The Failed European Union: Franco-German Relations during the Great Depression of 1929–321

French scholars have led a revival of interest in inter-war efforts at European integration and the prominent role played by the French Foreign Minister, Aristide Briand. Franco-German rapprochement was integral to this effort, but with the death in October 1929 of his like-minded German counterpart, Gustav Stresemann, it is generally held that Berlin adopted a more confrontational foreign policy even before Hitler took power. However, this article demonstrates that in spite of a series of upsets, an intense and sustained effort continued during the years of the Great Depression (1929–32) to forge Franco-German détente. This culminated in September 1931 in a Franco-German treaty that established the mechanisms for far-reaching integration of the two countries’ economies, with a customs union and European union as the ultimate goals. It then examines in detail how and why this remarkable effort collapsed during 1932, paying particular attention to an unforeseen crisis in trading relations and the impact of a media scandal surrounding the publication of Stresemann's memoirs. Despite this failure, efforts to integrate Europe around a Franco-German axis between 1929 and 1932 can nonetheless be understood as part of a deeper process that survived Hitler and saw the emergence of the current European Union.     

Crises and policy responses within the political trilemma: Europe, 1929–36 and 2008–11

The recent debate on the Eurozone failed to appreciate a particular characteristic of European crisis experiences, namely their fundamentally political character. To make my argument, I borrow from Dani Rodrik (2000) the framework of a “political trilemma” between cross-border economic integration, national institutions and democracy (in the sense of mass politics) and discuss its relation to the more commonly known “macroeconomic trilemma” as well as some limitations of the framework. The recent experience of a European debt crisis and the experience of Europe's Great Depression can be interpreted as a “political trilemma”: both reflect the problem of designing effective policy responses to major economic shocks within the environment of deep economic integration across political boundaries and the regime choices that this involves. Within this framework I highlight some aspects of the 1930s that are informative to the policy choices in Europe today. Once we accept that some policy choices should be avoided, attention should be shifted to the remaining options and the obstacles that prevent their implementation, notably the challenge to transform democracy beyond national borders.     

Italian emigration policy during the Great Migration Age, 1888–1919: the interaction of emigration and foreign policy

This article illustrates the development of Italian politics on emigration up to the end of the First World War (and even later), focusing on the operation and activity of the Commissariato generale dell’emigrazione (Commissioner-General of Emigration, 1901–27), a government agency that enjoyed considerable autonomy. The research is based on archival materials and the study of publications of the time, and proposes an unconventional view on the phenomenon of migration, as seen through the relationship between the evolution of the regulatory system and the political orientations of the ruling classes. Indeed, Italy progressively increased the freedom of expatriation, to the point of creating social legislation for the protection of emigrants, with the ambition of extending Italy’s influence over the countries of destination. This policy of migration interfered with foreign policy, and was at times influenced by the nationalism emerging in Italy at the time, even to the extent of provoking diplomatic disputes. For these reasons, the activity of the Commissariato generale dell’emigrazione created friction with the traditional consular network; these conflicts and the insufficient margin of autonomy given to the Commission in practice prevented the concrete completion of its more advanced projects.     

The ideals and origins of the Franco-German,sister cities movement, 1945–70

Vattel's Mélanges de littérature, de morale et de politique (Thoughts on literature, morals and politics) was published at Neuchâtel by the Editeurs du Journal Helvétique in 1760 and this is the first English translation. It was republished under the title, Amusemens de littérature, de morale et de politique in 1765. Vattel's text provides evidence of his response to the issues facing Europe's states in the 1750s, and in doing so provides another perspective on his best known work, Le droit des gens (Law of Nations) of 1757. Vattel emerges as a reformer steeped in debates about the future of the European state system, and particularly Europe's small states and republics like Switzerland.     

Imperial cooperation at the margins of Europe: the European Commission of the Danube, 1856–65

This article deals with the work of the European Commission of the Danube (ECD) during the first two decades of its activity in the aftermath of the Crimean War. It focuses on the early stage formation of international organizations in the mid-nineteenth century when river commissions were the first organizations that issued supranational regulations and had their own bureaucracies. In this context, I argue that the ECD became a testing ground for new types of inter-imperial cooperation. First, the ECD became a site where hydraulic expertise from all over Europe was gathered and analysed. As a consequence, this exchange among the representatives of different empires and of different sub-fields of expertise generated new technical knowledge and made the ECD a space for cross-imperial knowledge production. Second, in 1865, the ECD adopted a Public Act that codified navigation rules in the Danube Delta. These regulations were among the first upholding a supranational settlement. Furthermore, the document exemplifies how such a supranational agreement was implemented through a joint imperial intervention against the authority of the Ottoman Empire, the only territorial power.     

A ‘New Angle of Vision’: British Imperial Reappraisal of Hong Kong during the Second World War

This paper examines the involvement of British officials at the Stanley Internment Camp in Hong Kong in the perpetuation of imperial ideals during the Second World War, as well as in the eventual restoration of British rule to the territory. It highlights the debates that were conducted within the camp on issues of post-war reconstruction, as well as the strategies that were devised by the internees in anticipation of the new social, economic and political orders of the post-war colonial world. The paper also highlights similar discussions that transpired within the Changi Camp in Singapore and the Lintang Camp in Sarawak (Borneo) as supplementary case studies. Remarkably, many of these ideas ran in parallel with secret planning in London, where Hong Kong and Malayan governments-in-exile conceived revamped colonial administrations following the envisaged defeat of the Japanese. A number of these wartime schemes were even implemented after the Japanese surrender in August 1945, with significant impact on the phase of post-war British imperial revival.