Depayre, Gérard --- "The EU and Free Trade: Can We Still Afford It?" [2011] ELECD 776; in Govaere, Inge; Quick, Reinhard; Bronckers, Marco (eds), "Trade and Competition Law in the EU and Beyond" (Edward Elgar Publishing, 2011)

Book Title: Trade and Competition Law in the EU and Beyond

Editor(s): Govaere, Inge; Quick, Reinhard; Bronckers, Marco

Publisher: Edward Elgar Publishing

ISBN (hard cover): 9780857935663

Section: Chapter 9

Section Title: The EU and Free Trade: Can We Still Afford It?

Author(s): Depayre, Gérard

Number of pages: 14

Extract:

9. The EU and free trade: can we still
afford it?
Gérard Depayre*

Born under the auspices of free trade, and a key actor with the United
States in the post World War II efforts to liberalize international trade, the
European Economic Community (EEC), now the European Union,1 has
been one of the main beneficiaries of the liberalization of trade.


9.1 BORN UNDER THE AUSPICES OF FREE TRADE

The very creation of the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC) in
1952 and of the EEC in 1958, which required the elimination of restrictions
on trade among the six original members, involved a liberalization without
precedent of international trade in Europe.
This coincided with the major effort undertaken since 1945 by a number
of countries, led by the United States ­ as part of the broader plan to
rebuild the international economic system (Bretton Woods agreement of
1944) ­ to liberalize trade and create a more open international trading
system through the establishment of the General Agreement on Tariffs and
Trade (GATT 1947).2

*
The author wishes to express his gratitude to members of the law firm Gide
Loyrette Nouel for their support.
1
First called the European Economic Community by the Treaty of Rome, then
referred to as the European Communities following the Merger Treaty of 1965, it
became the European Community in 1993 and the European Union in 2009 with
the entry into force of the Lisbon Treaty. For the sake of simplicity, we shall refer
here to ...