British Business in the Formative Years of European Integration, 1945–1973 (review)

Students of European integration often rely on two-dimensional perspectives when describing business attitudes toward the European Economic Community (EEC) and now European Union. Typically, they pit management against labor or sheltered sectors against those exposed to international competition in order to sharpen the contrasts and simplify the analysis. The result can be very useful. This flattened view of business interests helps in model building or motive characterization. It makes it easier to explain the complicated exchanges between France and Germany, and it makes it more obvious why some countries are eager to participate while others are more content to stay outside.

Like any simplification, however, the two-dimensional view of business interests misses potentially significant details. It minimizes the divisions within the business community, exaggerates how well business leaders understand and appreciate what is happening, obscures the various functions of peak associations, and conflates the many objectives that firms and individuals may pursue. Hence, it is important to consider a multidimensional rendering of how business relates to Europe even if only to see how much detail really matters.

The importance of subtlety and nuance is nowhere more evident than in the case of the UK where business groups have had an on-again, off-again relationship with the institutions of Europe and where politicians have grown accustomed to striking a dichotomy between Anglo-Saxon free markets and the Continental social model. As Neill Rollings shows in his detailed account of British business during the period from the late 1950s to the early 1970s, the distinctions were not always so clear-cut (if, indeed, they are today). Business at that time was in some ways more protected in England than on the Continent; smaller firms in particular were fearful of any intensification of market competition, and even larger firms tended to view competition as something closer to an orderly sharing of the market than the kind of free-for-all anticipated in economic theory. By the same token, it could not be taken for granted that Europe would be either the most dynamic or the most secure arena for British investment. Hence, the appeal of a EEC for British business was not immediately obvious.

Below the surface, Rollings reveals an even more complex situation. Business, he argues, is hardly monolithic, business motives cannot always be aggregated by sectors, and much must be traced back to the specific strategy of firms. Within this context, two different considerations rise to the fore. One is the importance of peak organizations in educating and distilling (in addition to formally representing) business interests. The other is the wide variety of overlapping and evolving business concerns.

The point about education and distillation is easy to overlook given the penchant in economic analysis to assume perfect information. Therefore, it is striking how often the Federation of British Industries and later Confederation of British Industry had to step in to explain how Europe is integrating, what were the various options for Britain, and how these options were going to impact real industries and firms. As part of this process, the same organizations (and others) were involved in surveying their membership, building a quorum of “business” opinion, and then using that analysis to generate political momentum and support. The timing of these efforts was not always propitious. The campaign for EEC membership in the early 1960s had only just built up steam when Charles De Gaulle vetoed the first British application; this generated some disillusionment that had to be overcome before a second campaign could start. Nevertheless, the spread of information did have lasting consequences in terms of widening and solidifying the coalition of business interests behind the notion of Britain in Europe.

This coalition encompassed many motives. Some firms sought an easier regime for making investments in the Continent either with a view to expanding their production to diverse national markets or with the more ambitious goal of...