History and Theory of European Integration

JEAN MONNET European Module

History and Theory of European Integration

Marina V. Larionova


Lecture 3 The Decade of De Gaulle (1958-1969)

• British applications and rejections • Veto of the UK accession • Fouchet plan for a political community • Elysee Treaty • Merger Treaty • De Gaulle’s resignation • The Limits of Spill Over method


Readings for the lecture• Dinan Desmond (1999) Ever Closer Union. An Introduction to

European Integration. Second edition. The European Union Series. Palgrave. Chapter 2 and Chapter 12;

• Monnet J. A Ferment of Change. (1962). The European Union.

Readings on the Theory and Practice of European Integration, Nelsen B.F. and Alexander C – G. Stubb (eds.), Palgrave, 1998;

• Monnet J. Europe Needs Britain (1961). The Pro-European Reader. Leonard D. and Leonard M.(eds.), Palgrave, 2002;

• Gaulle Charle de. A Concert of European States (1965). The European Union. Readings on the Theory and Practice of European Integration, Nelsen B.F. and Alexander C – G. Stubb (eds.), Palgrave, 1998;


De Gaulle’s contentions contribution to the European integration

• Foundations of the Common Agricultural Policy

Implementation of the EEC Treaty provisions for Common Agricultural Policy as a condition for the

customs union and common external tariff enforcement

• Keeping the UK out of the EEC• The triumph of intergovernmental method in EEC

construction


Jean Monnet’s method for introducing change in Europe:

Inherent features1. The profound change is being made possible essentially by the new

method of common action which is the core of the European community. This method has become a permanent dialogue between a single European body, responsible for expressing the view of the general interest of the Community, and the national governments, expressing the national views.

2. To agree on the objectives and to negotiate afterwards. An overall settlement is unlikely to be reached by haggling over the details. Details fall into place and specific problems are more easily solved when they are looked at in the framework of a general agreement.


Jean Monnet’s method for introducing change in Europe: Inherent features

3. The system is not federal, because there is no central government; the nations take their decisions together in the Council of Ministers. On the other hand, the independent European body proposes policies, and the common element is further underlined by the European Parliament and the European Court of Justice.

4. Trust in the wisdom and strength of the existing institutions is needed to discuss the problems as common problems, using the machinery of the community, which has been devised for that specific purpose.


Jean Monnet’s method for introducing change in Europe inherent features

5. Common rules applied by joint institutions give each a responsibility for effective working of the Community as a whole.

6. European unity is not a blueprint, it is not a theory, it is a process of bringing people and nations together to find a way out of conflicts,… to adapt themselves jointly to changing circumstances.

7. The new institutional method is permanently modifying relations between nations and men. Human nature does not change, but when nations and men accept the same rules and the same institutions to make sure that they are applied, their behavior towards each other changes. This is the process of civilization itself.


The EC four years of harmony between the governments of the member states and the EC institutions

• Commission portfolios – external relations, economic and financial affairs, the internal market, competition, social affairs, agriculture, transport, overseas territories;

• Progress in elimination tariff barriers, success of commercial and external relations policy;

• Economic growth in Western Europe / increased trade activity;

• EC emerging international identity / GATT and Yaounde Convention;

• Competition, social affairs, transport, agriculture policies impasse;


Treaty establishing the European Economic Community

Article 61. The Common market shall be progressively established

during a transitional period of twelve years.This transitional period shall be divided into three stages of

four years each; the length of each stage may be altered in accordance with the provisions set out below.


The key general findings of the analysis (1958)

1. The initiation of the integration process does not require absolute majority support, nor need it rest on identical aims on the part of the key participants.

2. Acceptance of a federal scheme is facilitated if the participating state units are already fragmented ideologically and socially.

3. Acceptance of the integration scheme is facilitated if the participating groups, political, industrial, labor, have a tradition of consultations and shared values.

4. Integration process is facilitated by existence of an external threat, real or imagined.



5. The central institution once established will affect political integration process if it acquires the capacity to raise positive expectations.

6. Group pressure will spill over into the federal sphere and add to the integrative impulse.

7. National governments may attempt to sidestep, or sabotage the decisions of the federal authority, however, in the long run they tend to defer to federal decisions.



8. The major interest groups determine their support or opposition to the central institutions policies on the basis of a calculated advantage.

9. The process of community formation will succeed if the crucial expectations, ideologies and behavior patterns of the key interest groups can be refocused on a new set of central symbols and institutions.

