AbstractThe article first argues that we live in a neo‐liberal world in that neo‐liberalism has become the economic orthodoxy which informs policy‐making, but that the commitment of the European Union and its Common Agricultural Policy to neo‐liberalism is somewhat ambiguous. It then examines the impact of that ambiguous Common Agricultural Policy on Eastern European rurality in the decade or so since the New Member States joined. In many respects it has resulted in scenarios similar to developments in western Europe, but in one respect a phenomenon that is present throughout the European Union has been amplified dramatically in its eastern half. Overall, the weaknesses that many have identified in the Common Agricultural Policy have been reproduced in the east, but in a more extreme form.