The United Kingdom and Europe, forty-nine years of history on the "front page" of the "World"

Jun 24, 1971 – Europe towards its "new frontier"

The "front page" of "Le Monde" dated June 24, 1971. Le Monde

The six member states of the European Economic Community and the United Kingdom conclude an agreement for the latter's accession to the EEC on 1st January 1973. This decision, then unpopular within Labor, was confirmed by a British referendum in 1975. Extract from an article published on June 24, 1971.

What will the Europe of tomorrow look like? Coming out of Britain's negotiations with the Six, this is now the question that will fuel comment for a long time. The exercise is fascinating because the variables are multiple, the imagination strongly requested by this still blank page in the life of the EEC, the economic and political forces in movement forced to adopt a new order. () Some see the arrival of the English, Danes, Norwegians and Irish as a new chance for Europe and bet that the enlarged Community will find its balance, greater autonomy and, at the same time, will allow those who live there to make themselves heard better in the world. Others already assume the dislocation of community constructions, the Atlantic wind rushing into all the cracks. ()

By nature, the face of the Europe of ten will not necessarily be the same as that of the EEC today. The center of gravity of Community Europe is shifting towards the north-west, and more precisely towards countries with a strong maritime tradition. () All those who believe in the opening to the outside world, in the benefits of competition and the great mixing of men, ideas and goods will therefore see, in the arrival of new members of the Common Market, a new chance of its influence. . Anything that shrinks leads to decadence. The extension of solidarity is, on the contrary, a factor of civilization. That said, the theme of unequal exchange is too present to everyone's mind for us not to look at it twice before proposing liberalization. ()

But it is of course in relations with the United States that the new European balance will have to be found. To those who, without going further, believe that a predominantly American zone will thus be fatally created, we must make read what the Americans themselves say. After the success of the Heath-Pompidou meeting in Paris, the New york times saw the "End of special American-British ties". "The Common Market has already made life more complicated in the United States, he continued, but this has so far been only a shadow compared to the independence that a Europe including Britain could exercise. "

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