journal of european integration history revue d'histoire de l ...
journal of european integration history revue d'histoire de l ...
journal of european integration history revue d'histoire de l ...
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34<br />
Nicolau Andresen-Leitão<br />
as a rival threat. Although this threat was implicit, with Europe proving a magnet<br />
both for the Portuguese economy and Portuguese migration, reality would be a<br />
scarce commodity in the colonial argument. In 1970, the hard-line ex-Foreign minister,<br />
Franco Nogueira, argued in Parliament that if Portugal were to join the EEC,<br />
Portugal would be “colonised by Europe”. Although, Nogueira went on to consi<strong>de</strong>r<br />
European economic <strong>integration</strong> “a myth”! 35<br />
In the same year, a government report on the EEC was to conclu<strong>de</strong> that Portugal<br />
had no alternative to negotiating an agreement. Written by a committee chaired by<br />
Ruy Teixeira Guerra, with José Calvet <strong>de</strong> Magalhães, and José da Silva Lopes<br />
among its members, the report recommen<strong>de</strong>d the government to maintain the objective<br />
<strong>of</strong> the 1962-63 negotiations, i.e. associate membership <strong>of</strong> the EEC. 36 The<br />
advice was to be rejected in favour <strong>of</strong> a tra<strong>de</strong> agreement. Salazar’s weak successor,<br />
Marcello Caetano, un<strong>de</strong>rstood that the EEC would only be prepared to negotiate a<br />
tra<strong>de</strong> agreement due to Portugal’s continued colonial policy. Caetano was opposed<br />
to Community membership on political grounds, although, in public, he rejected<br />
EEC entry solely on economic grounds, consi<strong>de</strong>ring that Portuguese agriculture,<br />
industry and tra<strong>de</strong> would not survive. According to Caetano, “we did not ask, did<br />
not want, nor did it suit us to have any form <strong>of</strong> entry into the Common Market”,<br />
<strong>de</strong>liberately overlooking the possibility <strong>of</strong> signing an association agreement. 37<br />
Salazar thus proved to be more adaptable in European affairs than his successor,<br />
since he was prepared to negotiate an association agreement after 1962 while<br />
Caetano only favoured a tra<strong>de</strong> agreement, which was finally signed in July 1972,<br />
and ratified by the Portuguese Parliament in December. 38<br />
35. Nogueira's parliamentary intervention is published in J.M.T. CASTILHO, A I<strong>de</strong>ia da Europa no<br />
Marcelismo (1968-1974), Lisbon, 2000, pp.335-343. This recently published work, without the<br />
benefit <strong>of</strong> access to archive sources, gives an excellent <strong>history</strong> <strong>of</strong> the contradictory relations <strong>of</strong> the<br />
Caetano government with Europe. For an economic justification <strong>of</strong> Nogueira’s argument see P.<br />
XAVIER, Portugal e a Integração Europeia, Lisbon, 1970.<br />
36. “Relatório da Comissão <strong>de</strong> Estudos sobre a Integração Económica Europeia”, Lisbon, September<br />
1970, mimeo, pp.136-139. This report is available in the Archive Library <strong>of</strong> the Arquivo Histórico-Diplomático.<br />
37. M. CAETANO, As Gran<strong>de</strong>s Opções, Lisbon, 1972, p.33.<br />
38. Some authors, like J. Cravinho, consi<strong>de</strong>r that Portugal “got a rough <strong>de</strong>al” in the 1972 EEC tra<strong>de</strong> agreement<br />
with exceptions, as Lopes points out, to the general rule <strong>of</strong> free tra<strong>de</strong> affecting forty-five per cent<br />
<strong>of</strong> Portuguese exports; Characteristics and Motives for Entry, in: J.L. SAMPEDRO and J.A. PAYNO,<br />
The Enlargement <strong>of</strong> the European Community, Case-Studies <strong>of</strong> Greece, Portugal and Spain, London,<br />
1983, p.135, and LOPES, A economia portuguesa …, op.cit., p.277. According to Guerra the 1972 Portugal-EC<br />
tra<strong>de</strong> agreement was regar<strong>de</strong>d by the hard-line faction <strong>of</strong> the Salazar regime as containing the<br />
risk <strong>of</strong> “political infection (…) prejudicial to the overseas pledge”, quoted in R.T. GUERRA, A.S.<br />
FREIRE and J.C. MAGALHÃES, Movimentos <strong>de</strong> Cooperação …, op.cit., p.21.