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Simeon Mitropolitski is a Canadian analyst, of Bulgarian origin, and a former syndicated columnist with the Bulgarian News Agency (BTA). He is the author of several hundred articles dealing with hot political and economic topics, both national and international.

He was part of the first group of Bulgarian intellectuals and students that began the opposition movement that finally put an end to the communist regime in this country in 1989, and in 1996-1997 participated in international observation teams during the elections in several Balkan countries - Romania, Albania and Bulgaria.

In 2002 Simeon and his family moved from Bulgaria to Canada where they live now in Montreal, province of Quebec. Simeon is a Master of Political Science from McGill University and a B.A. of Political Science and History.

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The notion of the West by which we usually describe both the United States and Western Europe, in reality is a complex of political, economic, psychological and social structures that varies from one country to another. These dissimilarities apply not only to the details, but sometimes to some very considerable aspects of the way the people live.

The historical experience has played a huge role in nation building from both sides of the Atlantic. Prejudices based on race or religious differences not only can poison the relations within the framework of a given society but also can influence economic development, in general, and such a specific sphere of economic life as a real estate market in particular.

The New Economy challenges not only the old economic structures like the big corporations, it defies many old sacred cows -- first of all the 19th century notion of the nation-state, a creature that divides people and cultures.

Let's take an example from the recent West European development. According to several polls 30 percent of the European Union (EU) citizens consider themselves as moderate racists; another 35 percent, extreme racists. The extreme racists want all immigrants in Europe to be expelled; the moderate, to block any further flow of foreign migrants. There are no economic reasons for such excessive demands. The European economy is growing, unemployment is diminishing. Some European countries lack skilled workers (Netherlands, United Kingdom), others are going to follow soon (Ireland).

Logic tells us that the unemployed from one European state would have to go to the country with low unemployment. The facts indeed are very different. In reality the unemployed citizen prefers to stay home where s/he will receive social benefits for an unlimited period (Germany) rather than go to Netherlands. S/he knows that in Netherlands common people still hate Germans and that s/he will have to start working from the very bottom of the social hierarchy.

Part 2: European xenophobia

Part 3: Shifting cultural dominanace