This document contains everything that you need to know for the exam of the course European Governance at Utrecht University. It includes a summary of chapters 5-11 on the history of the EU, which are not discussed in the lectures, and it includes notes on all the lectures that are required for the...
5 t/m 11 (history) + lecture notes on the other chapters
January 23, 2022
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2021/2022
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european governance
european union
european union
europe
europe
politics
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Chapter 5 – From the End of the War to the
Schuman Plan
Background: The Ideal of European Unity
Plans for European unity go back a long time ago, but prior to the 1950s none had succeeded.
Movements in favor of peaceful integration emerged in Europe after the First World War, but the
political settlement after the war was based on the peaceful co-existence of nation-states rather than
integration. This was called the League of Nations and it failed to prevent the next war. However, the
League did successfully establish a number of special agencies working at a functional level to deal
with matters such as health and the protection of labor.
The End of the War: Federalism, and the Hague Congress
Federalist groups put the idea of European unity on the immediate post-war agenda and attracted
a lot of public support in several European states.
The European Union of Federalists (EUF) was formed in 1946 from the wartime Resistance
movements. It attempted to exploit the disruption caused to existing political structures by the war
to make a new start on a basis radically different from the Europe of nation sates, and to create a
federal constitution for Europe as part of a more distant plan for global unity. However, it took until
1947 to organize the conference that was supposed to pave the way to the new constitution, by
which time the European Congress, eventually took place in the Hague in May 1948.
By the time that the Hague Congress was held, in 1948, new national governments were in control
of the states of western Europe and were reluctant to surrender any sovereignty.
The Congress did lead to the creation of the Council of Europe, but it was dominated by national
governments and therefore there was little realistic prospect of it developing in the federal direction
that the EUF hoped. The Council was set up to:
- Defend human rights, parliamentary democracy, and the rule of law;
- Develop continent-wide agreements to standardize member countries’ social and legal
practices;
- Promote awareness of an European identity based on shared values and cutting across
different cultures.
Since 1989, its main job has become:
- To act as a political anchor and human rights watchdog for Europe’s post-communist
democracies;
- To assist the countries of central and eastern Europe in carrying out and consolidating
political, legal, and constitutional reform in parallel with economic reform;
- To provide know-how in areas such as human rights, local democracy, education, culture,
and the environment.
The Cold War
A growing rift between the Soviet Union and its former western allies led to the emergence of
fears in western Europe of a communist takeover inspired by Moscow.
Agreement was reached at an Allied summit meeting in 1945 to divide Europe at the end of the war
into “spheres of influence” (-> gives the ability to intervene in the affairs of other countries). This was
,intended by the western Allies to be only a temporary agreement, but the USSR soon started to
make it permanent. This is because the USSR installed Soviet-friendly regimes in the countries that
were assigned to the Soviet sphere in the Allied summit. Furthermore, communist insurgents started
a civil war in Greece. Also, the USSR made territorial demands on Turkey and refused to withdraw
troops from Persia.
The severe winter of 1946-47 led to unrest in several west European states that was exploited by
indigenous communist parties, and prompted the United States to propose the Marshall Plan to
feed economic recovery.
The Iron Curtain was a political boundary dividing Europe into two separate areas from the end of
World War Two in 1945 until the end of the Cold War in 1991. The term symbolizes the efforts by the
USSR to block itself and its satellite states form open contact with the West and its allied states.
The Truman Doctrine is an American foreign policy that originated with the primary goal of
containing the Soviet geopolitical expansion during the Cold War. More generally, the Truman
Doctrine implied American support for other nations thought to be threatened by Soviet
communism.
The Four-Power Council of Foreign Ministers, a standing conference to discuss the administration
and future of Germany, collapsed. Soviet intransigence (= refusal to agree) in that forum, and
eventually the walk-out of the Soviet representative in April 1947, convinced those who were trying
to negotiate on behalf of Washington that it was not possible to work with the USSR. From that point
on, the emergence of separate West and East German states became gradually inevitable.
Additionally, there were waves of strikes that spread across France and Italy. In both cases, the
strikes were supported by the communists, who engaged in revolutionary anti-capitalist rhetoric. The
non-communist parties in the French coalition expelled the communists from the government and
the Truman Administration set up the Marshall Plan.
The Marshall Plan, also called the European Recovery Program (ERP), involved giving a total of $13
billion in financial aid to the states of western Europe. The assistance was also offered to the states
of eastern Europe, but they declined under pressure from the USSR. There were contested views
about the Marshall Plan in the United States itself, and therefore Marshall and Truman decided to
advocate for the Marshall Plan in the name of the Truman Doctrine: to keep out communism.
