Introduction | 5 | Britain and European Integration since 1945

ABSTRACT

This book provides a study of British policy and attitudes towards the process of European integration associated with the European Union (EU), formerly European Communities (EC). It covers the period from the end of the Second World War in 1945 down to the present day. Few aspects of British politics during the past sixty years have attracted as

much continuing attention and intense debate as British involvement in European integration. This highly contested issue has frequently exposed major faultlines within governments; it has wreaked havoc with the political careers and reputations of prime ministers and other government ministers; it has caused rancorous disputes within and between the major political parties and their leaderships; it has given rise to bitter polemics in the press and between pressure groups; it has produced diﬀerent explanations from historians, political scientists and a variety of commentators; and it has bemused, confused and divided the public at large. The subject has also given rise to some colourful journalese. The British press is often thick with martial language, Churchillian rhetoric, and banner headlines proclaiming victory, surrender, defeat or unwarranted interference whenever Brussels and EU matters are in the news. A sample of the views of politicians and commentators conveys similar high drama. For example, Britain’s involvement in European integration has been variously portrayed as the end of a thousand years of history, as a thorn in the side of British politics, as a matter triggering the most visceral reactions in the British psyche, as the cause of a nervous breakdown in the political class, as a suitable case for treatment by psychotherapists as much as by historians and political scientists, and as an issue guaranteed to reduce politicians and the press to a pantomime routine of foot-stamping, ﬁnger wagging and name-calling. There is little disputing, then, that Britain’s strange relationship with European

integration is one of the persistently neuralgic issues in the country’s politics. The often heated controversy is understandable, if only because the decisions taken by British governments on this subject over the past ﬁfty years amount to one of the radical, if not the most radical, changes in the country’s domestic and foreign aﬀairs during this period. Why involvement in European integration has caused such an uproar and has often appeared as a

disagreeable necessity rather than a positive beneﬁt, why the role and functions of European integration have rarely attracted a national consensus, why a period of relative peace occasionally descends on this battleﬁeld, and why policymaking has frequently consisted of a set of tactical adjustments to suit the needs of the moment and to preserve a ‘wait and see’ position towards plans for further integration, are among some of the key questions addressed in this study. At the outset it should be noted what this book is and is not about. The

subject matter is approached with a view to providing an historical understanding of the changing nature, scope and signiﬁcance of British policy and attitudes towards European integration. The emphasis throughout is on presenting an interpretation of past events that attempts to make sense of British policy and attitudes towards the EU. The analysis also oﬀers both a basis for understanding current events, problems and issues and for scrutinizing myths and prejudices that have gathered around the subject. This is not to suggest that an historical approach to the subject is suﬃcient in itself to illuminate contemporary problems. It is to say, however, that an understanding of longterm trends and developments and an awareness of the haunting of the present by the past, can shed light on how the past informs the present and may shape the future. A major feature of the book centres on the determination of policy and

attitudes. The main focus of attention in this respect is on the signiﬁcance of national government and party politics in shaping the nature and extent of British involvement in European integration and on the inﬂuence and interplay of principles, policies and personalities. This approach, one among many, means that particular attention is paid to the role and interaction of internal and external factors in accounting for the stance of successive governments towards European integration. Themes of particular interest in this context are the interrelationship between domestic and foreign policy, the changing mixture of real or perceived constraints, opportunities and threats that faced and continue to face policymakers, and the British contribution to the course of European integration. The analysis deals to a more limited extent with the impact of European integration on British politics and economic performance. It does, however, consider the ‘Europeanization’ of policymaking on matters previously under exclusively national control and jurisdiction. The analysis also provides rare coverage in this type of work of the concepts of Europeanization and regionalization in relation to Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales. Throughout the book we have tried to avoid making judgements about

whether, how far and on what terms Britain should be involved in the process of European integration, and also about how fast or how slowly British governments have responded to this process. The making of some general judgements about Britain’s performance as a member state of the EC/EU does in any case require comparative treatment that is beyond the scope of this book. We alighted on the sub-title ‘On the sidelines’ because the nature and extent