10. The “spill over” is not automatic and requires a measure of political activism.


De Gaulle’s Aims: • Recovery of France, both economic and spiritual;

• Reestablishment of the country as a great power invested with world responsibility for political stability and social order;

• Regaining the country’s independence

• Reclaiming France leading international role

• Rejuvenation of industry and agricultural sector


Challenges: Internal pressures • Colonial wars (Algerian crisis)• Collapse of the Fourth republic

1958 – De Gaulle negotiates a new constitutional regime

1958 September – referendum endorsing Presidential republic

Fifth republic – strong Presidency / exclusive responsibility for foreign and defense policy / greater legitimacy of the executive power

1958 December – De Gaulle elected President of France


Challenges: Internal pressures

• The need for financial and monetary reform1958 - Devaluation of the frank / cutting on the

government expenditure / tax increase • The need to stimulate the business sector facing fierce

international competition

• The imperative of industrial competitiveness

• The priority of agricultural modernization


EEC instrumental to

• Modernization of the agricultural sector• Industrial modernization• Enhancing Europe competitiveness• Franco-German reconciliation

De Gaulle-Adenauer accord


EC Common Agricultural Policy (Stresa conference, July 1958)

• Guarantee of high agricultural prices based on financial solidarity of the member states exercised through the price support and intervention mechanism

• Provision of a European Community wide Market for agricultural goods based on the community preferences and the free movement of goods principles

• Subsidization of surplus produce export outside the EC through export refunds

• Protection of internal agricultural market through a system of import levies based on the community preference principle


De Gaulle’s Quid pro Quo

Industrial policy on tariffs and quotas versus Agricultural policy on tariffs and quotas

Stage 1. May 1960 – January 1962

Lowering internal customs barriers Establishing external tariffsTimetable for decisions to be taken on agricultural policyFinancial levy liability on imports of foodstuff from the third countries


1962 January 13 –14 Council Resolution

“France and common sense prevailed”“Agriculture admitted into the Common Market” Aim – 50 % reduction in customs duties for agricultural

goods by the end of the second stage


External pressures

• Europe desolated and divided by the Iron Curtain

• Cold War tearing apart both European continent and the World

• International Institutions polarized by two opposing camps

• Germany - divided, but reindustrialized and rearmed, hence EC perceived as an institutional framework embedding Franco-German reconciliation


External pressures• European free trade area perceived as Britain’s efforts

to undermine European integration eroding the common external tariff

• Free trade area (European Free Trade Association) versus Common market (European Economic Community)

• The UK special position - application to join “provided that their special relationship with the Commonwealth and their associates in the free trade area, as well as their special interests in agriculture are respected”


De Gaulle’s Principles for the Concert of European States

• Independence of the nation• Reclaiming what was due to the country• Preserving the national identity• Shaking off the Atlantic supremacy over the Old World• Rejecting the doctrine of supranationalism• Intergovernmental cooperation on political and security affairs• Germany - the heart of the problem and the keystone of the European edifice• Germany - an integral part of the organized system of cooperation for the

whole continent• Systemic rapprochement, not a fusion of peoples• “Setting up of a concert of European states which in developing all sorts of ties

between them would increase their interdependence and solidarity”• Emergence of a strong, politically and military independent Europe


De Gaulle’s European Security Community initiativeSeptember 1960 – Fouchet Committee

• Logic - Intergovernmental• Approach - a Confederation of member states• Aims - Common foreign and defense policy, cooperation on

cultural, educational and research issues• Institutional framework – heads of states or ministerial council,

political commission based in Paris and an assembly of national parliamentary representatives

• Results – collapse of the Fouchet plan in April 1962• Reciprocity of Adenauer - De Gaulle support policies (CAP/ESC)• Achievements - signing the Franco-German Treaty of Friendship

and Reconciliation in January 1963 to become a driving force of European integration later on


De Gaulle’s Manifestation of Nationalism • National interests neglected in ECSC (French relinquishment of coke in

Ruhr)

• National interests neglected in EURATOM (15 years history of the Atomic Energy Commissariat)

• National interests neglected in EEC (agricultural versus industrial regulations)

• The doctrine of supranationalism “national self effacement” by the leading school of thought inside France and support for Europe seen as “edifice in which technocrats forming an executive and parliamentarians assuming legislative powers would have the authority to decide the fate of the French people”


De Gaulle’s Manifestation of Nationalism• Atlantic alliance intentions to prevent France from becoming its own master

• Ludwig Erhard’s Atlanticist position stalling the development of the Elyssee Treaty

• Walter Hallstein’s ambitions for Germany to regain its respectability and preponderant influence

• The UK (Harold Macmillan) desire to undermine the project of the six dissolving Common Market in the Free Trade Area ( “Having failed to prevent the birth of the Community from without, they planned to paralyze it from within”)

• Veto of the UK membership application following the intergovernmental bargaining process (August 1961 – January 1963)


The Empty Chair crisis and Luxembourg Compromise1965 July – 1966 January

in view of the initial financial regulation expiry date in July 1965 the Commission’s proposals to:

introduce the EC “own resources” funded from agricultural levies, customs duties and up to 1 percent of the national VAT revenue;

enhance the EP and EC budgetary powers;introduce a system of funding CAP from the EC “own

resources”;introduce majority voting principle into the

deliberations of the Council of Ministers


The Empty Chair crisis and Luxembourg Compromise1965 July – 1966 January

• Walter Hallstein announcement of the proposals to the EP in Strasbourg

• French counter proposal to continue funding CAP from the national contributions as of 1 July

• The Council of Ministers’ meeting on June 28 stalemate and withdrawal of the French representatives

• De Gaulle’s attack on the qualified majority voting and insistence on the principle of unanimity

• The Council meeting on October 25-26 with the French chair empty• December 1965 Presidential election in France – De Gaulle’s narrow

margin victory over the candidate of Europe, Francois Mitterrand• The Council of Ministers meeting on January 28-29, 1966


January 28-29, 1996Luxembourg Compromise

Financial regulation for CAPEC own resourcesEP budgetary powersMajority voting


Outcomes • Agreement to disagree:

If one member state considered that a vital national interest was at stake, the Council would endeavor to reach within a reasonable period, solutions that could be adopted unanimously.

