The mid-1980s: ‘Single market’ and ‘single act’

The main developments of the later 1980s became headline topics with surprising swiftness, yet their roots were deep, as we have seen. It is significant that they followed hard on the heels of the appointment of the new Commission at the start of 1985, under the presidency of French socialist – or more accurately ‘left-of-centre technocrat’, Jacques Delors.