of Britain’s involvement in both the origins and early leadership of the EC (nil) and in the current range of EU policies (limited) can be demonstrated by objective criteria. The sub-title also has signiﬁcance in terms of the role played by Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales in the making of British policy towards the EU. Sixty years ago in May 1948, the British Labour government of the time boycotted The Hague Congress of Europe on the grounds that it was too closely associated with the idea of a federal Europe and with the mainland European political leaders who were to the fore in the origins of the EC from which Britain excluded itself in the 1950s. Since then, Britain has become a full member of the EC/EU. At present, however, Britain is not a member of the euro zone, which is the centrepiece of the EU. Robin Cook, the former British Foreign Secretary, observed that Britain cannot be at the core of Europe if it is outside the single currency that increasingly deﬁnes that core (Cook: 2003). At the very least, therefore, it is diﬃcult for any British government to pretend to be a key player in the EU while excluded from this major project. It is also the case that Britain does not belong to the group of EU states subscribing to the Schengen Agreements on the abolition of internal border controls. Furthermore, Britain holds opt outs on particular measures such as the EU’s working time directive limiting the working week to 48 hours and also has United Kingdom (UK)-speciﬁc protocols on the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union.1 Certainly, British governments have played a leading role in some spheres, notably in pressing for reform of the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), in advocating the creation of the single market, and in developing European foreign and defence policy where the principle of intergovernmental cooperation is much more to the liking of British governments. But the general record, studded with a history of showdowns, boycotts, opt outs and ‘red lines’, has frequently given rise to the view of Britain as a semi-detached or associate member of the EU. Reﬂecting on this record, Chris Patten, a former member of the European Commission, once commented that Britain has never actually ‘joined Europe’. The principal objects of the book are threefold. First, it attempts within the

limits imposed by space to provide a comprehensive and up-to-date study of the nature, inﬂuence and interaction of internal and external factors that have shaped policy and attitudes towards European integration. Coverage of the often-multidimensional character of British policy and attitudes includes the choices and dilemmas confronting policymakers and the character of the debate within and between political parties. Such matters are considered in the context of the changing conﬁguration of the international system and of particular responses to the dynamics of European integration. Second, the book aims to highlight several themes that are closely linked to the question of Britain and European integration. For example, the treatment deals with the loss of empire and of great power status, the management of relative economic decline and the modernization of the British economy, elitist and popular attitudes towards European integration, the strains in Britain’s

relationship with the EU as well as the tensions between the territorial components of the UK concerning EU membership, and the ‘special relationship’ between Britain and the USA. Finally, the book examines the degree of continuity and change in British policy and attitudes towards European integration over the past sixty years. In particular, it discusses both the nature and extent of change and also the recurring features in the British approach to European integration. There are several reasons for undertaking a general study of the subject at

this stage, some of which are worth mentioning here to illustrate the general scope and importance of the subject. First, few, if any, broad-based studies of Britain and European integration have emerged since the turn of the century when a clutch of books appeared on the subject (H. Young 1998, J.W. Young 2000, Gowland and Turner 2000a, Pilkington 2001). British policy and attitudes towards the EU since 1997 have therefore received limited treatment in this type of literature. This book also takes account of some of the large volume of published research on the subject in the past ten years. Furthermore, during this recent period some of the major trends in the EU have proved markedly diﬀerent from the tone, texture and character of EC/EU developments in the 1980s and 1990s. During this latter period, there were major changes and signiﬁcant advances in the character of European integration, and at the very least the vestigial remains of the earlier momentum, vision and inspiration underlying the formation and early development of the EC were still in evidence. The ﬁrst decade of this century, however, has witnessed few landmark events in the EU landscape, while stalled attempts at institutional reform have raised questions about the limits of further integration. Second, British membership of the EC/EU has had a pervasive inﬂuence

on many aspects of Britain’s political and economic life. It has had a major impact on British political institutions as well as on a wide range of policy ﬁelds and on the standing and supremacy of domestic law. At least 10 per cent of all UK laws originate in the EU, while approximately 50 per cent of the legislation aﬀecting British business is currently determined at the EU level. Furthermore, varying estimates suggest that between 60 per cent and 90 per cent of national legislation is aﬀected by EU decisions. At the time of writing, for example, the Brown government’s bailout package for the Northern Rock building society has to demonstrate compatibility with EU rules on state restructuring aid. Meanwhile, attempts in some quarters to impose quotas on the number of non-national footballers in British professional club sides fall foul of EU law on the free movement of workers (MacShane 2005: 2; Forster and Blair 2002: 2). EC/EU membership has had a particularly profound eﬀect on the law making powers of the UK Parliament, especially in recent decades with the widening of EU competencies and the ongoing march of European integration. This process is so far advanced that in the view of some observers the House of Commons has become little more than a provincial assembly progressively relegated to what Walter Bagehot, the Victorian constitutional authority, called ‘the digniﬁed part of the

