Journal of European Integration History – Revue d'histoire de l'

Challenge to the Community 15about possible alternatives in Geneva at the beginning of December 1958. 34 Theofficials now also liaised much more closely with industrialists and with individualpoliticians, who supported the EFTA option, such as Maudling. In a meeting withFBI representatives, for example, Board of Trade officials made it clear “that we[do] not want to make the FBI toe any official line and that we might find it just asuseful to be under embarrassing industrial pressures [to create a small FTA]”. Intalking to leading industrialists Maudling “expressed this doctrine more specificallyand suggested that industrial pressure for a rival FTA. would do no harm andmight do good”. 35 In cooperation with industrialists, officials from the outer Seven– particularly the British, Swedish and Norwegians – carried the preparatory talksforward in early 1959 36 , raising the expectations about the economic benefits ofEFTA and its medium-term usefulness in bringing about a wider trade settlement inWestern Europe. After the Norwegian and Swedish diplomats Søren Sommerfeltand Hubert de Besche had explored the basis for an accord in late April and earlyMay 1959, officials from the outer Seven agreed on much of the EFTA Treaty duringtalks at Saltsjöbaden from 1-13 June 1959, leaving only the politically sensitiveissue of bilateral concessions in agriculture and fish to ministers and to the concludingministerial talks at Stockholm in July and November.It has been suggested, not least by some of the officials involved in the deliberationsduring 1958-9, that the creation of EFTA was essentially the result of a conspiracyof civil servants. 37 The final decision in favour of the EFTA option was,however, clearly taken at the political level, although officials and industrialistsfilled the political vacuum which had developed because the issue was still hardlypoliticized. At the same time, however, the quick progress the outer Seven madeunder official guidance after the disappointment of the failure of the FTA negotiationsresulted in a lack of strategic political analysis at the governmental level ofthe long-term prospects and aims of EFTA. The widely varying motives of theouter Seven for joining EFTA remained largely implicit, and there was little publicdebate and certainly no consensus about the key question of the future relationshipwith the EEC. As a result, Macmillan rather helplessly wrote to Lloyd shortly afterthe initialling of the EFTA Treaty in Stockholm:“I think we may drift into rather a confused presentation of the economic position inEurope. (...) Are we to represent the Seven as a thing in itself, or merely as a bridge?Is this country to take the lead? I have read the weekend press carefully and it isobvious that there is a good deal of confusion.” 3834. On this Swiss initiative as well as for an overview of Swiss European policy after 1945 see M.ZBINDEN, “Die schweizerische Integrationspolitik von der Gründung der OECE 1948 bis zumFreihandelsabkommen 1972”, in: M. GEHLER and R. STEININGER (eds.), Die Neutralen und dieEuropäische Integration 1945-1995, Vienna 1997 (forthcoming). See also P. du BOIS, La Suisse etle défi européen 1945-1992, Lausanne 1992.35. Golt to Cohen: PRO BT 11/5649 (5/6 January 1959).36. See in greater detail M. af MALMBORG, Den Ståndaktiga Nationalstaten. Sverige och den VästeuropeiskaIntegrationen 1945-1959, Lund 1994, pp.353-60.37. K. STAMM, “Hans Schaffner”, in: U. ALDERMATT (ed.), Die Schweizer Bundesräte. Ein biographischesLexikon, Zurich 1991, pp.505-11 (507).38. Macmillan to Lloyd: PRO FO 371/142498/272 (22 November 1959).