ABSTRACT
However, in economic terms, it was from the Schuman Plan that the current European Union developed.
The Schuman Plan envisaged the merging of production of what, at that time, were the two wartime necessities, coal and steel, to ensure these could not be used to promote war. With this in mind, it proposed that the control of these sections of the economy was given over to an independent international authority, the High Authority, comprising individuals who were not government representatives but who were given the power to fi x prices and ensure compliance with competition rules.
