ABSTRACT
The post-war aluminium market was characterised by the construction of regional trade associations that worked to assure a new kind of industrial regulation. In the US, firms used national trade associations and ad hoc committees in which also the government was involved to provide some governance to their industry. In Europe, the construction of the Common Market drove the formation during the 1950s of a ‘club’, which evolved by 1969 into the European Primary Aluminium Association – EPAA. Many attempts were made to find a workable way to establish new global cooperation. During the 1950s and 1960s, dialogue between US and European producers was found assured both by informal agreements, which aimed to administrate the flow of metal from the US and from the USSR to the European market, and by official actions, which were carried out within the OECD to share data between the two sides.
