The Microbunched Electron Cooling (MBEC) proposed by D. Ratner is a promising cooling technique that can find applications in future hadron and electron-ion colliders. In this paper, we develop a new framework for the study of MBEC which is based on the analysis of the dynamics of microscopic 1D fluctuations in the electron and hadron beams during their interaction and propagation through the system. Within this framework, we derive an analytical formula for the cooling rate and benchmark it against 1D computer simulations with a agreement between the analytical and numerical results. We then calculate the expecting cooling time for a set of parameters of the proposed electron-ion collider eRHIC in a simple cooling system with one chicane in the electron channel. While the cooling rate in this system turns out to be insufficient to counteract the intra-beam scattering in the proton beam, we discuss how the electron signal can be amplified by two orders of magnitude through the use of plasma effects in the beam.