The French delegation special position that when very important interests were at issue, discussions must be continued until unanimous agreement is reached


Outcomes

• Presumption within the Council in favor of unanimity / “Transformation of the community spirit into a more cost-benefit attitude of the member-states”

• Demonstration of the community dependency on the political environment

• Shaped the political environment for the next decade• Intergovernmentalism prevails


Objections to the Luxembourg Compromise

• The Commission excluded from the meeting was not party to the agreement

• The Court of Justice ruled that Resolutions and Declaration of political will by the Council can not prevail against the Treaty rules


Vetoing the accession applications


The UK first application for EC membership August 1961 - January 1963 / Conservatives /

Reasons for realization of the mistake of self exclusion from the Treaty of Rome and decision to apply /Harold

Macmillan/Success of the customs unionFailure to dissolve the EC into the EFTAFear of economic exclusionThe Commonwealth proving inadequate instrument

for promotion of British interestsKennedy’s endorsement of the UK membership in

the EC


The case for failure

British position on ensuring its special interests in the EFTA and the Commonwealth

Anglo-American missile accord, December, 1962 Decision to integrate UK nuclear force into NATO

The lack of trust and use of intergovernmental method of bargaining instead of Monnet’s community method

January 15, 1963 De Gaulle’s conference


The second application May – December 1967 / Labor / Harold Wilson

Increasing need for accession growing European commercial contacts and slumping

economic ties with the Commonwealth

Barriers to membership De Gaulle’s anti Atlantisiam - Anglo-American special

relations

De Gaulle’s quest to preserve France’s leadership role in the EC

December 1967 De Gaulle’s conference


1968

• May – protests, riots and strikes in France

• June – dissolution of the parliament by the prime minister George Pompidou / reelection of the parliament / victory of the Gaullists

April 1969De Gaulle’s resignation


De Gaulle’s road towards European unity

• United Europe is only achieved through organization of concerted action in every sphere…

• Individual States are the only valid elements, “when their national interests are at stake nothing and nobody must be allowed to force their hands, and the cooperation between them is the only road that will lead anywhere.

• “although it is perfectly natural for the states of Europe to have specialized bodies available to prepare and whenever necessary to follow up their decisions, these decisions must be their own”.


Arguments for Intergovernmental approach • “Common market, a brainchild of technocrats, carrying all the hopes and illusions of a

supranational school”.

• Fruitless bargaining with the British showed the fledgling Community that good intention are not enough to reconcile the irreconcilable, the Six found that even in the economic sphere alone the adjustment of their respective positions bristled with difficulties which could not be resolved solely on terms of treaties concluded to that end.

• “Executives of the common institutions were helpless … when it came to making and enforcing decisions, only governments were in a position to do this, and then only as a result of negotiations carried out in due form between ministers and ambassadors”.

• The important measures should be subordinated to the decisions of individual states…

• The member states decisions should be the cornerstone of the Institutions and a guarantee of the members’ sovereignty


Recommended Readings • Macmillan Harold “Britain’ Place and purpose in the World”. Extract

from speech at Conservative party conference, October 1961. Pro-European Reader. 2002. Palgrave.

• Kennedy F. John “The US Welcomes European Unity”. Speech at Washington, DC, 17 may 1962. Pro-European Reader. 2002. Palgrave

• Jenkins Roy “Let us go in with Hope and Confidence”. Speech at labor party conference, October 1062. Pro-European Reader. 2002. Palgrave

• Wilson Harold “We mean business”. Extract from speech to the Council of Europe, Strabourg, 23 January 1967. Pro-European Reader. 2002. Palgrave


Lecture 4: The Intergovernmentalist backlash

Critiques and contemplations of Neofunctionalism


Readings for the lecture • Hoffman S. Obstinate or Obsolete? The Fate of the Nation State

and the Case of Western Europe (1966). The European Union. Readings on the Theory and Practice of European Integration, Nelsen B.F. and Alexander C – G. Stubb (eds.), Palgrave, 1998;

• Lindberg L.N. Political Integration: Definitions and Hypotheses (1963). The European Union. Readings on the Theory and Practice of European Integration, Nelsen B.F. and Alexander C – G. Stubb (eds.), Palgrave, 1998;

• Rosamond Ben. (2000) Theories of European Integration. The European Union Series. Palgrave; Chapter 4


Thank you!

History and Theory of European Integration

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