Furthermore, the injection of a large amount of money into the European economy facilitated trade
with the USA.
The United States favored European Unity and pressed for movement in that direction.
The US was committed to the idea of free trade. It was concerned to see what it described as
“European integration”, meaning that national economic barriers to trade should be broken down.
Integration was also compatible with the stated aim of strengthening western Europe against
communist expansion, as well as the aim of creating a large and exploitable market for US exports
and for investments by US multinational corporations.
The US insisted that decisions on the distribution and use of Marshall Aid be taken by the European
States jointly. Hence, in 1947, the Committee for European Economic Cooperation (CEEC) was
established. In 1948, this was transformed into the more permanent Organization for European
Economic Cooperation (OEEC). In 1961, the OEEC was superseded by the Organization for Economic
Cooperation and Development (OECD), which had a broader remit, concerned with issues of
,economic development both in Europe and globally, and included the United States and Canada as
full members.
The German Problem
Germany’s neighbors, particularly France, were concerned to guard against a resurgence of
German militarism and initially opposed the re-formation of a German state. After the German
Federal Republic was set up in 1949, a new approach was needed.
The Schuman Plan for Coal and Steel
Proposed by Robert Schuman, but devised by Jean Monnet, the plan proposing the pooling of the
coal and steel resources of the European states.
It involved the surrender of sovereignty over the coal and steel industries.
Monnet was trying to solve two problems with one plan:
- The problem on how to avert the threat of future conflict between France and Germany;
- And the problem of ensuring supplies of coal to French industry once the Ruhr region
reverted to German sovereign control.
Six states took part in the negotiations that led to the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC).
National Positions and the Origins of the ECSC
France: Monnet saw the need for an European common market with coal and steel as the start.
Monet aimed to create more than just a common market. He showed no great confidence in the
free-market system, which had served France badly in the past. He placed his faith in the
development of supranational institutions as the basis for building a genuine economic community
that would adopt common economic policies and rational planning procedures. Coal and Steel were
only starting points. The aim was to extend integration to all aspects of the west European economy.
Germany: Adenauer saw the ECSC as a way to restore Germany’s international position, establish
the Federal Republic as the legitimate successor to the pre-war German state, and consolidate the
western and capitalist orientation of the new state.
The legacy of the Nazi era and of the war had left Germany a pariah nation. It had also left it divided
into two separate states, the Federal Republic in the West and the Democratic Republic in the East.
Adenauer wanted to establish the Federal Republic as the legitimate successor to the pre-war
German state, but also as a peace-loving state that would be accepted as a full participant in
European and international affairs. He also wanted to establish the western and capitalist orientation
of the Federal republic beyond question or reversal. This was important to Adenauer because the
Social Democratic Party was arguing for the Federal Republic to declare itself neutral in the emerging
Cold War in the hope that this would facilitate re-unification of the country. As well as being strongly
anti-communist, Adenauer believed that the Democratic Republic was dominated by the USSR, and
he feared that the cultural influence of Russia would be damaging to the vitality of German culture
and to the process of moral renewal in the aftermath of Nazims, which, as a devout Catholic, he
believed to be essential.
The Ruhr region was important to him both politically and economically:
- Politically: it was important that the region would be integrated into the Federal Republic.
- Economically: the Ruhr had always been one of the powerhouses of the German industrial
economy.
, The Benelux States could not afford to be left out of a community that pooled the coal and steel
supplies of France and Germany.
In Italy, Alcide de Gasperi has very similar motives to Adenauer in Germany: he wanted to restore
Italy’s international respectability and confirm its western and capitalist identity.
At the endo f the war there had been a serious risk that the Italian Communist Party would take over
the country in democratic elections, and it remained the largest party in terms of support.
Britain was not interested in participating in a coal and steel pool as it had its own supplies of coal,
the new Labor government had just nationalized these industries, and it saw itself as a global
power within a strong economy.
Britain still had a considerable empire, British companies had interests in all parts of the world, and
British armed forces were globally deployed in keeping the peace, or acting as a bulwark against
communist encroachment.
From the Schuman Plan to the Treaty of Paris
Months of bargaining let to modification of Monnet’s original ambitious plan.
There was a struggle between France and Germany over the powers of the High Authority of the
ECSC and over the attitude to cartels.
Cartel = a coalition or cooperative arrangement between political parties intended to promote a
mutual interest.
The United States played a vital role behind the scenes.
The institutional arrangements established for the ECSC provided, in embryonic form, the basic
institutional framework of the European Union as it exists today.
Embryonic = early stage of development.
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