The Schuman Plan and French Steel Industry 1950-52, The Creation of the European Coal and Steel Community

Abstract

The Schuman Plan was announced by Robert Schuman, the French foreign minister, on May 9 1950. It proposed to establish the common market of the coal and steel products based on the principle of free competition in Western Europe and also proposed to create super-national organization which would control the coal and steel industries. This plan aimed to establish a peace between the two countries, France and Germany, and among european countries, and to lay the foundation of economic development with the cooperation of European countries. Germany, Italy and Benelux accepted the French proposal, and these countries signed a treaty in April of the next year. At last, in 1952, the European Coal and Steel'Community was created. This paper analyzes the dispute on the Schuman Plan in France and explain what meaning this plan had for French economy, and how french people recieved the plan. Though former studies had been interested in the political character of the plan under the cold war after the World War II, this study focuses on the economical character. At the begining, the French economic world didn't make clear its attitude toward the announcement of Schuman, but the managers of French steel companies opposed the plan on account of the inferiority of French steel industry to German one at the expected competition in common market. But, at this time, French steel companies were criticized by the other industries that these industries were forced to purchase expensive and inferior steel, because the cartel of steel companies had disturbed the trade of steel. The french people and many French managers hoped that the cartel of steel industry would be abolished by creating common market. This is the reason why the view of steel industry against the Schuman Plan was rejected.