<Articles>The Negotiations of the Free Trade Area and European Integration, with Particular Reference to the French Response

The conception of the Free Trade Area (hereafter FTA), which was launched by the British government in 1956, was a European plan aimed at the l7 countries of Western Europe that participated in the Organization for European Economic Cooperation (hereafter OEEC) , The majority of scholarship addressing the FTA has been a response to the problem of why British participation in European integration ended in failure. This study focuses not only on the pros and cons of accepting the English stance in the FTA negotiations, which began with the announcement of the FTA, but also deals with broader issues concerning European integration throughout Europe and aims to locate the negotiations within the history of European integration. The issues addressed in the FTA negotiations were the following three: first, the FTA as proposed by the British, second, the Association Economique Europeenne (hereafter AEE) that was sought by the six EEC nations and which was based on France's counter demands for revision of the FTA, and third, a "provisional agreement" that stipulated the relations between the six EEC member nations and non-member states in lieu of including them in the organization. Ultimately the De Gaulle regime in France followed the provisional agreement, and as it was accepted as EEC policy, the FTA negotiations came to an end. If we trace this course of events, we see that French influence on the FTA negotiations was extremely important. After the collapse of the Guy Mollet regime, France faced an extremely difficult period both politically and economically. In the space of approximately one year, three men, Maurice Bourges-Maunoury, Felix Gaillard, and Pierre Pflimlin, held the premiership, but none was able to remedy the French situation. At this point the chief goal in the FTA negotiations was to avoid the creation of an FTA that worsened the French economic situation. Then, pursuant to this goal, France began to demand that the English proposed FTA be changed into an organization that resembled the EEC. In agreeing to the French policy, the other EEC countries began to seek the establishment of new organization called the AEE. However, with the inauguration of the Charles de Gaulle regime, France itself eliminated the possibility of the implementation of the AEE. If the AEE with a structure similar to the EEC were established, de Gaulle reasoned that the value of EEC would be reduced. As is well known, the EEC was for de Gaulle the key to the revival of the "La Grandeur" of France, and he viewed exposing the EEC to danger through the FTA negotiations as to be avoided at all costs. Thus the de Gaulle regime abandoned the position that had been adopted by previous French governments and began to pursue a new provisional agreement. However, the French economic situation remained a serious problem for the de Gaulle regime as well. The contents of the provisional agreement reflected economic interests favorable solely to France, and the other five nations of the EEC criticized its position. Despite this, the adoption of the French position as the basic policy of the EEC was due to the fact that the European Commission held the same position as the French. As a result the FTA negotiations had the following two major effects on the EEC. First, they prescribed relations with new non-member countries that had not been designated in the Treaty of Rome. In the Treaty of Rome, which had established the EEC, only the introduction of common external tariff had been settled on in dealing with non-member states. In contrast, in the FTA negotiation, the EEC demonstrated a measure of concern for nonmember states and decided to expand free trade. This reflects the reality that as the EEC actually proceeded with market integration, it could not overlook the negative reaction of non-member states and was compelled to adopt a flexible response even if it was a departure from the Treaty of Rome. Second was the increasing presence of the European Co