Two wars within 40 years were enough for those assisting in the birth of the new Europe to try and change the course of history. Jean Monnet wanted to create his vision of European wide co-operation. Help came from Christian Democratic political leaders such as Robert Schuman and Konrad Adenauer. They were encouraged by Winston Churchill. His ‘Iron Curtain’ speech, in Fulton, Missouri in March 1946, warned the growing Soviet threat, ‘requires a new unity of Europe from which no nation should be permanently outcast.’ The tasks were, firstly, to repair the damage done by the war and, secondly, to provide the climate for peaceful coexistence.

It fell to Schuman, previously the French Prime Minister, to make the first move. He had Monnet draft the Schuman Plan in May 1950. It called for the pooling of Europe’s coal and steel resources. Nation-states ceded their sovereignty in these areas and the resulting Treaty, in 1951, created the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC). Its success led to the more adventurous Treaty of Rome in 1957, which set up the broader European Economic Community (EEC) consisting of the ‘six’ - France, Germany, Belgium, Italy, Luxembourg and the Netherlands.

Germany, because of her pivotal role in both wars, was the focus of international attention. Monnet issued a second initiative, the European Defence Community (EDC), in the Plevin Plan in October 1950. However, even though it faltered, the idea was not abandoned. By October 1954 the Western European Union (WEU) had been created but it was to operate as a subsidiary of NATO.

The 1960s saw growth and consolidation for Europe and a double rejection for Britain’s applications although membership was finally granted in 1973, with Ireland and Sweden, to make the ‘nine’. Despite the two-thirds vote to stay in, the referendum in 1975 questioned Britain’s enthusiasm for the European experiment. This reached its height in the time of Margaret Thatcher. She became British Prime Minister in 1979, the same year that the first elections were held for the European Parliament. However, it was not this elected body which annoyed her so much but the more powerful unelected Council of Ministers and its bureaucratic Commission. Her renegotiation of Britain’s subsidies to the EEC and general reluctance did not preclude the UK signing up to the Single European Act. This created the European Community (EC) in 1988 and the idea of a Europe ‘without borders’. In the meantime Greece, Spain and Portugal had joined.

Thatcher’s strident declaration of ‘No, No, No,’ to a more federal Europe was to signal her own demise in 1990 and her party’s later difficulties. These did not prevent John Major winning the 1992 election and taking Britain into the Maastricht Treaty, which created the European Union (EU), although he negotiated opt-outs on both the single currency and a raft of social measures. In 1995 Austria, Finland and Sweden joined and the 1997 Amsterdam Treaty on further monetary union was followed by the creation of the European Central Bank in 1998.

The victory of Tony Blair’s ‘New Labour’ in 1997 saw the social chapter of the Maastricht Treaty accepted but the resistance to the single currency remained. While other countries in the EU embraced the ‘Euro’ in 2002 Britain remained aloof and still does so although there has been the promise of a future referendum. However, the EU continues to grow. The most recent example of this being its enlargement to 25 nations, which was started at the Treaty of Nice in 2001 and came to fruition in May 2004. Many of the newest members - Poland, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia - had been part of the same Soviet Empire that had provided the extra stimulus to European integration. A European Constitution unveiled in Brussels in 2003 is a natural development, as well as a necessity, for a fully developed European-wide organisation. It is due to be signed in Rome in May 2005 with ratification by the end of the year.

From humble beginnings, rising from the rubble of war-torn Europe, we now see an organisation, which in population and monetary terms, may stand close to, if not alongside, the American and Asian blocks. How successfully it will continue to do this in the future will depend on a number of key issues. How well will it answer the questions concerning its currency’s future? How quickly and effectively will it achieve equalisation for its new, poorer, partners especially those yet to join such as Turkey? How readily will its constitution appear and develop to meet its needs? How well will it address the thorny issues of common tax, social security, defence and power generation policies that await it in the future? What is certain is that the European experiment has stayed the course so far and looks set, for better or worse, to do so again in the future.