1. Origins of European Integration: Historical Background September 29, Wednesday

2. Main question: After many centuries of warfare, why did the European states decide to merge their economic and political systems?

3. Today: the background Economic Political Ideological

4. Economic background: Interwar years  Severe inflation  Breakdown of the int’l monetary system  Nationalistic economic policies  Great Depression (1929-1932) World War II  Devastated European economies

5. Dresden, 1944

6. Churchill’s Zurich Speech (1946) “…over wide areas a vast quivering mass of tormented, hungry, careworn and bewildered human beings gape at the ruins of their cities and homes, and scan the dark horizons for the approach of some new peril, tyranny and terror”.

7. Political Background The German problem The Cold War context Domestic Communist “threat”

8. Ideological background Origins go back to antiquity, however European states never united voluntarily

9. Europe united: Roman Empire (5 th cent BC – 5 th cent AD)

10. Europe united: Charlemagne’s Frankish empire Napoleon Napoleon Crossing the Alps on 20th May 1800 Museum of Palace of Versailles, Paris, France

12. Ideological background Abbey of Saint-Pierre Kant’s pacific union Coudenhove-Kalergi and the Paneuropa movement Churchill’s Speech in Zurich “The Tragedy of Europe”