Saturday. Italy, Spain and Portugal, where anger over rising prices has also led to protests, were keeping a nervous eye on the developments after smaller clashes broke out in Milan over the weekend and protests about housing costs persisted in Spanish cities. Some half-a-million people turned out across France to protest the surging cost of living, a culmination of four weeks of protests that began with high school students demanding better conditions at their schools.” (https://www.rfi.fr/en/france/
Although the US and the UK have not been the scene of civil unrest as of mid-October. However, these states cannot remain immune from the crises sweeping the European continent.
Leading up to the midterm elections slated for November 3, during October much attention was focused on whether the MAGA Republican tendency would remain in total control of the House of Representatives and the Senate. If there are attempts by the Trump administration and its base within and outside the government to maintain control of the legislative branch irrespective of the election results, these potential developments could very well trigger mass demonstrations, strikes and violent conflicts.
A clear set of circumstances in Europe could portend much for the situation in the US:
“Protests in Italy, Belgium and Portugal over the weekend underline the wider pressures, while significant strike activity is planned in Portugal and Spain in November. ‘Europe is becoming a pressure cooker for social unrest, with squeezed households, rising political polarization and growing discontent with governments proving increasingly fertile ground for disruptive and damaging demonstrations,’ Middleton added. ‘A repeat of the kind of violence seen in France is far from inevitable, but with governments facing difficult fiscal choices and a dense election calendar through to the end of 2027, the potential for disruptive and damaging unrest will remain elevated in Europe over the near term.’ Verisk Maplecroft’s predictive Civil Unrest Index ranks Europe as the world’s highest-risk region by a significant margin. Germany, France, Spain, Italy, the UK and Belgium are all among the 10 highest-risk countries globally, alongside the US, India, Mexico and Brazil.” (https://www.cirmagazine.com/
The level of repression inside the US has risen sharply since the advent of the Trump administration in its second iteration. The Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) have been deployed into the cities, suburbs and rural areas.
Numerous people have been killed by these federal agencies. Some of those killed were US citizens while others were not.
National Guard units and even the Marines have been ordered into cities such as Washington, D.C., Memphis and Los Angeles. As people continue to organize against these undemocratic measures, the administration wants to quash these forms of resistance to continue its redistribution of wealth and political power from the working class to the wealthiest entities within the US and the world.
Unrest in Albania
During the period of the late 1980s and early 1990s, the socialist project in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union collapsed. With specific reference to Albania, the student demonstrations of 1990 and the 1992 multi-party elections led to the transformation from socialism to capitalism.
Nonetheless, after more than three decades of capitalist rule, unrest has resurfaced on a mass level. The Trump administration bears responsibility due to the plans for a luxury tourist complex coordinated by Jared Kushner, the son-in-law of the US President.
The protest against the resort has been deemed the Flamingo Revolution. Youth demonstrators are calling for the resignation of Prime Minister Edi Rama who is the leader of the Socialist Party of Albania.
The Socialist Party bears little resemblance to the former ruling Party of Labor of Albania which was headed by Enver Hoxha. By shifting its orientation from socialism to capitalism, the Albanian people have been left to the whims of imperialism.
These events illustrate the failure of the reimposition of capitalism in the former socialist states of Eastern Europe. A similar crisis in Western Europe portends much for the future prospects of capitalist development. Until the contemporary crisis of capitalism and imperialism is resolved, unrest will continue throughout the European continent.
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