constitution’.2 Other no less signiﬁcant eﬀects of EU membership are evident in relation to the status of EU law in several important respects. Especially notable is the fact that EU law is capable of conferring rights on individuals which British courts are obliged to uphold (direct eﬀect), and furthermore that EU law takes precedence over conﬂicting provisions of British law, regardless of whether these were made before or after the EU law in question (Giddings and Drewry 2004: 37). It is a commonplace that British membership of the EU has not put Britain

at the heart of Europe but it has put Europe at the heart of Britain. Certainly, EU membership has ﬁgured as the elephant in the room of British politics, sometimes dormant, usually stirring and rarely passing unnoticed for long, and this for at least two reasons. First, Britain’s EU membership raises fundamental questions that have

bedevilled British politics for sixty years and that have centred on the country’s post-imperial role and identity in the wider world and in particular its relationship with mainland Europe. Some of the key questions focus on whether Britain should primarily engage militarily, politically and ﬁnancially with Europe or concentrate on the world beyond Europe. There are also questions about whether the country is politically and psychologically part of Europe or is in some way an island apart. Such questions are scarcely novel. Indeed, they ﬁgure in a recent study of the rise and fall of the ﬁrst British empire as precisely the sort of questions that were at the heart of eighteenth-century British politics, so much so that the British debate about European integration since 1945 ‘would have struck an informed eighteenth-century observer as remarkably familiar’ (Simms 2007: 2). Second, major global and European developments invariably pose ques-

tions about the nature of Britain’s membership of the EU. For example, at the time of writing, the tumultuous events since August 2007 and especially during the period October-December 2008 in the ﬁnancial markets included the plummeting value of sterling as it rapidly closed in on parity with the euro and added the year 2008 to the series of periodic major devaluations of sterling: 1949, 1967, 1976 and 1992. These developments brought in their train very diﬀerent judgements about the meaning of events for the EU at large and for Britain’s relationship with the EU in particular. There was much speculation on the question of British membership of the euro zone, and some rustling sounds in the undergrowth of British politics around an issue that had scarcely attracted attention during the preceding ﬁve years. In December 2008, José Manuel Barroso, President of the European Commission, claimed that ‘the people who matter in Britain’ (but evidently not the electorate) were currently thinking about the possibility of joining the euro zone.3 Some commentators suggested that Britain might now have to enter the euro zone in order to secure the necessary ﬁnancial power to deal with the crisis, while recognizing that such a course of action was political poison even as its logic became more compelling. Others insisted, however, that this was no time to contemplate joining the euro zone.4 At the same time, one long-standing view

in some British circles received yet another airing. In short, the euro zone was almost certain to disintegrate, as it was an unstable halfway house to a political union. According to this view, it could easily unravel under the impact of the crisis and in the absence of a consistent euro zone policy and a large-scale central or federal spending authority. The issue entered so much into the public domain by late 2008 that Gordon Brown publicly denied that there were any plans to scrap the pound and he insisted that it would remain in being ‘this year, and next year and beyond’.5 Shortly afterwards, William Hague, the Conservative Party Shadow Foreign Secretary, criticized the Brown government’s handling of the matter, possibly fearing the loss of votes to the UK Independence Party and the British National Party in the European parliamentary elections (June 2009). In any event, Hague declared that a Conservative government under the leadership of David Cameron would never join the euro zone.6 Meanwhile, an ICM poll carried out in December 2008 reported that 71 per cent of Britons questioned would vote to keep the pound while 23 per cent would vote to join the euro.7 It is not the validity of these views or the signiﬁcance of the polling data that are relevant here. Rather it is the extent to which the vexed question of Britain’s relationship with the euro zone is so easily resurrected by events and becomes an issue in party politics once again. Third, a general study of Britain and European integration can help to

