SPECIAL ISSUE | ||
Cunha Alice |
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Mediterranean Europe and the Portuguese Accession Negotiations to the European Economic Community | ||
in Officina della Storia , n. 11 , 2014 | ||
Enlargement is on the European Union’s (EU) agenda for more than five decades now. Much has been though, discussed and written about it, especially in the near past and in particular about the 2004 Eastern enlargement, whose 10th anniversary was just celebrated. Meanwhile, enlargement studies have become a new area of study[1], but literature on the second and third enlargement is still somewhat scarce, even though a younger generation of researchers[2] is starting to explore this subject. The European Economic Community’s (EEC) third enlargement round, often considered as “Mediterranean enlargement”[3], brought up a series of tensions between member states, which would require a great amount of time and effort to be solved. Bigger issues, such as the British budget contribution, the community budget and the Common Agriculture Policy (CAP) reforms, were at the centre of EEC’s agenda in the late 1970-80’s and, ultimately, British and French national interests on these matters will prevail, proving that member states used the prospect of enlargement to achieve particular policy goals, and only after those accomplishments, member states agreed on concluding the third enlargement. This article analyses, from an historical perspective, the influence that the Mediterranean dimension (countries of this geographical area and their commercial, agricultural and industrial relations), had on the Portuguese accession negotiations to the EEC, held between 1978 and 1985. More specifically, it is the purpose of the article to provide a clear view on the positions taken by the Mediterranean states, especially France, on the Portuguese accession negotiations, by taking stock of the positions sustained throughout negotiations and the demands made, such as the creation of the Integrated Mediterranean Programme, to avoid any further gridlock that would jeopardize enlargement. Full text available online | ||