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

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60Markus SchulteThe fact that imports from the other EEC countries soared as soon as internaltrade barriers were lowered in 1959, was perhaps not very welcome in sectors thatfaced problems of competitiveness. In these cases the establishment of yet anotherpermanent arrangement with the abolition of trade barriers was certain to bestrongly rejected. In the case of the problem sectors analysed here, the EEC, whileleading to intensified competition within, still offered them relatively comfortableexport opportunities and thus cushioned the effect of increased competition. Noneof this cushioning would have remained within a Europe-wide free trade area. Arapid shrinking and painful restructuring of these sectors would inevitably havebeen the consequence.The rise in total imports of manufactured goods from the EEC is certainly also asign of a booming economy with a relatively high level of investment. That this isso is corroborated by the fact that imports from countries other than the EEC andEFTA rose very markedly above the 1955-58 trend at the beginning of the 1960s.The establishment of convertibility of European currencies might also have contributedto further growth of imports into Germany.For the sectors which were fearful of the free trade area, the most importantconsequence of its failure was that imports from EFTA did not increase at all or didso only slightly above the 1953-58 trend. The same is true for manufactured productsas a whole (in this case the trend only refers to the period 1955-58).Thus, whereas these sectors retained protection against their most dangerouscompetitors, they were given unprecedented export opportunities in the other EECmarkets, mainly France and Italy. At the same time, the division between the EECand EFTA did not lead to important repercussions for the exports of these sectors.On the whole their exports to the Seven continued to follow broadly the pre-EFTAtrend. Thus the failure of the FTA and of the accession negotiations insured that forthe problem sectors of German industry high risks were avoided and at the sametime high gains were incurred. It is obvious that the structure of interests in thesesectors was conducive to decisive action with regard to interest representation. Asthe theory of collective action suggests, industrial associations are particularlyvociferous at the political level when they are faced with probable losses andopportunity costs as the consequence of measures negotiated between states, whilethe prospect of some additional gains is unlikely to induce a large amount of actionon behalf of members of any industrial association 13 . One cannot therefore assumethat the seemingly stronger sectors which expand and are more competitive thanothers are likely to prevail over the less competitive ones which might also be facingstructural problems and would tend to ask for protection. Quite the contrary. Inpolitical terms an industrial sector’s weakness might be its strength vis-à-vis a governmentbureaucracy and indeed vis-à-vis competing interests within industrydepending on the overall scenario. It means in fact that the narrower, more clearlydefined and more visible interest will produce a high amount of activity on the partof those representing that interest and, in any scenario like the one addressed here13. For the core of Mancur Olson’s argument see Olson, M.: The Logic of Collective Action. PublicGoods and the Theory of Groups. Cambridge/Massachusetts, London/England 1965, pp. 1-3
Industrial Interest in West Germany´s Decision 61would be more likely to carry the day than the more widely dispersed and lessclearly defined interest represented by a larger group.We may conclude that the free trade area or British accession to the EEC wouldhave been somewhere between a crisis and a catastrophe for the paper, timber, nonferrousmetal, the textile industries and a number of other sectors which have notbeen described here in detail. The EEC as such offered them unexpected relief andeven a profitable medium term future. These options were clearly visible. Thus tothem the free trade area issue was of crucial importance, while the potential winnersdid not see any concrete gains held out to them on the EFTA markets. Theymight have feared some losses there, though in the end these did not occur. Yetwhat counted more to them were the very visible and substantial gains in the openingcommon market.Markus Schulte
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Journal of European Integration History – Revue d'histoire de l'

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