convey knowledge of a subject that attracts many opinions, some of which are based on slender evidence or outright prejudice. Certainly, there is a large amount of ignorance about Britain and Europe among the public at large and among holders of political oﬃce in particular. According to one wellinformed observer, the lack of knowledge of, or empathy for, the history of Europe and of Britain’s complex role within it extends across much of the British political elite (Wallace 2005). As Leader of the House of Commons, Robin Cook concluded that the Commons had not recognized the extent to which what happened within the EU had such a big bearing on what happened in domestic politics.8 Denis MacShane, a former Europe minister in the Foreign and Commonwealth Oﬃce (hereafter FCO), claimed that Britain and Europe was a subject that all too clearly demonstrated the poor level of policy discussion and debate in British political parties. MacShane further maintained that ignorance weakened British inﬂuence and masked the real question of how Britain could extract maximum advantage from EU membership (MacShane 2005: 2, 13-14). Public knowledge about the EU is in short supply. At best the EU is regarded as remote, complex, interfering or boring in so far as it attracts any attention. In the biggest survey of British public opinion carried out by the EU’s Commission, well over 50 per cent of the respondents said they knew only a bit about the EU, while 30 per cent of respondents said that they knew nothing.9 Such limited knowledge has often meant that distortions, simplistic and demonizing narratives, deeply ingrained prejudices and stereotypes easily creep into British media representations of the EU and acquire status as immutable historical truths. As a highly

politicized issue, moreover, Britain’s past relationship with the process of European integration is frequently plundered for partisan purposes. Politicians, in particular, sometimes place a one-sided, unnuanced construction on past events in the form of self-serving, unreliable memoirs. These are written with the beneﬁt of hindsight and are often designed to demonstrate the strengths or limitations of past or present policies and attitudes. In fact, political debate about the EU in Britain often appears to be determined to remain entrenched in the past with the history of the past sixty years weighing heavily on the present. This extended British version of coming to terms with the past, or of failing to do so and thereby becoming imprisoned by the past, found eloquent expression in Hugo Young’s arresting opening sentence to his stimulating study of Britain and Europe since 1945: ‘This is the story of ﬁfty years in which Britain struggled to reconcile the past she could not forget with the future she could not avoid’ (H. Young 1998: 1). The combination of the historical and the polemical in this single sentence is illustrative of some of the literature on the subject that involves historical scholarship and political values. The historiography of this subject is still in its infancy partly because of the

huge gaps in the availability of primary source material, especially in the form of government papers for the second half of the period covered by this study, and partly because of the close proximity to the events discussed in this book. Much of the published work of historians has so far concentrated on the period 1945-73 and has made extensive use of government papers in the National Archives that are available under the 30-year rule. British policy towards the origins and early development of the EEC in this period has received contrasting treatment at the hands of historians and commentators. Some of the early studies of the subject portray British governments as short-sighted and unimaginative in their response to the Schuman plan of 1950 that resulted in the formation of the ESCS and to the Messina initiative of 1955 that culminated in the formation of the EEC and EAEC. According to this version of events, the leadership of Europe was Britain’s for the taking. British governments, however, failed to take opportunities as they occurred in 1950 and 1955 and thus left a legacy of ‘lost opportunities’, a failure portrayed in the literature as Britain missing the European bus or never missing an opportunity to miss an opportunity. Anthony Nutting oﬀered one of the most powerful, contemporary expressions of this view in his polemical book Europe Will Not Wait (1960), arguing that the Schuman plan, in particular, was the most critical of the lost opportunities for Britain to lead Europe. The classic exposition of this view appeared shortly afterwards in Miriam Camps’ book, Britain and the European Community 1955-63 (1964). In this account, the British withdrawal (November 1955) from the negotiations resulting in the formation of the EEC was the major lost opportunity. Camps argued that the policymakers lacked vision and failed to recognize the value of the Community method of European integration. A recent biographical sketch of one senior Foreign Oﬃce oﬃcial of this period, Roger Makins, perhaps summed

up the lack of vision that Camps and others perceived in British policymakers of the time; Makins was described as a man ‘for whom security outbid futurity and the purposive crowded out the imaginative’.10 Later accounts based on primary source material echo some of the criticisms of British policy associated with this explanation. But they do so while seeking only to explain why Britain was not a founder member of the EEC and without making unhistorical comments or judgements based on hindsight about whether any British government could or should have acted diﬀerently in this period. At the same time, the ‘lost opportunities’ account remained a potent force, at least in political circles; Tony Blair as Prime Minister, for example, subscribed to this version of events in some of his major pro-European speeches.11